You can’t put a finger on the goodwill spinach has compounded over the years. I’ve seen it make its way into everything – spinach fritters, spinach paratha, palak paneer, spinach and cheese cutlets, spinach rice, who can forget pasta à la Florentine and a bunch of other dishes.
Aspanak is what the inhabitants of Persia (modern-day Iran) called it when they first domesticated the crop in the 11th century. Persia back then was occupied by the Moors and as their conquests extended to the West, so did the cultivation of spinach. It began with the occupation of Seville in Andalusia (present-day Spain), where aspanak became spanacha to signify its association with Spain, later went to be referred to as “Persian grass” and “Persian herb” by the rest of Europe. But perhaps its most definitive connotation in history is the use of “Florentine” in my opinion. Simply because even today, the suffix ‘à la Florentine’ instantly means that the dish contains spinach. And for the longest time, I can attest to reading menus and then assuming the dish originated in Italy. Although it isn’t quite like that. It was all Catherine de’ Medici, the former Queen of France’s doing. Catherine was an Italian ruler from Florence who was wed to Prince Henry II of France in the sixteenth century. Once she became Queen, she insisted that the royal kitchen undergo some changes to honor her Tuscan upbringing. Her edict was that every dish in her court be served with a side of spinach. And so began the trend of serving protein on a bed of spinach accompanied by some sort of cheese sauce depending on where you were, Mornay in France and Béchamel in Italy.
Now there’s a famous story about spinach’s overstated iron content. Erich Von Wolff, a scientist, while studying the iron content of leafy vegetables, incorrectly placed the decimal point which led people to believe that spinach contained ten times its real iron content. This happened in 1870 and it wasn’t until 1937 that the study was given a second look before someone, that being Professor Schuphan, analysed, came forward and listed its real iron content which rendered the previous study grossly overstated. Now scientists, researchers and one criminologist (we will get to that) seem divided on this. There’s a school that argues that Wolff’s 1870 study never existed and his subsequent studies in later years never said anything about spinach’s ginormous iron content (Joachim's Weltmurksbude https://historiesofecology.blogspot.com/2015/10/the-real-decimal-point-error-that.html).
Another, this one is by the criminologist, who debunked the decimal-point error entirely through whataboutery. (Mike Sutton's Popeye, Spinach, Iron https://958be75a-da42-4a45-aafa-549955018b18.filesusr.com/ugd/b93dd4_1fe4a4c3e82444d1986c4ef560a91e28.pdf).
In this thick soup, I found this deconstruction of the case (https://mrsuttonntu.wordpress.com/2020/07/14/popeye-spinach-iron/) to be more balanced and realistic. Although it leans to support Joachim’s view, it also propounds reasons why the myth is true in a way.
There’s one more piece to this puzzle, the table (fig 1), which has made its appearance on several articles as visual evidence to back the veracity of Wolff's decimal-point error. Although, the truth is, Wolff did not publish this table, infact the figures are not his either, they come from Bunge and Häusermann’s study in 1904. Here, the high value of iron is because Bunge used dry spinach for his study.
I too prematurely made my judgement based on this chart, but really, all I had to do was skim through some german. Oh mein Gott.
Anyhoo, here's the recipe for Palak Murg.
Palak Murgh
Serves 3-4
For the spinach paste:
300 ml water
A bunch of spinach (250 gm)
Salt to taste
Ice cold water for rinsing
For the marinade:
A knob of ginger, sliced
5-6 cloves of garlic, chopped
3-4 green chillies, chopped
200 gm mint leaves
200 gm coriander leaves
50 ml water
1 kg of chicken pieces, curry cut
1 tsp turmeric powder
1 tsp salt
For the curry:
4 tbsp vegetable oil
3-4 smashed cardamom pods
3-4 medium cinnamon sticks
4 medium onions, sliced
A dollop of ginger-garlic paste
Marinated chicken
2 tomatoes, diced
1 tsp turmeric powder
2 tsp coriander powder
2 tsp chilli powder
2 tsp chicken masala powder
Salt to taste
Spinach paste
Roasted garam masala powder
A dollop of desi ghee (clarified butter)
To make the spinach paste:
1. Chop the stems off the spinach bunch.
2. Heat a pot of water, once it begins to simmer, drop a pinch of salt along with the spinach leaves. Leave it to soften for 5 minutes and then turn the heat off.
3. Rinse with ice cold water and then blend to make a fine paste.
To make the marinade:
1. Grind ginger, garlic, green chillies, coriander and mint leaves along with some water.
2. In a bowl, add your chicken pieces, turmeric and salt.
3. Rub the marinade all over the chicken and let rest for an hour in the refrigerator.
To make the curry:
1. Light up your karahi (deep cooking pot) on medium heat. Once the oil is warm, add oil, cardamom, cinnamon sticks and onions.
2. Add a pinch of turmeric and a dollop of garlic paste. Give it a stir and then close the pot for 10 minutes. It would be wise to peak after the 5 minute mark to check up on the onions. We don’t want them stuck to the bottom of the pan.
3. Once the onions have softened, add the marinated chicken. Gently incorporate the oil, onions and aromats into the chicken. Close the lid and let it cook for 10 minutes.
4. Add tomatoes, turmeric powder, coriander powder, chilli powder, chicken masala powder and salt to taste. Stir for a good 5 minutes to get rid of the raw taste of the powders. Reduce to low flame and let it cook for another 10 minutes with the lid on.
5. Add the spinach paste, stir and then add roasted garam masala powder. Stir some more and let it cook for 5 minutes with the lid on.
6. Top with a dollop of desi ghee and give it one last mix. Turn the heat off and serve with hot Basmati rice or roti.
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