Cooking with herbs & spices

Sage dressing. Chili beans. Caraway rye. Most everyone who cooks considers a handful of herbs and spices staple ingredients. But why limit yourself to the expected? With just a little know-how and a sense of adventure, you can create original recipes or transform the same old meal into an entirely new one.

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Savvy seasoning can make for more healthful recipes, too. Use them to reduce salt and sugar consumption or make low-fat meals more enticing. Of course, certain herbs and spices are intrinsically good for you. And many people say they eat less of a well-seasoned dish than they do a bland one. Here are a few tips to help you feel like a seasoned pro:

• With a few exceptions, use herbs and spices sparingly, to enhance and accent other flavors rather than dominate them. 1/2 For starters, try1/2 teaspoon of spice for a dish that serves four to six. (For herbs, use 1/2 teaspoon powdered, 1-1/2 teaspoon dried, chopped, or 1 tablespoon fresh chopped.) Because oils are concentrated in the drying process, it takes about half the quantity of dried herbs as fresh.

• To release the flavor of dried herbs, crumble them in your palm—or grind with a mortar and pestle—before adding them to your dish.

• Add whole spices during cooking to allow their flavors to permeate the food.

• When you use whole dried spices in cooking, tie them in a cheesecloth or metal tea strainer for easy removal.

• Add ground or cut herbs and spices midway or towards the end of your cooking time, so their flavors won’t dissipate.

• When preparing salad dressings, blend the seasonings with the other ingredients a few hours before needed and refrigerate, so the flavors will meld.

• Allow for the buildup of pungency with red pepper or any spice blends containing red pepper. First taste tests often seem mild!

• Season vegetables with herb butters. Simply add herbs or spices to melted butter and pour over vegetables, or refrigerate for later use. Good herb butter seasonings include parsley, lemon pepper, thyme, marjoram, garlic, basil, oregano, chervil, tarragon and dill weed.

• Marinate fish in lemon juice and herbs several hours before cooking. Or lay herbs across fish before steaming.

• Substitute cinnamon, cloves, allspice, ginger, anise or fennel for some of the sweetener in fruit and dessert recipes.

• To reduce your salt intake, substitute strong, flavorful spices such as black pepper, curry, cumin, basil and oregano. Experiment with blends in your salt shaker.

Our buyers have travelled the world many times over, meeting with farmers and suppliers in order to guarantee the quality and purity of our herbs and spices.

Visit our sourcing diary to learn about our most recent trip.


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