Ingredients · Spice

Szechuan Peppercorns

Zanthoxylum spp. · Rutaceae (citrus family)

Szechuan Peppercorns
Not pepper, and not heat — Szechuan peppercorns are the dried husks of a citrus-family shrub, and what they produce is a buzzing numbness on the lips and tongue called málà when it is paired with chile. That tingle is the whole point and there is nothing else in a kitchen like it. Two products carry them. The shiny black seeds inside are gritty and flavourless; it is the reddish husk that does the work, so a good lot has been sifted.

What it’s like, and how to use it

The partHusk
KindSpice
CaffeineCaffeine-free
Where it is fromChina
TasteBright citrus and pine over a buzzing, numbing tingle on the lips and tongue; no heat at all

How to use it

Toast them in a dry pan until fragrant, then grind — untoasted they taste dusty. Sift out the black seeds and any thorns. In mapo tofu, dan dan noodles, hot pot and dry-fried green beans. In five-spice. Added at the end as much as the start, since the tingle fades with cooking.

With food

Chile and garlic. Tofu. Pork and beef. Noodles. Cucumber. Eggplant. Peanut. Soy and black vinegar.

With spices

Chile, its constant partner. Star anise, fennel, cinnamon and cloves — five-spice. Ginger. Black pepper.

With tea

Pu-erh or a roasted oolong alongside a Sichuan meal.

Its story

Where it comes from

Sichuan is the name everyone knows, but the genus is used across a wide band of Asia — timur in Nepal, yer ma in Tibet, thingye in Bhutan, sanshō in Japan, and in Korea. Our lot names no origin.

What happened

Three unrelated plants get sold as peppercorns and only one is pepper. Black, white and green are all Piper nigrum, the same berry treated differently. Pink peppercorns come from a Brazilian tree in the cashew family. Szechuan peppercorns come from Zanthoxylum, a citrus relative — which is why, when you look closely at the husk, it smells faintly of grapefruit peel. They are one of the five in Chinese five-spice and the numbing half of Sichuan cooking's most famous effect: má, the numbness, and là, the heat, together.

On the shelf with it

Sold on its own, and in these blends.

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