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Cayenne Pepper

Cayenne Pepper is made from the dried pods of pungent chili peppers.

Try adding Cayenne Pepper to salsa, avocado dip, taco, and enchilada sauces for extra zesty flavour. You can heat up a barbecue sauce or meat marinade with a shake of Cayenne Pepper. Spice up your tartar sauce or vegetable dips and dressings with a pinch of Cayenne Pepper. You can make South of the Border omelets with tomatoes, onions, peppers, and a pinch of Cayenne Pepper added to the eggs.

Cayenne Pepper has little aroma, but it is extremely hot to taste.

Cayenne Pepper comes from Central and South America and the West Indies. Cayenne Pepper comes from Central and South America and the West Indies.

Cayenne Peppers were grown for thousands of years in the West Indies and Central and South America. Spanish explorers looking for black pepper misnamed them as pepper, and introduced them to the rest of the world. One of Columbus’ passengers, de Cuneo, wrote how the Native Americans ate pepper like fruit “like we eat apples.”

The word Cayenne most likely comes from French Guiana, where the capital is Cayenne. Portuguese traders carried the variety around the world, with evidence of its cultivation in home gardens beginning in 1771. Cayenne pepper is well known for its health benefits. It was referred to in 1652 by Nicholas Culpepper as "violent" fruit, useful in many ways, from digestion to improving the sight. It is also widely available today in powdered form to ingest as capsules.