Turmeric - World of Words

Turmeric — The golden spice

Turmeric is a flowering plant, Curcuma longa, of the ginger family, Zingiberaceae, the rhizomes of which are used in cooking. The name possibly derives from Middle English or Early Modern English as turmeryte or tarmaret. It may be of Latin origin, terra merita ("meritorious earth").

There are more than fifty varieties of turmeric and not all of them used for cooking – each has it’s own distinct medicinal property.

The origin of turmeric

Turmeric is a type of ginger. In Chinese, it is known as 黃薑 or yellow ginger because of its yellow colour. In Malay, it is known as kunyit.

The use of turmeric dates back nearly 4000 years to the Vedic culture in India, where it was used as a culinary spice and had some religious significance. In 1280, Marco Polo described this spice, marveling at a vegetable that exhibited qualities so similar to that of saffron.

India produces nearly all of the world’s turmeric crop and consumes 80% of it. With its inherent qualities and high content of the important bioactive compound curcumin, Indian turmeric is considered to be the best in the world.

Turmeric is one of the key ingredients in many Asian dishes, imparting a mustard-like, earthy aroma and pungent, slightly bitter flavor to foods. It is used mostly in savory dishes, but also is used in some sweet dishes, such as the cake sfouf.

In India, turmeric has been a staple ingredient for centuries (Credit: Mark Eden/Alamy)

The Only Good Thing In 2020

Once upon a time, there was a lovely cat, who had fungus. Her human mother was not Indian. But it turns out, she is more desi than we realise.

Because, to treat the ailment, she used the traditional remedy of turmeric. Basically, haldi mein nehla diya billi ko. Lo, and behold, we have a Pikachu.

P/S: You will thank us for sharing this one with you ;)

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In our recent digital initiative — World of Words, we have carefully selected a handful of beautiful creation of God that means something to us. We used them as our new website imagery as part of the celebration of life we tend to miss out in our hectic daily lives. We hope you will take a moment to pause, breathe and admire these wonderful things around us.

References:

India’s original “turmeric latte” by BBC
The golden spice by NIH
Turmeric by Wikipedia
Five things you didn't know about turmeric by Tasty Bite