Luxuries Part 4 - Spices 2

     It's spice time again! After looking over all the herbs and spices that are possible to put in your cabinets, I decided to break them into three smaller posts so you wouldn't have to read them all at once.  Besides, there are plenty in each post that you can think about.  If you break your spice buying into several weeks, it'll go more smoothly.  I've found that there are some grocery stores that sell some of their spices for $1.  If you read a spice here that you think would work with your cooking style and you see a bottle for a dollar, you should probably pick it up.  You won't need to worry about having back ups until you know what you tend to run out of quickly, and even then, you don't generally run out in the middle of a recipe.  There are a couple of herbs and spices of which I've gotten the larger bottles so I can refill when I need them, but you probably won't need that for a while.

• Cumin is the ground seed of a flowering plant in the parsley family native to the Mediterranean region.  It dates back to at least the second century B.C. and is even mentioned twice in the Bible (Isaiah 28:27 and Matthew 23:23).  It has a flavor and taste that is impossible to describe.  Though it’s used in almost every culture’s foods, it’s very common in Hispanic and Middle Eastern foods.  I’d get a tiny bit and try it for yourself, but I adore the flavor of cumin.
• Curry isn’t a spice.  It’s more of a group of Indian dishes that involve a very specific mix of spices in very delicate ratios.  However, I can’t take the time to make my own curry mixes, so I cheat and use commercially available curry powder.  Curry powder is usually yellow because there’s a large amount of tumeric in them.  They provide a very authentic Indian taste while not being spicy (usually) or requiring you to mix your own spices.
• Dill Weed is a flowering plant in the Mediterranean and Russian areas.  It gives your dill pickles their flavor.  Dill doesn’t have that many culinary applications.  In fact, most people only ever use it to mix into sour cream and make dip.  I can’t think of a reason you’d need it otherwise.
• Fennel is the bulb end of a flowering plant in the Mediterranean region.  It has a strong licorice taste and is sold in bulb, leaf, and seeds varieties.  I don’t like fennel because I don’t like licorice.  If you like licorice, you’ll like it.
• Fenugreek is a plant that comes from the Middle East and Asia.  Fenugreek seeds are used in the preparation of pickles while the dried leaves are used widely in Indian and Ethiopian cuisine.  I’ve racked my brain and can’t remember that I’ve ever used this one.
• Garlic is the best thing to ever make the spice trade.  Native to Europe, it’s a member of the onion family with a deeper flavor.  You can buy it in whole cloves, pre-minced in oil, and dried in flakes, powder, salt, pepper, etc.  I personally prefer to buy pre-minced in oil and keep it in my fridge.  That stuff stays good forever, as long as it’s refrigerated.  However, garlic powder doesn’t take up that much room in your cabinet either.  Your preference – your choice.
• Ginger is the root of a plan native to South Asia but it also grows in the Caribbean.  It’s sold fresh, powdered, candied, and pickled.  Eating straight ginger will appear spicy, but it’s also a great stomach calmer.  Ginger is used, almost exclusively in Asian dishes, but if you ever make real gingerbread, you’ll need it.
• Lemongrass is a general name for about 55 different types of grasses.  As you might have guessed, they have a lemony flavor to them.  It’s generally used in south Asian dishes.
• Mace is not an incredibly spicy herb, regardless of the pepper spray by that name.  In reality, mace is the lacy covering of the nutmeg seed.  As such, it has a very, very strong version of the nutmeg taste and costs about twice as much.  I have successfully substituted twice as much nutmeg for mace in the past.
• Mint is probably the most versatile of any of the herbs listed here.  There are peppermint, spearmint, winterfresh mint, and others who all lend their name to different types of gum.  Mint tastes just like its name and is excellent in some teas as well as a rub for fishes and a dip for lamb.  I like fresh mint, but it is available dried.
• Mustard is the yellow spice that both flavors and gives color to the condiment.  You can buy the seeds ground or whole.  The whole seeds are those neat round pebbles in bread and butter pickles.  I have a cool recipe that uses ground mustard as part of a rub.  It gives a unique taste to the meat you use it on.  However, most people don’t need this to start out with.
• Nutmeg is the nut of a tree that grows in Indonesia.  As such, if people in your family have tree nut allergies – do not use nutmeg!!!  I’m serious; I accidentally served a nutmeg dish to a friend who had to use his EpiPen because of it.  It made me feel awful and I’ve never made the same mistake again.  Nutmeg has long been considered good luck and has a flavor that’s great in cookies and tarts.  In fact, there was a time that you could buy an entire American plantation for three or four whole nutmeg nuts.  If you don’t use nutmeg a lot, buy a whole nutmeg and grate it when you need it.  It’ll hold its flavor much better.  If you’ve watched Good Eats with Alton Brown, you’ve probably seen him do that.