SALT, PEPPER, SEASON, SPICE

Budding cooks and history buffs alike will relish this introduction to some common flavor enhancements.

Beginning with those stalwarts, salt and pepper, this book dips into chili, mustard, and ginger, then samples sugar, cinnamon, vanilla, and chocolate, finishing with tea and coffee. Putting spices on our foods is a way to encounter other lands and cultures—and the past. The text is concise, providing information on whatever history is known, the spice’s sources, a bit about its chemistry and uses (occasionally including uses outside of cooking), and describing different versions of each spice, such as black, green, oolong, white, and even herbal tea. Readers learn how mustard and sugar are produced or refined, meet the “young slave” who developed the process of hand pollination for vanilla plants, and encounter some of the ways to brew coffee. Pasquet retells the charming story of the Yemeni goats who are said to have stayed awake all night after eating coffee berries. He also attributes the discovery of tea to an accidental leaf-fall into the cup of the Chinese emperor Shennong in 2737 BCE. Sidebars serve up such related tidbits as the Pepper Imps in Harry Potter and the fairy Mustardseed in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Attractive gouache vignettes offer appealing realistic detail in a stylized presentation.

An appetizing menu of culinary complements.