The Basque History of the World - Mark Kurlansky [41]
Amerikanuak bezain, good, like an American, is an Euskera expression meaning “generous.” Ez gira Amerikanuak, you’re no American, is a way of calling someone cheap. In both expressions, the Americans referred to are Amerikanuak.
A people are shaped by their land, and the mountains of Basqueland, the green slopes that no one else would fight as hard for, could not support a population. Despite a lush appearance, the land is not fertile, and Basques always needed to look beyond Basqueland for food. It had been this special need for imports that had induced Castilian kings to exclude the Basques from the Spanish customs zone. Goods that landed in Basque ports paid no Spanish customs. If the goods were bound for Spain, they were taken through Alava to Miranda de Ebro, a river town, to enter the Spanish zone and pay duties. But goods could also be landed in a Basque port and reshipped to Europe without entering the Spanish customs zone.
Both the need for food and the customs arrangement were incentives to trade. The Basques bought Castilian wool and sold it to the rest of Europe, where it was a highly prized commodity. By the fifteenth century, Basques were producing and supplying one-third of Europe’s iron from Vizcaya’s huge deposits. They also produced swords, musket barrels, and ship’s anchors. Using the Euskera name for Bilbao, Shakespeare referred to “Bilbo swords.”
Long accustomed to looking abroad, the Basques were among the first Europeans to realize that the unique products of the new American lands could become as valuable as the silk and spices of Asia. Not only did Basques trade new American products, but they were also open to using them. From rubber balls to tobacco, the Basques pioneered American products in Europe.
THE CHILI PEPPER was easy for Europeans to understand. In a sense, it was what Columbus had gone looking for, a spice. Exotic spices were already one of the most lucrative trades in the world. Columbus must have immediately recognized that hot peppers were valuable because he named them after the already high priced black pepper, pimienta. The new spice was called pimiento—masculine pepper, like black pepper but stronger. “Mejor que pimienta nuestra,” Better than our pepper, he reported.
The chili pepper was sold by Basques, Spaniards, and Portuguese to Africa, the Middle East, the Asian subcontinent, and the Far East. Its trading value soon declined because the plant was easily cultivated in these climates. Most Europeans ate only the mild sweet peppers. Basques were the only Europeans to have adopted a taste for hot peppers directly from America.
Guindilla peppers, grown in the Spanish Basque provinces, are pickled green or chopped into food when dried and red. Espelette, a whitewashed town next to St. Pée, is famous for its peppers. The small thin ones and the slightly hotter larger ones grow green but turn bright red in September, when they are harvested. The peppers are then strung through their stems and hung from the southern side of houses to dry, the lines of peppers echoing the traditional red trim of the white buildings. These peppers are used in the local sausage and many other dishes to give a subtle heat, nothing comparable to the fire of Caribbean or Mexican food, but the hottest burn of any cuisine in France. On the last Sunday in October, worshipers in Espelette are given a blessing and a string of dried peppers at Mass.
The following recipe is from Itxassou, the town next to Espelette that is famous for its cherries. The sauce is served by Jean Paul Bonnet at the Hotel du Fronton over skewers of grilled duck hearts.
ESPELETTE PEPPERS AND DUCK HEARTS
Brown shallots in duck fat, add 2 powdered