Mythbusting: Why Sichuan Pepper Isn’t Actually a Peppercorn, a Pepper, or Even Only From Sichuan

Sichuan pepper isn’t actually pepper — and it isn’t spicy either.

Often called “Szechuan peppercorn,” this ancient Chinese spice isn’t related to black pepper or chili peppers at all. It comes from the husk of a citrus-family berry in the genus Zanthoxylum, prized not for heat but for its electric, tongue-tingling sensation and bright, lemony aroma. Grown across Sichuan and much of China, it has flavored Chinese cooking for thousands of years — yet its English name still sends cooks down the wrong path.

So how did three completely different plants — black pepper, chili peppers, and Sichuan pepper — all end up sharing the same confusing label?

Let’s start with the original: the true peppercorn.

Let’s Start With Black Pepper and Peppercorn: What Exactly Is a Peppercorn?

Let’s begin with the most common point of confusion: peppercorn.

Image: (1) Fresh green Piper nigrum berries are harvested unripe and dried into (2) whole black peppercorns. Grind them to make (3) black pepper, or remove the outer skin before drying and grinding to produce (4) white pepper — the same fruit, processed in different ways.

A true peppercorn is the dried berry of the black pepper vine, Piper nigrum. Native to India’s Malabar Coast, the plant produces clusters of small green fruits that can be turned into black, white, or green pepper — the Western world’s original “pepper.”

Black pepper and peppercorns come from the same plant — Piper nigrum — the difference is simply whether the berry is used whole or ground, and how it’s processed.

So valuable were these berries that in 1439 a pound in England cost more than two days’ wages, helping fuel the Age of Exploration. Which raises the question: how did this spice end up lending its name to chili peppers at all?

By the Way… Here Comes the Red Hot Chili Pepper

When Columbus sailed in 1492, literally carried black peppercorns with him to help locals point him toward the prized spice — a reminder of how valuable pepper had become after centuries of global trade. Even Zheng He’s famed 15th-century Ming-dynasty voyages detoured to India’s Malabar Coast for it, while ports across Southeast Asia thrived on the pepper trade.

Instead of Asia, Columbus reached the Americas and found fiery red pods he called “peppers.” But chili peppers (Capsicum annuum) are nightshades — closer to tomatoes than to black pepper — and their heat comes from capsaicin, not pepper’s piperine.

Two plants. Two families. Two sensations. One confusing name.

Huajiao Enters the Chat: China’s Misnamed “Pepper”

Long before black pepper reached China — and centuries before chilies arrived from the Americas — Sichuan pepper (Zanthoxylum) was already buzzing on Chinese tongues.

Known as huajiao, flower pepper, or prickly ash, it has flavored Chinese cooking for millennia, with archaeological evidence dating back to 6300 BCE. Food writer Fuchsia Dunlop notes that it appears in the ancient Book of Songs and was once associated with fertility and romance, from Han-dynasty palace rituals to rural love tokens.

So why call it “pepper” at all?

When the spice began appearing in Western writing, translators reached for the closest familiar category: pepper — a word English had already stretched to cover anything sharp, aromatic, or tongue-tingling. Early European sources referred to it as “Chinese pepper,” and by the late 19th century the label “Sichuan pepper” (or “Szechuan”) stuck.

An ancient Chinese spice ended up with a modern English name — and a confusing one at that.

Below are some of the most persistent myths surrounding Sichuan pepper!

Myth #1: Sichuan “pepper” isn’t technically a pepper or peppercorn

Botanically, Sichuan pepper belongs to the citrus family (Rutaceae), not black pepper or chilies — it’s closer to an orange tree than a pepper vine, which explains its bright, lemony aroma.

And “peppercorn”? Another misnomer: black pepper uses the whole dried berry, while Sichuan pepper uses only the papery husk, discarding the bitter seed.

Myth #2: Sichuan “pepper” isn’t spicy

Image: While we love chili heat (left), we often have to clarify: we’re not a hot-sauce company — our huajiao (right) bring the tingly buzz, not the burn.

Sichuan pepper isn’t hot in the way chilies are. It contains no capsaicin, the compound responsible for fiery heat. Instead, its signature sensation comes from hydroxy-α-sanshool, which triggers a vibrating, numbing, electric feeling on the lips and tongue — citrusy, floral, and strangely addictive.

The Scoville scale measures capsaicin heat, so it can’t capture this effect at all. There’s no official unit for tingliness yet — which may be part of the reason Sichuan pepper still confounds first-time tasters.

Myth #3: Sichuan “pepper” isn’t just from Sichuan

To make matters even more confusing, Sichuan pepper isn’t just grown in Sichuan. It grows across much of China — in Chongqing, Guizhou, Yunnan, Gansu, and Shanxi — thriving in mountainous terrain with sultry summers and cold winters.

Myth #4: Sichuan “pepper” isn’t all red 

Image: Sichuan “pepper” comes in many shades of tingle — (1) red huājiāo (Z. bungeanum), warm and aromatic; (2) green (Z. armatum), bright and citrusy; (3) sanshō (Z. piperitum), zesty with a minty snap; (4) mắc khén (Z. rhetsa), wild and smoky.

There are over 200 recognized species of Zanthoxylum, but just a handful make it into our spice jars.

Zanthoxylum bungeanum is the classic red Sichuan pepper most people know — aromatic, warm, and widely sold in markets across China and abroad.

Green Sichuan pepper (Zanthoxylum armatum) is less known: brighter and more citrus-forward with a quick, sparkling tingle — see our detailed Green vs. Red guide.

Japan’s sanshō (Zanthoxylum piperitum) is zestier still — think yuzu zest with a light minty-pine snap. It’s traditionally sprinkled over rich dishes like unagi kabayaki to cut through the fat.

If red Sichuan pepper is red wine and green Sichuan pepper is white wine, then sanshō is like sparkling wine — bright, sparkling, and palate-cleansing.

And that’s not all — other culinary Zanthoxylum cousins like Nepal’s timur and Vietnam’s mắc khén deserve their own deep dive, but that’s another rabbit hole. 

Why Do We Call Huajiao “Sichuan Pepper” then?

As with many things, you can thank the English for the confusion.

Sichuan pepper’s path from East to West goes back to the 11th century, when Ibn Sīnā (Avicenna) — a Persian philosopher and doctor — wrote about it using the Arabic word fagara. From there, the word slipped into Latin as Fagara, and later into botany as Zanthoxylum.

Early English writers called it “Chinese pepper” or “pepperwort.” By 1871, physician F. Porter Smith also noted its Chinese name 蜀椒 (‘Sichuan pepper’).

The English label “Sichuan” or originally “Szechuan pepper” (under the outdated Wade–Giles romanization) only started showing up in the late 1800s. That’s when the name stuck.

So why the confusion? In English, “pepper” became a catch-all for spicy things — like calling allspice “Jamaica pepper.” 

And calling it “peppercorn” makes it worse. With huājiāo, we use only the papery husk of the berry, not the seed. A true peppercorn (Piper nigrum) is the whole dried berry including seed — or just the seed, in the case of white pepper.

In short, an ancient Chinese spice ended up with a modern English label that points to the wrong plant and the wrong plant part.

Should we just call it huajiao (花椒)?

Image: Pepper, peppercorn, huajiao… call me by your name, and I’ll call you by mine. At the table, that name is delicious.  

Sichuan pepper” is useful for recognition, but it’s misleading — wrong family, wrong plant part, and it suggests it’s chili-hot or only from Sichuan.

Huajiao is clearer, authentic, and covers both the red and green varieties. After all, you wouldn’t call wasabi Japanese horseradish, right?  

We’ll still use “Sichuan pepper” or even “Szechuan pepper” when it helps people find it, but if we had our way, we’d just call it huajiao. And hey — we’re a business after all. Whether you search for Sichuan pepper, Szechuan peppercorn, or huajiao, we’ll happily claim it all (thanks, Google SEO). 

And if you’ve made it this far, your taste buds must be salivating… or you’re a pepper nerd like us. Either way, we’ve got you covered! 

Shop our huajiao collection.