Processing Black Pepper: What Are MC and FAQ Pepper?

As an exporter in the agricultural products industry, understanding the processing methods and different types of black pepper can be valuable for your business. Processing of this spice contains many steps that the farmers need to focus on to produce good products. Besides, people grade black pepper into 2 classifications, based on its cleaning method. Here’s a concise guide to get you started.

1. Processing of Black Pepper: Harvesting and drying

Initially, farmers harvest the green peppercorn from their farms. They have to follow the standard to ensure the pepper reaches the highest quality. Farmers only harvest when the ripe rate of pepper fruits on a bunch reaches 5 – 10%. This rate is for making black pepper, while the rate for making white pepper is more than 20%. The pepper fruit ripe when it changes from green to yellow.

After the farmers harvest the peppercorns, they move to the drying steps to make black pepper. The purpose is to dehydrate pepper fruit and unlock its smell and taste. To achieve the full black color of dried pepper, farmers need to dry pepper in direct sunshine.

The farmers spread pepper berries out on PP fabric under the sun to absorb the heat. The pepper berries get dried until they turn black and wrinkled.

The farmers take care to maintain a final moisture content of 8 – 10% to prevent mold growth. It takes about 3 – 4 days to finish the process.

When the pepper turns from green to black and the water content reaches 11 – 12%, that’s qualified.

Now, black pepper undergoes the cleaning process. The purpose is to pick up flat, damaged seeds, separating impurities… from black pepper. This is also an important step because it determines whether pepper meets the standard for export. This step makes 2 kinds of pepper MC and FAQ black pepper.

2. What are the differences between MC and FAQ Pepper?

This is an important step because it classifies pepper into MC and FAQ kinds. So what are MC black pepper and FAQ black pepper? Here’s the breakdown:

• MC Black Pepper: This type undergoes machine cleaning, resulting in a very low level of admixture, typically around 0.2% max. This means there are minimal foreign objects like leaves, twigs, or other peppercorns that aren’t whole. Also, using machines to process means this kind of pepper has a uniform size.

• FAQ Black Pepper: This refers to a “Fair Average Quality”. FAQ pepper goes through some basic processing to remove objects like branches and large impurities like stones or dirt. However, it may still contain some admixture, up to 1% max. This could include small leaves, twigs, or broken peppercorns. FAQ pepper is generally considered less visually appealing than MC but can retain a more robust flavor due to minimal processing.

Feature	MC Black Pepper	FAQ Black Pepper
Admixture	0.2% max	1% max
Cleaning process	Machine clean	Basic clean
Foreign materials	Minimal	May contain some leaves, twigs, broken peppercorns