NUTMEGS.



NUTMEGS grow on trees, which look like pear-trees, and are generally over twenty feet high. The flowers are very much like the lily of the valley. They are pale yellow, and very fragrant. The nutmeg is the seed of the fruit, and mace is the thin covering over this seed. The fruit is about as large as a peach. When ripe it breaks open and shows the little nut inside. The trees grow on the islands of Asia, and in tropical America. They bear fruit for seventy or eighty years, having ripe fruit upon them at all seasons. A fine tree in Jamaica has over four thousand nutmegs on it yearly. The Dutch used to have all the nutmeg trade, as they owned the Banda Islands, and conquered all the other traders, and destroyed the trees. To keep the prices up, they once burned three piles of nutmegs each of which was as large as a church. Nature did not sympathize with such meanness. The nutmeg pigeon, found in all the Indian islands, did for the world what the Dutch had determined should not be done, carried these nuts, which are their food, into all the surrounding countries, and trees grew again.

 The Watchman.

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God has furnished man with abundant means for the gratification of an unperverted appetite. He has spread before him the products of the earth--a bountiful variety of food that is palatable to the taste and nutritious to the system. Of these our benevolent heavenly Father says we may freely eat. Fruits, grains, and vegetables, prepared in a simple way, free from spice and grease of all kinds, make,... the most healthful diet. They impart nourishment to the body and give a power of endurance and a vigor of intellect that are not produced by a stimulating diet."

  CG 380 


"A nutritious diet does not consist in the eating of flesh-meats, butter, spice, and grease. The fruits, vegetables, and grains, God has caused to grow for the benefit of man."  

PH123   45

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The Dark Side Of Nutmeg


It is almost too powerful a flavor for everyday use: pungent and musty, a strange and rough alloy of basil and mahogany. And with a history of war, piracy, drug abuse and riddles behind it, the nutmeg is truly imbued with curses and black magic.


There are two biological issues the nutmeg illustrates: Intoxication and dispersal. Nutmeg is intoxicating in every way; its unique flavor made it highly prized to the Europeans whose temperate climate could never produce the double-rainbow of phytotoxins that make a modern spice cabinet. It takes a stable tropical climate to push biodiversity and evolution to the point where plants created enough phenolic compounds to furnish a good kitchen.


One of the alkaloid compounds, which gives nutmeg its peculiar appeal, called myristicin, is so intoxicating that it’s actually hallucinogenic. It’s apparently popular in prisons, which is why nutmeg has been banned in many prison kitchens. “Stirred into a glass of cold water, a penny matchbox full of nutmeg had the kick of three or four reefers,” wrote Malcolm X in his autobiography, describing his prison psychedelics. What he doesn’t mention is the brutal headaches, nausea, and convulsions that accompany the relatively short trips. 


Quantum Biologist