18.9.10

Spices of Zanzibar

As mentioned in a recent blog, we were in Zanzibar for a week. During that week, we took a spice tour, highlighting some of the interesting things grown on the island. Prior to the tour, I had no idea how many of these spices grew. See if you can identify some of them from our photos (note: some are fruits, not spices). Answers at the bottom.







1--Nutmeg and mace (mace is the red part that wraps around the inner nut of nutmeg)--the outer shell of both is discarded

2--Jackfruit
3--Cocoa
4--Bananas
5--Hot peppers (in swahili, pili pili ho ho. Apparently pili pili is spicy, and "ho ho" is the noise you make after eating one of these because it is soooo hot)
6--Coconut (haven't you always wondered how they get coconuts down? There is a rope circle that gets placed over both feet for extra traction. Huh)
7--Vanilla beans
8--The red stuff that makes tandoori chicken red (we can't remember its name), also used in cosmetics and, according to a guy from New Zealand on the tour, cheese (to make it more orange-y)
9--Coffee

2 comments:

CI said...

Interesting. I got most of those. I wasn't sure what spice is made with jack fruit, so I slipped up there. I don't know what the cosmetics one is really called, but here we call it the lipstick plant. I didn't guess right, though I thought about it. Anyway, our tropical paradise apparently has a lot of the same plants as your tropical paradise.

Anonymous said...

Very similar spices to St. Vincents island too, where I took my very first mission trip. Fun to see them just growing on trees etc. Mom