Spice of Life? No, Spice for Death!

Spice up your life! Cinnamon, pepper, curry, and nutmeg all make our foods more flavorful and exciting. Garlic can enhance your food as well as your breath, though the later may not be your desire. Spices are used to help flavor and enhance the taste of food. But they also have served a very important biological function.

Most spices are antimicrobial. They act to kill or at least prevent the growth of bacteria. Some are also effective at inhibiting the growth of molds or fungi. One way that this ‘poisonous' trait might be noted is that the spice has some bitter taste to it.

Most bitter substances are poisonous to some extent. This is true for many of the plant derived chemicals we use for pharmaceuticals, the poisonous nature actually able to provide the healing benefit. That bitter taste is what makes many medicines taste bad, but allows us to be warned by the plant that there is a poison. In the same way spices are poisonous to bacteria, they have some bitterness, but are normally not poisonous to people if eaten in moderation.

One of the reasons the spices we used became prominent and widely used is their antimicrobial properties. Thousands of years ago, when meals were prepared, people added parts of local plants, including seeds, leafs and roots. Besides increasing flavor it helped preserve the food.

Without refrigeration, it was important to cook meat and other food to help prevent spoilage. When there was too much to eat, the food would begin to spoil before the next meal time. The foods with fairly large amounts of the right spices had much less bacterial growth, and the flavors of the spices helped hide the taste of the rot.

Countries with warm or tropical climates had greater difficulties keeping food fresh in the hotter temperatures and so most found a variety of spices And many of them have cuisines that are quite spicy.

Even salt is considered a spice by many, in part because it is widely used to as a bacteriostatic, it helps keep bacteria from growing.

Among the spices with antimicrobial activity are:

• Allspice is antibacterial and may also help fight fungi and viruses.
• Black Pepper helps kill bacteria and helps with intestinal health.
• Cinnamon helps stabilize blood sugar and can kill bacteria.
• Cloves are antibacterial and historically were used to stop bad breath before the advent of toothpaste and mouthwash.
• Garlic and garlic powder may be antiviral as well as antibacterial.
• Ginger is great at preventing or slowing bacterial growth.
• Mustard was so widely understood as an antibacterial that it was used historically to disinfect the hands of physicians.
• Oregano has antibacterial properties.
• Red Pepper (& Cayenne) is strongly able to kill bacteria and is a great help in preventing food spoilage. It and related spices are widely used in tropical countries because of these benefits.
• Rosemary fight bacteria.
• Sage is used historically to help preserve stored foods.
• Turmeric and mixtures that include turmeric, such as curry, are able to prevent spoilage.

Enjoy these spices and others. And if you need to leave foods out on the table for a while, make them spicy!