choking from a "spicy" cultural shock

[chinchin]

We bought some Chinese spices, include anise, star anise, wild pepper. Wild pepper is a very popular ingredient in Chinese cooking, some people just can't live it without it. We call it "hua jiao" which translate from the words itself is "flower pepper". Check its translation from HERE , it will come with Chinese translation for wild pepper is "

Comments

[catfish]

That's really cool, I feel like I have been educated. I think I will look for this wild, sexy pepper at the asian market down the street. Does it come packaged or should I find a picture so I know what to look for?

[chinchin]

It's hard to describe how it looks like and I couldn't find any picture on web. If you go to any Asian market,they should have it at spices or ingredients shelf. And I think always there ;-), since it is very common for Chinese cooking. They might be labelled as "wild pepper" or "dried pepper shell", it looks kinda like standard pepper before it is ground up, but the skin(shell) is not smooth, and the color is dark red.

[teedz]

She can probably give you better advice than I, but based on my experience, I've never seen it used whole. It seems to be a bit more.... fibrous (?) than black pepper, so I dunno that you can use the whole corns.

However, if you seep the shells in hot oil in a pan, then scrape them all out, it makes for a nice flavour addition.

[chinchin]

Teedz already talked about Chinese cooking, that's a large topic and lots of work (to be educated), man. hahaha, just kidding. Hope you enjoy your "wild pepper" for a having "unruly, unrestrained" taste. It still rolls me down when I talk about it.