Choosing and Cooking with Spices

Spices and herbs for cooking should be of great quality. We often look for quality in other ingredients (organic dairy products, grass-fed meat, farm-fresh eggs, and more) but might not consider spices and the fairly minimal quantities in which they are used. It can seem that their value does not matter, yet fresh and excellent spices can impart a wonderful depth of unmatched flavor to your food preparation.

  • Their source. Just as in sourcing other foods, you want to know at least something about the source of the spices you purchase. While many spices are grown in distant lands and we cannot exactly meet the farmer producing them, I like to buy spices from dedicated spice companies, local spice distributors, or boutique spice stores—all of which seem particular about their sources and package their spices in glass for freshness. Even the aroma of the spices from these types of sources shows a distinct difference from the spices in tiny plastic jars on supermarket shelves. Try not to reach for spices from the largest, most prevalent companies, as they deal in such volume that quality is sometimes lost in the process. In my experience, plastic jars do not keep spices as fresh as glass does; plus, it may be only me, but I’m not as inspired to use great quantities of spices or herbs if they are hiding inside a cloudy plastic jar instead of beckoning from a clear glass jar. Some brands I have liked are Frontier Naturals, Simply Organic, The Spice Hunter, and Savory Spice Shop.

  • Your pantry. Keep a jar of every herb and spice in your cupboard. Buy every single kind from your favorite brand {make sure it is a brand offering good quality}. This way you will be prepared to cook any common recipe, anytime. {There are some Asian or African spices that are harder to find but hardly ever called for in recipes that circulate in the Western world; having all of the typical spices found at your store will still cover what you need for almost any international flavor.} Much of being eager to cook and efficient while doing so, comes from having the ingredients at hand—ingredients to follow a recipe exactly, and ingredients with which to experiment when the mood strikes. Good quality spices add much depth to a dish, and continually substituting other spices or herbs is not only hard to figure out, but does not lead to adventurous flavors. While you are stocking one of everything into your pantry, go through old expiration dates in spices you already have, then look for duplicates, empty jars, and spices that you can use up in order to make room for a fresh supply. Besides, rows of glass spice jars are so pretty and decorative in a kitchen; I just love how they look, and love using their contents.

  • Their storage. Store spices out of direct sunlight and heat. While I do like to see spices in rows of glass jars, many of mine are in a tray in a cupboard, and only some are left out in a spice rack on a counter that never sees direct sunlight. The back of the stove-top is not typically a good place to store spices because there is too much heat and steam {not to mention splatters} nearby. Besides, you never want to pour spices directly from a spice jar into a steaming pot of food, so the spices do not need to be kept behind the stove for this reason anyway. Use mini-prep bowls to mix spices ahead of seasoning food, or pour spices into the jar’s cap or into a spoon so that steam does not get trapped inside the spice jar when you replace it to its shelf.

  • More on herbs. Some spices and herbs could be bought in bulk, such as from Costco {theirs always seem very fresh to begin with, but are large quantities to use up}, only if you use them frequently. Herbs can be grown and dried easily from your garden. If you grow your own herbs or buy a few types in bulk, you might more readily use spices liberally. For instance, recipes often call for 1/2 teaspoon of dried herbs when it can easily handle 2 teaspoons. Recipes call for a tablespoon of fresh herbs for garnish when they can easily handle 1/4 cup. I tend to buy herbs in crumbled-leaf form instead of powder. Herbs in visible pieces seem more versatile for both seasoning and garnishing food, and if you need them to be powdery, you can always make the dried pieces into powder with your hand, a food processor, or mortar and pestle. Herbs add countless health benefits and are well worth using generously as well as learning more about their unique nutrients.

  • Spice blends? We have mostly been considering individual spices. There are also spice blends to consider. Similar principles apply, of course. If you have a stock of almost every typical spice, kept in your own cupboard, you will be prepared to any blend of spices called for in a recipe {such as Herbes de Provence, Ras el Hanout, Garam Masala, or Jamaican Jerk seasoning}. If there are certain blends you frequently use, buy a few from a boutique spice company until you find the version you like the best, and keep it stocked in your kitchen. Spice blends of high-quality spices are not necessarily more expensive than individual spices, so there is nothing to lose from having blends ready-made. Spice blends from non-boutique companies are often far from wholesome; I have recently seen spice blends that include yellow food coloring, soybean oil, corn syrup solids, anti-caking agents, MSG, cornstarch, and overall things that we don’t want to eat—things that are superfluous and that detract greatly from the flavor and nutrition of the spices. Avoid these! Avoiding lesser-quality brands will mostly alleviate this problem, but you can still read the ingredients of anything you purchase. If the spices are high quality, fresh and flavorful in themselves, there will not need to be anything but the spice(s) itself contained in the jar.

Cooking Lessons, Recipe VignettesMountain Culinaire