In answer to a question recently posed to me by the New Belgium Brewing Company in Fort Collins, Colorado, this week’s offering on the blog is a primer on the food uses of schizandra – berries widely used in China, the Koreas and Japan for coloring and flavor in food and beverages. Schizandra berries are the fruits of the magnolia Schizandra chinensis or Schizandra sphenanthera that are … Read more
In previous posts I’ve extolled the virtues of Arab traders in keeping the engine of global commerce and subsequent cultural exchange alive along the Silk Road. Although the Arabs were indeed an important part of trade along the Silk Road, many other nationalities and ethnicities were as well. There were Chinese, of course, Greeks, especially along the maritime trade routes, Europeans, and Jewish merchants situated … Read more
A recent article in the journal Archaeometry tells of a new discovery of ancient silk in Pakistan’s Indus Valley. The ornaments that contain the fibers have been dated to 2450 – 2000 BC. The really fantastic thing about the find is that analysis of the fibers by electron microscope suggest that the fibers were produced by Antheraea moths indigenous to South Asia. In other words, … Read more
With a loud drumroll and a crash of cymbals the two enormous lions careened up the marble stairway, and paused to survey the lay of the land before continuing into the courtyard. One golden like the summer sun, the other as black as a new moon night. Both bedecked with mirrors and a single horn in the middle of their foreheads, they looked left and … Read more
Yesterday, the rain poured down, sometimes in a light wisp, and at other times in a torrent more like the rains brought by the visitation of Hurricane Ike. What better to do on a rainy Friday than to go shopping, right? But unlike most women, I didn’t head to the local department store or luxury mall. Instead, I went to the local East Asian Market, … Read more