Comments on: Gates of Damascus chili — the spice trade and worldbuilding

By: vidugavia

vidugavia — Mon, 16 Apr 2007 09:49:21 +0000

Doesn’t everyone use cardamom in their buns…?

- an ethnocentric swede

By: Kevin Andrew Murphy

Kevin Andrew Murphy — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 20:41:31 +0000

Laura–

Indeed.

Browsing about the web looking for recipe bits, I found this great 1865 extract of a lady’s diary from a trip to Palestine. The cultural and sensory details are great, and there’s even this nice Indiana Jones-style scene with her being lowered down a well to recover a lost holy book:

I’m going to have to read it more fully later.

By: LauraJMixon

LauraJMixon — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 20:08:01 +0000

Great post, Kevin. This is true for me as well — odd facts and twists that associate sensory detail with culture, history, or technology make great references.

By: Constance Ash

Constance Ash — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 23:37:53 +0000

I spent much of today making New Mexico posole, with ingredients brought in from New Mexico: the parched corn, the chile pods, the ground chile (molido). Many thanks to friend Peter, who brought me back a care package when he closed the sale of his Santa Fe house!

The onions, garlic, cilantro and lime juice, however, and the pork, are from elsewhere — many elsewheres.

Spices were as valuable as gold. Columbus wanted both equally as he sailed the blue in 1492.

Love, C.

By: Charles

Charles — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 22:37:49 +0000

While I haven’t developed location specific recipes (yet) — I’ve concentrated on the location specific drinks — commerce and trade in general play an important role in my writings. In fact, trade routes are responsible for starting the first major war in the world I am writing about. I’ll have to add the spice book to my list. Next up for me in terms of research is: The Gothic Enterprise: A Guide to Understanding the Medieval Cathedral by Robert Scott.