HAND-PICKED WHITE MUNTHOK PEPPERCORN

In the hills behind the village of Muntok, on the Indonesian island of Bangka, pepper farmers climb traditional bamboo tripods and hand-pick fruit spikes of red ripe pepper berries. The fruit spikes are packed into rice sacks and soaked in slow running streams of water that come down off the mountains above. 7 days later the outermost skin of the pepper has disintegrated and the peppercorns are piled together for a traditional trampling called “nari mereca” or the Pepper Dance. The dancing separates the peppercorns from the fruit spike and after a final …

JAVANESE COMET’S TAIL PEPPER

Javanese Comet’s Tails or “kemukas” as they are known locally are a wonderful rarity among the world of Piper (true pepper) family. Known to the west since medieval times as Piper cubeba or Cubebs, this pepper has a wonderful fresh aroma of pepper, pine and lemons. On the tongue, Comet’s Tails exhibit a distinctly cooling menthol feeling offset by the peppery heat and a bright citrus-like sweetness.

Traditionally, Comet’s Tails were used in a variety of curries and ground spice mixtures for darker meats such as duck, pigeon and beef. They were also …

SHADE-GROWN LAMPUNG BLACK PEPPER

At a time when many farmers are simply walking away from their pepper fields in frustration, Big Tree Farms has created a new opportunity by reawakening the past. Big Tree Farms is working with producer groups in a small region called Kota Bumi or “Center of the Earth”.

Here farmers still use the traditional system of shade-growing peppercorns. Glossy leaved vines meander naturally up the trunks of tropical shade trees providing protection from heat and harsh sunlight. On the forest floor, nitrogen-fixing legumes are planted in rings around the pepper vines, offering a constant …