Pimentón
Also known as Spanish smoked paprika, Pimentón de la Vera, paprika, Paprika extract, Smoke
Spanish smoked paprika, the defining spice of chorizo and many Iberian sausages. Added in far larger amounts than other spices, it gives vivid red colour, smoky flavour and useful antioxidant protection.
Pimentón is Spanish paprika, and in its smoked form it is the soul of Spanish charcuterie. It is what gives chorizo, sobrasada and lomo their vivid brick-red colour and their characteristic smoky, sweet or hot flavour. A Spanish sausage made without it is not chorizo at all but chorizo blanco, white chorizo.
The most prized is Pimentón de la Vera, from the La Vera area of Extremadura, which earned European Protected Designation of Origin status in 2007. Its peppers are dried slowly over oak or holm-oak fires, which is what makes it smoked, unlike the sun-dried paprika of Murcia. It comes sweet (dulce), bittersweet (agridulce) and hot (picante).
Pimentón is unusual in how much is used. Where black pepper or nutmeg go in at a fraction of a per cent, pimentón is added to chorizo at roughly one to three per cent of the meat, ten times more, and the sausage carries it happily. Beyond colour and flavour it is a genuine antioxidant, helping protect the fat, so it is functional as well as decorative.