Chili pepper was originated in

Bolivia, and was brought back by Columbus to Europe (called aji by Indians). It took less than 100yrs to spread its cultivation across Asia. Many Asians today think the red pepper or chili pepper is native in their land. My korean friends get annoyed when I told them otherwise. In fact, Korean court recipes from the sixteen century had no mentioning of red pepper.

Obviously black pepper was native to Asia, which was one reason for Columbus to discover another route to reach India,although he ended in a very different place. At the time, the trade was controlled by the Muslim world,the arabics concealed the source of black pepper, and often used mythical refernece to explain its origin and charged europeans huge amount.


Other food from the New Continent include corn,peanuts,etc.

Good work in digging out the chinese reference on "foreign pepper".