If you are at all an aficionado of Asian cooking–most notably Indian food–you probably already are familiar with the distinctively pungent smell and taste of curry.
Many Indian dishes use curry, which is also recognizable by its distinctive, bright golden yellow color. The main ingredient in curry is the powdered form of the turmeric plant, which can also be used as a dye to obtain that lovely golden yellow.
Turmeric also has a long history as a medicinal herb within Ayurvedic medicine.1 As with many culinary herbs and spices that actually have their roots as medicinals, turmeric has a long and fascinating dual history as a type of food therapy, similar to Chinese herbal medicine.
Turmeric (Curcuma longa) is from the same family as ginger (Zingiber officinale). Both are tropical plants that originated from India. The roots of both plants are harvested for both culinary and medicinal purposes. India remains the largest producer of turmeric in the entire world.2
Records of turmeric use go back more than 4,000 years. There have even been analyses of pots dating back to 2500 BCE that found turmeric residue.3 Furthermore, turmeric has shown up in Ayurvedic medicinal texts as far back as 500 BCE.
The fumes of burning turmeric were used to clear up congestion, while turmeric juice was used to heal wounds and bruises, and turmeric paste was said to be beneficial for a variety of skin conditions, including smallpox, blemishes, and shingles.3
Turmeric makes its way to the West
It should not be any surprise that turmeric, as a part of curry powder, found its way to the West as a result of colonization of India by the British military, as well as through trading via the British East India Trading Company.3,4 The word curry came from the Tamil word, kari, for sauce. By the time the British had colonized India, curry was generally recognized a dish that consisted of vegetables and/or meat cooked with a spice mixture that included turmeric.
The first mentions of kari could be found in a Portuguese cookbook from the mid-17th century, based on descriptions by members of the British East India Trading Company who did business with Tamil merchants along the southeastern coast of India.4 The first recipe in English calling for turmeric was for making “India pickle,” published in 1747 by Hannah Glasse in The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy.
A later edition, printed 1758, included a recipe for a curry dish.3 The first appearance of curry in an American cook book was in the 1831 edition of Mary Randolph’s Virginia Housewife.
It should also come as no surprise that right around the same time as British traders and soldiers were discovering curry, enterprising Indian merchants figured out how to make up a powdered mixture of the spices used in the dish and sold it as curry powder for them to take back home. Furthermore, the powder was being touted, not only as a culinary spice, but as a cure-all for an entire array of health problems.
Today, turmeric is available as a part of curries in a wide variation of flavors, spiciness and styles, ranging from mild Japanese curry to very hot Thai curry. However, they all share the long tradition of turmeric in common.