The team at Aberdeen Art Gallery are delighted to welcome visitors back to the building this week and to give people the opportunity to reacquaint themselves with some of the amazing artworks and beautiful objects in our care.
A favourite item of mine is this surprisingly modern-looking silver spice box dating from 1810, which is on display in gallery 6 and is well worth a closer look.
It was made by William Jamieson, a prominent Aberdeen silversmith. Renowned for their warming properties, spices from the tropics have been highly sought after for hundreds of years with trade wars being fought for control of the prized spice routes.
This exquisite piece would have been quite the status symbol and conveys the importance of spice in the fashionable cookery of the 1800s. Cookery books such as English Housewifery by Elizabeth Moxon (1764) refer to the use of spice in recipes of the time.
The elegant silver cylinder, engraved with the names of three popular spices – ginger, cinnamon and nutmeg – with compartments stacking one on top of the other and an integral grater ingeniously contained in the lid, was designed to be seen. Its workmanship, design and materials would have been proudly displayed to visitors.
Many traditional Scottish recipes, such as gingerbread and clootie dumpling, make use of these popular spices to give a distinctive flavour. Perhaps you’ve been cooking, baking or brewing at home during lockdown? If you’ve made a batch of banana bread or brewed some ginger beer, you’re likely to have added some of these ‘sunshine spices’ to the mix.
The outside of this stoneware ginger beer bottle, which you will also find in gallery 6, says that the contents were “fermented in Peterhead” by Heslop and Son, and proudly claims that the “finest Jamaica ginger” was used. Ceramic bottles like these were commonplace until the early 20th Century. A hundred years later, reusable bottles are making a comeback as we move away from single-use plastics to more sustainable products. Its ‘Kilner’ style clip-top wouldn’t be out of place in the latest lifestyle section or wellbeing magazines.
The health-giving properties of spices – reputed to ward off coughs and colds, ease digestion and improve circulation – coupled with their familiar, zesty flavours, should encourage us all to get creative in the kitchen.
This article originally appeared on the Evening Express website. For more information, read about our new combined website.