[Sca-cooks] paprika

[Edouard de Bruyerecourt]

I just watched an episode of "American's Test Kitchen" on PBS that 
addressed paprika. The salient points:

All paprika is made of some variety of capsicum pepper, and almost 
always a blend of varieties.

The paprika made from just the flesh ('mesocarp') of the pepper will 
tend to be milder, while that made from the veins ('placenta') and seeds 
will be hotter.

California and US peppers for paprika are usually oven dried in a one 
day process. Hungarian/Spanish/European peppers for paprika are 
traditionally sun-dried up to three weeks. There is a trend in Europe 
towards oven-drying for less space and and less time, which is 
significant since paprikophiles tend to favour the sun-dried paprika, 
holding Hungarian paprika as superior for this reason.

Their favourite was Penzey's Hungarian Sweet (by mail order only), 
followed by Pendery's Spanish Sweet. Even the US brands could deliver 
good results (the editor chose McCormick's/Schilling blind, as hotter 
one of his two favourites). The test kitchen guy said the price per 
ounce of McCormick's was comparible to Penzey's _before_ you added for 
shipping.

-- 
Edouard, Sire de Bruyerecourt
bruyere at mind.net
================================================================
"Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, 
while bad people will find a way around the laws." 
- Plato (427-347 B.C.)