Abstract

Merken is the Mapuche name of a traditional condiment based on smoked ground hot peppers. The recipes and hot pepper landraces vary from family to family, but the tradition remains. In Santa Juana, Biobio region - Chile, several families use hot peppers as their main income source, maintaining alive their heritage. A characterization of hot pepper varieties and some family recipes were studied in order to describe differences and variation between family recipes. Structured interviews, in situ analysis of the varieties and ex situ variety trials were analyzed. The families recognize how spicy are the varieties, and they use them accordingly. 'Huaipe' is recognized as the less spicy, then 'Cacho de Cabra', and 'Puta madre' as the strongest, which was demonstrated according to their capasaicine content. In the case of Santa Juana recipes, all the families share the steps of the process that allows the product to be named merken, such us the smoking, toasted and grinding, but they differ between them in the in the proportion each variety is used, obtaining Santa Juana's different recipes. When comparing to other places where merken is elaborated, other varieties and proportions are used and the recipes include salt and/or cilantro.