The Citron of the Tabernacles

Varieties of Citron (citrus medica)

Oranges, grapefruits and lemons, tangerines, limes and maybe even a pomelo are types of citrus fruits we eat, or juice, all the time. But how many of you are familiar with the citron?

The citron has been around for thousands of years, and when crossed with other species, gave rise to the different citrus varieties we know and love today. But aside from its fragrance, the citron does not have many redeeming qualities, especially as it is almost devoid of juice and has a thick rind. While this can be candied to make succade, the citron's main uses have been religious.

The small etrog I bought for this year's Sukkot holiday

In the Book of Leviticus it is written: "And you shall take on the 1st day (of the Feast of Tabernacles, Sukkot) the fruit of beautiful trees...". The citron, known in Hebrew as the etrog, has always been assumed to be this fruit, as indeed the literal translation of the Hebrew word for "citrus" is eitz hadar, which literally translates as "beautiful tree". Because god commands us to use the etrog during the Feast of Tabernacles, the trade in citron, and especially beautiful unblemished fruit, can get competitive and expensive. The search for the perfect etrog was even the subject for an excellent movie, Ushpizin, which I highly recommend.

Happy Sukkot!

ReBlog - The Legumes of War: How Peanuts Fed the Confederacy

I found this on Smithsonian.com.  Rather than summarize, I'm just showing the entire blog post. the original link is http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/food/2012/04/the-legumes-of-war-how-peanuts-fed-the-confederacy. Good thing for the confederacy that peanut allergies are a modern epidemic!

April 19, 2012

The Legumes of War: How Peanuts Fed the Confederacy

Peanuts. Image Courtesy of Flickr user La.blasco.

When it came to fighting the Civil War, the South may have been rich in military leadership, but the North had superior resources, especially when it came to industrial strength. Still a largely agrarian society, the Southern states had to import most of their manufactured products, and with a poor railway system, keeping troops well-stocked was a battle in and of itself, especially when enemy blockades interrupted supply lines. Combined with inflation and scorched-earth military campaigns—such as General Sherman’s march through South Carolina—food shortages were a problem for both military and civilians. But even in those hard times, people could find relief in peanuts.

Before the Civil War, peanuts were not a widely cultivated crop in the United States—Virginia and North Carolina were the principal producers—and were generally viewed as a foodstuff fit for the lowest social classes and for livestock. When they were consumed, they were usually eaten raw, boiled or roasted, although a few cookbooks suggested ways to make dessert items with them. The goober pea’s status in the Southern diet changed during the war as other foods became scarce. An excellent source of protein, peanuts were seen as a means of fighting malnutrition. (And they still are, with products such as Plumpy’nut being used in famine-plagued parts of the world.) In addition to their prewar modes of consumption, people used peanuts as a substitute for items that were no longer readily available, such as grinding them to a paste and blending them with milk and sugar when coffee was scarce. “This appreciation [for peanuts] was real,” Andrew F. Smith wrote inPeanuts: The Illustrious History of the Goober Pea. “Southerners continued to drink peanut beverages decades after the war ended.” Peanut oil was used to lubricate locomotives when whale oil could not be obtained—and had the advantage of not gumming up the machinery—while housewives saw it as a sound stand-in for lard and shortening as well as lamp fuel.

Peanuts became ingrained in the culture, going so far as to crop up in music. For Virginian soldiers wanting to take a dig at North Carolina’s peanut crop, there was:

The goobers they are small

Over thar!

The goobers they are small

Over thar!

The goobers they are small,

And they digs them in the fall,

And they eats them, shells and all,

Over thar!

The humorous song “Eatin’ Goober Peas” also surfaced during the war wears. (You can hear the song in full as performed by Burl Ives and Johnny Cash.)

Just before the battle the General hears a row,

He says, “The Yanks are coming, I hear the rifles now,”

He turns around in wonder, and what do you think he sees?

The Georgia militia eating goober peas!

There is also an account of a July 1863 episode where the Confederate Army’s Fifth Company of the Washington Artillery of New Orleans was entrenched in Jackson, Mississippi, and burned down a mansion in order to clear their view of the battlefield—although not before saving a piano. As the Union Army drew nearer, one soldier took to the ivories, encouraging his compatriots to join in song, including a round of “You Shan’t Have Any of My Peanuts”:

The man who has plenty of good peanuts,

And giveth his neighbor none,

He shan’t have any of my peanuts when his peanuts are gone.

While the Fifth Company succeeded in keeping the enemy at bay that day, peanuts just weren’t enough to save the Confederacy in the long haul.

Posted By: Jesse Rhodes — Drinks,Food History,Fruits and Vegetables | Link | Comments (1)

Carrots weren't always orange!

The orange-colored carrots so ubiquitous today weren't around forever. Actually orange carrots were only first documented in the 17th century by Flemish painters. Before that, European carrots were commonly white, purple, yellow and even red. But by the 18th century, orange carrots had not only taken over culinarily, but have also influenced language. For example, carrots were an incentive for donkeys to move forward, which led to the "carrot or stick" approach to motivation.

Evelyne Bloch-Dano tells the story of the carrot and other under-appreciated vegetables in her new book, aptly named Vegetables, a Biography.

Revenge in a name - Sigesbeckia orientalis

Sigesbeckia orientalis

Carl Linnaeus is often called the Father of Taxonomy. While the crtieria he used for taxonomy have largely been replaced, the hierarchical classification and custom of binomial nomenclature that he established remains. 


While many criteria went into determining the binomial name of a plant, at least in one case, revenge was the main criteria. When Linnaeus announces his discovery that plants produce contain male and female organs and reproduce sexually, some of his contempories responded with shock and contempt. One of them Johann Siegesbeck called his idea "loathsome harlotry" and wondered "who would have thought that bluebells, lillies and onions could be up to such immorality?"  Linnaeus got even by naming St. Paul's wort, an ugly, foul-smelling weed that grows in the mud, Sigesbeckia orientalis.

Native or Immigrant? The prickly pear's identity crisis

This is the flower which will develop into a prickly pear. The young fruit can be already seen growing under the flower, and a few more mature ones grow behind it.

Prickly pear cacti grow all over Israel and the Middle East in general, where they are used not only to produce the tasty fruit, but also as borders between houses and villages. The cactus is so omnipresent that most people think the prickly pear to be endogenous to the Middle East. Israelies have taken this one step further and have adopted the Hebrew name for the prickly pear (tzabar) (Sabra in English) to describe native born Israelis. Like the fruit, a tzabar is thought to be prickly and dangerous on the outside, but soft and sweet inside.

In reality though, the prickly pear may be an imposter. While it pretends to be native, it is actually a new immigrant (in Hebrew, an oleh). Molecular DNA studies indicated that the prickly pear of the Middle East, Opuntia ficus-indica, is actually an import from Mexico! Many European traders carried the prickly pear on board to prevent scurvy, and then transplanted the cacti around the Mediterranean. 

As a new immigrant, I can now proudly declare myself a tzabar !

Guest Blog: Dr. Yuval Sapir and the Lily from the mountains

Lilium candidum - Madonna lily

Dr. Yuval Sapir is Director of the Tel Aviv University Botanical Gardens 


The crusaders fell in love with the large white, trumpet-like flower of Lilium candidum when they arrived in the middle east. These christian believers immediately took the lily as the sign of the Annunciation, when according to Christian lore, the Angel Gabriel told Mary that she would give birth to the son of God.

What could cause these European religeous warriors to consider the lily the flower of the Annunciation?

Well, lilies flower religiously (all pun intended) towards the end of March. Count nine months forward from the end of March, and you get December 25. So of course the flowering of this marvelous flower must have religious meaning. Thus they termed this majestic, pure white flower the Madonna Lily.

The Crusaders picked and shipped thousands of Madonna Lilies back to Europe, where its cultivation failed miserably. Over the years, another species of Lily - Lilium longiflorom - was adopted as a proxy for the Madonna Lily. This species is from Eastern Asia, and defined (as the name hints) by longer flowers than the Middle-Eastern lily.

The Madonna Lily still grows naturally in Israel in the upper Galilee and on cliffs in the high Mount Carmel. It is among the rare and endangered plants in Israel, but also among the most pilgrimaged ones, because of her beauty. It became the symbol of the Tel Aviv University Botanical Garden, based on a picture that Prof. Jacob Galil, the founder of the garden, took in the 1950's.

Methuselah, the 2000 year old date

The Methuselah date palm, 2012
Kibbutz Keturah, Israel

The date palm has been a source of food, medicine, shelter and shade for thousands of years. While the exact date trees grown in the bibical period are long extinct, in 2005, a 2000-year-old date seed recovered from Masada in the Judean dessert was successfully germinated. Genetic analyses have shown that this tree is distinct from all known date palms, and scientists want to see if the ancient tree has any unique medicinal properties no longer found in today's date palm varieties.


Unfortunately, Methuselah, true to its name, appears to be male, so we won't get any ancient fruit. Date palms are dioecious, meaning that there are separate male trees which make pollen, and female trees which make ovules which lead to fruit and seeds after fertilization with pollen from the male. But through careful genetic breeding, Methuselah can be used to pollinate modern species, and some of these offspring will be female. These hybrids can then be recrossed with Methuselah's pollen, to yield a new generation that's mainly the ancient date.

The danger in monoculture spuds

Solanum tuberosum (potato)

Potatoes were first cultivated almost 10,000 years ago in the Peruvian Andes. The Spanish introduced the potato to Europe in the 15th century, and by 1845, 1/3 of the fields in Ireland were planted with a single strain of potatoes. That same year the crops were devastated by potato blight, a disease caused by a pathogenic fungus. By 1855, Ireland's population shrunk by 25% with 2,000,000 people dying of hunger or emigrating.

This disaster highlighted the danger of using only a very small number of different crop varieties (monoculture). Blight never devastated South America where hundreds of potato varieties are grown, with each variety being both resistant to (and sensitive to) different strains of pathogens.

Reliance on single strains of crops is a danger in modern times also. Educated uses of genes from wild strains is essential for ensuring food security. For example, research funded by the Gates Foundation is looking to utilize genes from wild wheat to combat rust, a fungal disease that's devastating cultivated wheat crops in Africa.

Food for silk

Morus alba (Mulberry)

The mulberry tree produces a tasty berry, but not because of this did the mulberry tree change history. Leaves of the mulberry tree are the sole food of the silkworm. 1400 silkworms eat 50 pounds of mulberry leaves to make just one pound of silk. The Chinese closely guarded the secret of silk production and so had a monopoly in supplying the great demand for silk by the Egyptians, Romans, Persians and other cultures. Trade of silk, and other wares, along the Silk Road from China through the Middle East and to Europe helped lay the foundations for the modern world.

Is Marijuana Kosher for Passover?

In the spirit of the Passover Holiday, I couldn't resist commenting on this. High Times, which since 1974 has been spreading the gospel of legalizing pot, has run an article asking the obvious question, can a person get high on Passover and still be religious?

This may not be as absurd as it seems, as the question on what is kosher for Passover, and what isn't, is taken very seriously in some circles, and can even lead to familial conflict. For example, when I was a kid, rice was verboten as it is for all Ashkenazi Jews. This is NOT because rice is a leavened product. Indeed the Talmud clearly states that rice should be eaten at Seder to commemorate sacrifices at the temple. But a few hundred years ago European rabbi's decided that rice COULD be contaminated with wheat, and this should not be eaten during Passover. This prohibition was expanded to include other grains and legumes. The overall effect on the Ashkenazi digestive system is best left not discussed.

Sephardi Jews though never adopted this extreme position, and as such their seders contain rice and a variety of foods I could only dream about. So I was totally shocked 30 years ago to find out that my wife's family eats rice on passover! Not that my wife is Sephardi, but her family had years ago adopted the customs of one of the uncles by marriage. It didn't take long until I also became a convert.

Which then leads us to the question of marijuana. Now under no condition should this be construe as a call for illegal activity (for those unfortunante places where marijuana is still considered a controlled illegal substance)! But IF one were to partake in any illegal activity, is it still kosher (for Passover that is)?

The article concludes that marijuana would fall under the classification of legumes, which means that, as always, the Sephardim get to have all the fun.

And the people of Israel called the bread "manna"

The Book of Exodus gives several descriptions of the food provided by God for the Jews as they meandered through the dessert. Manna is described as fine,white flakes that melt in the sun, and taste like wafers made with honey. Like all fresh food, manna came with a "best used by..." date, which in this case was "best used by tomorrow". If collected and stored, manna became infested with worms and rotted (yech!).

So can we define the botanical basis of manna? This is a slippery slope where scientists try to merge their craft with religion, but this hasn't deterred a number of hypotheses. Manna has been claimed to have come from tamarisk trees, which excrete a sweet, melt-able resin; insect honeydoo (bug poo in other words) which is actually edible; lichens, mushrooms or even locusts.

Regardless of what it was, manna was not a food of choice. Back in Egypt, the Children of Israel would not had subsisted on bug poo or lichens. But as they were obviously suffering from problems of food security, God provided the Israelites with daily rations of manna. The manna provided basic subsistence, but not much variety. Manna could be compared to corn meal provided by the USA to Africa - its not the food that they'd choose, but given the alternatives, it did provide nutrition!

Happy Passover!

The grain of civilization

Triticum dicoccoides (wild emmer wheat) growing in an Israeli field

Emmer wheat was first cultivated at least 10,000 years ago in the area of the Fertile Crescent, and enabled the establishment of the first agricultural communities. While emmer grains have been found in numerous archaeological sites, it was discovered still growing in the wild in Israel in 1906. Subsequent studies have shown that this wild wheat is the progenitor of modern cultivated wheat, and is thus a great resource for breeding heartier strains.

A living fossil resurrected?

The ancient plant

Could a team of Russian scientists have resurrected a 32,000 year old plant? According to a new report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, these scientists found seeds in an ancient squirrel burrow that had been buried in the Siberian permafrost and kept for the past 30,000 or so years at a cozy -7 degrees Celsius (~-19 Fahrenheit). While thes seeds couldn't germinate, the scientists succeeded in isolating a very few viable cells from the seeds. Plants you see have the amazing ability to regenerate an entire plant from a single cell. So from a single ancient cell isolated in the lab, the Russians regenerated a living fossil that looks surprisingly like a modern narrow-leafed campion, except for its flowers, whose petals were narrower and had a slightly different pattern. The findings still need to be confirmed by molecular genetic methods, as contamination is always a problem in studies like these. But if true, this is an amazing opportunity to study plant evolution. You can read more about the finding in the New York Times or in Ed Yong's blog.

The tree of God's House

Cedar in Barouk Lebanon. source

This tall and strong conifer is the the national emblem of Lebanon and found throughout the mountains of Lebanon and northern Israel. The`cedar is mentioned through out the bible, such as in Psalm 92:12 - The righteous ... shall grow mighty like the cedar of Lebanon. King Solomon was so impressed with the beauty and strength of cedar wood that he imported huge amounts of cedars from the Phoenicians in Tyre to build the First Temple.

The wood in a tree trunk is actually old water vessels called xylem. Each year a tree makes new xylem tubes on the perimeter of the trunk, while the old ones are plugged up and serve to support the tree.

The tree with bloody bark

Arbutus andrachne (Eastern strwaberry tree)
Tel Aviv University Botanic Garden. source: Eytan Chamovitz  

This evergreen is found in countries bordering the Eastern Mediterranean. It has a distinctive bark that peals off and renews each year, turning from greenish brown for the new bark to a bright red in mature bark. This blood-red color has spurned many legends and in Arabic and Hebrew, the tree is called "killed father". The tree's fruit is edible. Arbutus was mentioned by Virgil, Horace and Ovid.

No yams, no Pill

Dioscorea mexicana (Mexican yam).
photo by Nhu Nguyen

Mexican yams were the original source of the chemicals that were used in the first oral contraceptives (affectionately known as The Pill) in the mid-20th century. These inedible wild yams (not to be confused with sweet potatoes, which belong to a different family of plants, but are are sometimes mistakenly referred to as "yams")  contain a chemical called diosgenin, a type of phytoestrogen. Scientists at the Mexican pharmaceutical company Syntex extracted Diosgenin from these yams and used it to make progesterone which in turn was used in the early versions of The Pill. In nature, Mexican yams are found in the rain forests of southern Mexico and Central American and are cultivated today primarily for the interesting "turtle shell" look of the tuber root.

A not so merry Christmas?

Bosweillia sacra (Frankincense tree)

Frankincense, a traditional staple of the Christmas story, is produced from the resin of Bosweillia trees  much in the same way that syrup is tapped from Maple trees. The smallish Bosweillia tree is native to the southern Arabian penninsula and the neighboring Horn of Africa . A recent study has shown that Bosweilla populations are in severe decline due to over-harvest, with the number of trees projected to decrease by one half within 15 years, and to be wiped out by the middle of the century. This would leave the Catholic church, one of the main consumers in frankincense, with a big problem. In addition to its religeous uses (or maybe explaining them) frankincense smoke is psychoactive and may relieve depression and anxiety!