Flavors of the World: Spice it up!

Photo courtesy of realfood.tesco.com

Spice Up Your Life!

Summer is heating up with a too hot to handle edition of Chef Nicholas’ Flavors of the World! This week our dear chef shares his thoughts on all kinds of different spices and peppers! And now, I’ll turn things over to Chef Nicholas:

My love of spices in foods, desserts, cakes, and pastries stems from kindergarten. My best friend Peter was Indian and, at the age of four, I began eating the delicious Indian food that his mother would make for us.

I adore hot and spicy food and I have yet to eat something too spicy for my palate. I have, however, eaten spicy foods that are not enjoyable because the flavors are not balanced; being the spiciest does not make a dish the best! My partner, Scott, has always said that I have an iron stomach because I can eat foods that are very hot in temperature and that have a great deal of heat from spices.

Spices come in many forms and in varying qualities, so let’s talk about what’s available! Spices can be available in whole (both fresh and dried), ground, paste, extract, oil, and compound forms. I mostly use dried whole spices and grind them as needed, but I have used oil based spices for hard candy and chocolate centers. Companies like Lorann Oil make ginger, nutmeg, clove, and cinnamon oil that are great for candy making; this type of product is perfect for making spice lollipops! These oils would be the best choice when flavoring fondants, or making cream centers (like a ginger cream chocolate). Companies such as Silver Cloud Estates and Amoretti also have extracts and compounds from the spice family.

Spices, like perfumes or fine wines, need to be kept in the right environment- usually a cool, dry, and dark environment. Most people buy spices in the grocery store, but unfortunately they are often not the best in quality. Sometimes these spices are blended with other ingredients which can deplete the intensity of flavor. Where you buy spices makes a huge difference. In Chicago, just up the road from the French Pastry School, is the Spice House. It is the Mecca of spices, and you can buy the most amazing spices there! Having traveled all over the world, it’s the closest thing to being in a spice market in India, Sri Lanka, Morocco, or China!

Photo courtesy of facebook.com/thespicehouse

Walking into the Spice House is a sensory overload! Dozens of jars are beautifully displayed like an old fashioned drug or candy store, and then the wonderful smell and aroma hits you. The Spice House offers every spice you could ever use or need, and offers spices in many forms. Coffee connoisseurs usually buy whole coffee beans and grind as they need them- that is the way to go with many spices too. For example, you can buy ground cinnamon at the Spice House, but it is ground fresh on demand; grinding the cinnamon on demand ensures an amazing flavor as the natural essential oils are only released at the time of grinding. If you were to buy ground cinnamon at the grocery store, the intensity of flavor would be lacking since the cinnamon in the jar could have been ground months or even years ago. Just remember that grinding or grating whole spices (like cinnamon bark/sticks, whole nutmeg, and dried ginger root) only when you need them gives a stronger flavor, so be sure to consider this when adding to recipes! Whole spices can keep for many years, but once they have been ground they will lose their peak flavor and intensity after only a few weeks or months. The most popular spices used in baking are cinnamon, ginger, clove, star anise, nutmeg, mace, cardamom, and allspice.

Cinnamon comes from several geographical regions of the world. Ceylon (Sri Lanka) cinnamon is delicate and light-natured, with a note of citrus. Indonesian cinnamon has a stronger flavor than other cinnamons, with a sharp, bitter edge that goes well with coffee; as the flavor most Americans grew up with, it’s often called the “regular” cinnamon. Chinese cinnamon is sweeter than the Indonesian variety, with a mild depth that blends beautifully into other flavors. It’s often the preferred cinnamon for baking. Saigon cinnamon, from Vietnam, is much stronger than the others, with a sweet spicy heat like red-hot candies. Cinnamon is available in ground and bark/stick forms.

Dehydrated dried Chinese ginger root comes in whole and powdered form. Ginger has the best flavor and is useful for baking. I adore crystallized and candied ginger chopped in my fruit cake as an addition to the vine fruits (especially if enjoying undecorated with fruit and cheese or for afternoon tea), or in scones and ginger cookies. I also use freshly grated ginger in certain cookies and desserts but ginger tends to be more popularly used in savory dishes.

Another spice that I like to use in baking and pastry is star anise. It is used in many Chinese culinary dishes, and it gives an unusual flavor when used in cookies, fruit pies (apple, peach or cherry), and chocolate desserts like mousse and ganache.

Clove is a classic flavor in England, found in clove balls (a hard candy I grew up with) and fruit cake. It has a very unique flavor, and is often used in its ground form. Whole cloves do have many culinary uses such as making pickled peaches, a staple on any southern Thanksgiving table.

I love freshly ground nutmeg on egg nog during the holiday season, in baked rice pudding, in fruitcake, and for making custards. Mace is the outer lacey skin of the nutmeg; when ground I use it in cookies, fruit cake, and tea cakes.

Cardamom comes in black, green and white forms. I use grounded green cardamom in Indian spice cookies (recipe included), and the whole green cardamom pods when I make orange marmalade as it gives a very unique flavor.

Allspice s a mixture of spices that is very popular in the UK for hot cross buns at Easter and in fruit cake. It’s bought as a pre-mixed spice, but can be made by combining equal amounts of ground cinnamon, ground cloves, and ground nutmeg.

Peppers: Too Hot to Handle!

Over the last few years, there has been a trend of adding peppers to unexpected dishes, especially chocolate-based cookies, desserts, chocolates, and cakes. Peppers come in fresh or dried forms and, just like adding espresso to a chocolate cookie or cake, can really liven up the flavor profile! Ancho chilies, habaneros, and bird chilies can be infused in mousse, ganache, ice cream, and brownies that can work beautifully if not over-done. Use peppers with caution- I have eaten various confections that have way too much added! Remember it’s all about balance!

As always, thank you Chef Nicholas for sharing your culinary insights with us in your Flavors of the World articles! I don’t know about you all, but I al pretty excited to give the Indian Spice Cookie recipe a try! I hope that the heat of the summer matches the heat of this spicy post!

Sweetly yours,

Stephanie

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