Spice Up Your Life With Herbs And Spices

By Robert Catherine
The secret to great tasting food is spicing it up and adding your own flavors.To give your food that WOW taste, add additional spices and herbs to your recipe.Spices will change how your food tastes. Here are some simple facts and tips about spices, herbs, condiments and salt and how to use them.Spices are usually found in the baking section of the grocery store. Spices are dried aromatic parts of plants such as roots, bark, flower buds, fruits and seeds.The most well know spice is pepper.Here are some spices I like to use; cayenne will add heat to your dish. Great in chili, soups and stews. Cumin is one of my favorite and it is most commonly used in Mexican dishes but is also great in soups, vegetables and really good in pan fried mushrooms. Cinnamon adds a nice flavor to beef or pork stews. Add a pinch of allspice and clove to your meat sauce for pasta to give a rich and full taste.
Herbs are soft stemmed aromatic plants that are now available fresh at any quality grocery store. There is no need to buy dried herbs any more. Storing fresh herbs is as easy as taking the herbs out of the container and placing them in vase of cold water. Put them in your fridge and change the water daily. The herbs will last for at least week.Most recipes refer to dried herbs, so when using fresh herbs double the amount you are using to get the correct flavors.Always add one third of the fresh herbs at the beginning of the cooking process. This helps flavor the food you are cooking. Then add the remaining herbs about five minutes before serving. This will allow the taste of the fresh herbs to give your dish a signature taste. Use rosemary in pork dishes, oregano in mushrooms, chop fresh basil into your salads, and use both opal (purple basil) and green sweet basil. Chop cilantro into your tomato dishes, use chives to add zip to your omelets. Use fresh chopped parsley to add color and flavor to beans and vegetables.
I call Tabasco, Worcestershire great food pick me uppers. They are great in stews, sauces and soups. Add just before serving to allow their flavors to accent your dishes. Use in small amounts and taste after each addition until you that wow taste.
Salt is very important in adding flavor to dishes. Add small amounts at the beginning of the cooking process and finish with salt just before serving. Always add small amounts and taste. Salt helps to bring all the flavors of your dish together.
The secret to great tasting food is spicing it up.
Chef Robert and Barb Catherine are authors of Chef Robert Presents Romantic Dinners For Two and relationship experts on the television show Get Married.
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Why Spices are Important

By Dyfed Lloyd Evans
These days certain spices have become so ubiquitous at our tables that we hardly think of them as spices at all... Black pepper is the obvious example here, but I'd include chillies in the form of sauces and pastes as well. Just think of the salt and pepper cellars on just about each and every table and the chilli-based condiments that are everywhere. Also, look at any recipe on the web and if they're for a savoury dish I guarantee you that well over 90% will have 'season with salt and pepper' somewhere in the cooking instructions.
Today black pepper is both cheap and plentiful and it's hard for us to even consider a time when pepper was an incredibly rare and expensive commodity. However, until very recently (and even during the Second World War in Europe) black pepper was both expensive and rare. It was only produced in India and found its way to Europe by strange and mysterious means.
The first recorded use of black pepper in Europe and North Africa was in the tomb of the pharaoh Rameses II who had two peppercorns stuck in this nostrils when he was mummified (and that was 4000 years ago). But the first Western peoples to use black pepper extensively were the Greeks and they introduced the love of this spice to the Romans. As a result the Romans were the first Europeans to travel to India in search of this magical substance (of course, Indian traders had been going the other way for centuries!).
In many ways black pepper is the perfect spice in that it has the 'heat' and 'pungency' that lift the flavours of a dish but brings with it no hint of bitterness. It therefore gives any and all foods an 'oomph' in terms of flavour without making them unpalatable (this is why Romans even put pepper in their desserts!).
But what actually is a spice? In terms of a modern definition, a spice is typically obtained from the dried fruiting body of a plant. Thus it can be the whole fruit (as in cubeb pepper or allspice berries or cumin) or it is the kernel or seed of the fruit (as in nutmeg and fenugreek seeds or nigella seeds). In contrast, herbs are the vegetative parts of a plant (the stems and leaves) and include lemongrass (stems), thyme (leaves), oregano (leaves). Spices are also obtained from the roots, rhizomes or tubers of plants. Thus ginger (and its relatives, galangal, zedoary etc) are spices, as is the Medieval spice, Galingale (the root of a sedge, a grass-like plant).
Humans are odd amongst animals in that we like pungency in our foods and many, many spices we do or have employed tend to have this note in their flavour. This, in turn, has led us as a species to use a whole range of spices in our cookery and many of these spices, in some way, echo the distinctive nature of black pepper.
This is why the chilli, when introduced to Europe from the Americas was called the 'chilli pepper' (to associate it with black pepper). Indeed, the vast majority of spices impart 'heat' on a dish and only very few are purely used for their flavouring properties. Chilli is widely used because it imparts pure 'heat' to a dish but it does not have the pungency of black pepper and this is why chilli, though very widely used today, still hasn't displaced black pepper as the King of Spices.
Most of our common and not so common spices have a heat and pungency that mimics black pepper in some way or other. But all of them also impart a bitterness to the foods they flavour. Good examples are cubeb pepper (common in the Middle Ages) and Sénégal Pepper (which was used as a black pepper substitute during the Second World War). They impart both heat and pungency to dishes, but if used to excess they also impart an unpleasant bitterness and this is why they never truly rivalled black pepper as food flavourings.
In our craving for adding that extra 'pep' to our foods humans have scoured all corners of the world and we have tasted and added some very strange things to our dishes (Sichuan pepper, beloved of Chinese cookery is a relative of the orange!). But nothing has rivalled the pre-eminence of black pepper in cookery. The only spice to come close is chilli.
This does mean that our love of black pepper has displaced many local spices that we used to use in the past and it also means that we are ignoring many taste sensations that could usefully be put back in our cookery. Maybe it's time to re-discover some of these lost spices from all over the globe an to re-gain some of our lost culinary heritage.
Dyfed Lloyd Evans is a cook and a lover of all things spice and spice-related. In his [http://www.celtnet.org.uk/recipes/spice_guide.php]Celtnet Guide to Spices you will find descriptions of spices (and recipes for their use) going all the way from Acacia Seeds to Zedoary Root, with everything in between (every letter of the alphabet except 'Q' is represented). He has gathered together a catalogue of 57 57 spices and descriptions of these spices and recipes including them into an eBook: [http://www.celtnet.org.uk/info/spice-book.php]Guide to Spices and their Uses, sales of which go to helping Liberian refugees in Africa. There is also an extensive recipe list of the world's [http://www.celtnet.org.uk/recipes/spices-recipes.php]spice blend mixes which you can get from the site.
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Why Use Organic Herbs And Spices?

Why Use Organic Herbs And Spices?
By Anne Harvester

Organic herbs and spices add zest to your favorite dishes, and several also offer superior medicinal qualities. Some organic herbs are suited to making teas, while others are appropriate for use in perfumes. Purchasing bulk organic herbs makes the use of organic herbs and spices even more cost effective.

Some organic herbs and spices are used in the making of sweet dishes. Orange peel, for example, is a wonderful component of many cookie, pancake and quick bread recipes when a touch of citrus is required to bring out the best in the total combination of ingredients used.

Organic spices can also be used in many of your favorite savory recipes. Dill is wonderful used in stuffed grape leaves' filling, as well as in tartar sauces. Organic spices such as curry powder can take a meal that might be otherwise bland and bring it to a new level of taste with the addition of this zesty spice. Organic bay leaves can be used in a plethora of different recipes from many cuisines from around the world, including simmered bean dishes, soups, and sauces. Fresh organic cumin seed can be ground at home in small batches for the freshest flavor.

Perfumes for the body and household can be made [http://www.starwest-botanicals.com/category/organic/]out of organic essential oils. You can choose to relax with the scent of lavender or lemon organic essential oils wafting around the air from your bath. Other tantalizing scents you might enjoy are orange, peppermint and rosemary. Each offers the senses a slightly different aromatic experience, yet all are enjoyable.

For those who can no longer tolerate the large amount of caffeine in coffee drinks, organic teas can provide the panacea for something hot to drink that you crave. You could select a tea that features a single herb, such as chamomile tea, or you might go for an exquisite blend, such as chai or cinnamon orange spice tea. Some organic teas can provide medicinal features as well. There are detox teas that help to rid your body of impurities and are useful to drink if you choose to abstain from food for a short time. Other organic teas focus on one quality herb noted for its outstanding flavor. Hibiscus tea will boost your daily intake of vitamin C in a delicious way. Moroccan mint and peppermint teas are a wonderful accompaniment to crisp sweet cookies at the end of a meal as well.

When you find [http://www.starwest-botanicals.com/category/organic/]specific organic herbs and spices that you like and use frequently, you will want to economize by purchasing bulk herbs. Because you may select exactly what you use, you will eliminate waste and thus save money. You will also be sure of having what you need on hand when you have a good supply of bulk herbs at the ready. Once you discover the glorious [http://www.starwest-botanicals.com/]taste of organic herbs and spices, you will never want to go back to dull supermarket varieties.

Anne Harvester is an herbalist who has studied the benefits of organic seasonings. In this article, she explores organic herbs and spices. Anne's advice on buying bulk organic herbs and bulk organic spices can help you to save money.

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