teaspoon spices

Best breakfast for a cool, overcast day -- oatmeal. Healthy, stick-to-your-ribs hearty, and perfect for the pure flavors or organic spices. You won't miss the sugar!

Spiced oatmeal -- healthy, hearty and just plain good

What better breakfast on a rainy winter morning -- or any morning, really -- than oatmeal? Healthy, stick-to-your-ribs hearty, and the perfect vehicle for yummy condiments.

Like spices -- organic spices.

The only problem with oatmeal is that it begs for additions like cream, sugar and even butter. We solved that problem by reaching for spices instead. Add a teaspoon of cinnamon or ginger or allspice -- or a blend of all three -- and you won't miss the sugar.

 

Simple cider

If you’re on the watch for ghosties and goblins tonight, warm yourself up with some simply mulled cider.

We heated up some good, local apple cider last week, added a tablespoon of honey plus a teaspoon each of ginger, allspice and cinnamon. Then we heated it gently and served it up.

Yum! We loved it better than the more elaborate mulling-spice combinations. It must be the ginger – our current favorite companion for Fall’s fabulous apples.

 

Simple mulled cider

 

4 cups apple cider

1 tablespoon honey

1 teaspoon allspice

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon ginger

 

Combine all ingredients in a pot and warm gently. Do not boil.

Food Day every day!

Somebody proclaimed this past Monday as National Food Day, but we like to think of every day as Food Day.

After all, we eat every day, so why not pay daily attention to the goals of Food Day – the need for healthy, affordable food produced in a sustainable, humane way.

Here at tsp spices, we like to make that easier for you with convenient packets of organic spices that inspire you to try new ways of enjoying familiar food.

This time of year we are enjoying the Fall harvest, all those choices of winter squash, yams and root vegetables. Our current favorite is butternut squash, peeled, diced, tossed with some olive oil and herbs (we like a teaspoon each of rosemary and thyme), and roasted for 20 minutes or until done.

That’s healthy, affordable, sustainable and humane.

It’s also delicious!

Creamed fennel cabbage

Not everybody in my household loves cabbage.  But I do!  I frequently make a one dish meal of cabbage, apples and pork chops, and everyone is pretty compliant about eating it.  But cabbage as a side dish?  Or plain cabbage as an accompaniment? Not so fast.

I came up with a solution last night, and it is a keeper.  (Even the Doctor agreed to that, and he usually complains that cabbage makes the house smell bad for days.)  I love the sweet flavor of fennel in the autumn, and wanted to make a more substantial dish of the cabbage than just steaming or sautéing usually yields.

 I experimented with creaming a lot of vegetables this summer, as I was totally hooked on the Victory Garden cookbook, and just about every other recipe in that classic volume either calls for cream or is a creamed version.   Then one of the NY Times food writers got me hooked on creamed corn (which I spiced up, of course.)  I have also been trying to eat less meat (well, less food in general if you want to know the truth) but I find I am far more satisfied when I have a little bit of richness in my veggies rather than just plain steamed or roasted veggies.

So I made creamed cabbage.  I had a beautiful tender cabbage from One Straw Farm, our local CSA.  It was lovely in texture and flavor, it did not smell during cooking or afterward, and I served it with a gratin of eggplant and butternut squash. 

Creamed Fennel Cabbage

1 teaspoon fennel seed

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon butter

1 green cabbage head, cored and cut into 4 or 8 wedges (depending on size)

½ cup chicken broth

½ to 1 cup half and half or cream.

 

Melt the butter in a large enough saucepan to hold the cabbage easily.  Add fennel seed, salt and pepper and allow fennel seeds to toast until fragrant.  Add cabbage to pan, and sauté briefly.  Pour chicken broth and cream over and allow to simmer over low heat for about ½ hour, until cabbage is tender and soft.  Remove cabbage from pan with a slotted spoon, then reduce cream and broth mixture until the sauce is thick and almost syrupy. 

Pour the sauce over the cabbage and serve with a lean protein or another vegetable dish as a main course.  Add more salt and coarse ground pepper to taste.

--Katie

 

Blend your own curry powder

Katie's post on curried squash reminded me how much I love curried vegetables this time of year. Something about the warm flavors of cumin, turmeric, and the other spices that make up a good curry blend seem to go well with the onset of cooler evenings.

We love our Smart Spice curry powder blend. But it's also fun to blend your own, which you can easily do. The recipe is simple. And because you can control the amount of each spice, you can make it hotter with more chile pepper, or choose less heat and add more cumin for earthiness or a bit more ginger for that special ginger tingle.

Here's our favorite formula for self-blending curry powder. You can use it for the curried squash coins in the previous post, or in any other dish that calls for curry. One of our favorite uses for this blend is adding it to mayonnaise (start with 1 teaspoon for about 1/2 cup of mayo) and spread it on your favorite lunch-time sandwich. If you don't have all these spices on hand, check out our $10 spice sampler.

Curry powder

2 teaspoons ground cumin

1 teaspoon ground coriander

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1 teaspoon ground turmeric

1 teaspoon mild chile pepper

Combine all ingredients in a small bowl. Store the unused seasoning in an airtight container for up to 2 months.

Makes 2 tablespoons

--Sara

Curried butternut squash "coins"

I always love autumn- not least because I love the richness of autumn vegetables,  especially squash.

Last week, I picked up a beautiful butternut squash at our CSA, and thought about what to do with it.  I had recently seen a recipe that called for cutting wedges out of an acorn squash and roasting them. 

The shape of butternut squash does not really lend itself to this treatment, so instead I sliced it into "coins," all the way down the neck.  Once I reached the fat part that houses the seeds, I made the coins a bit thicker, and then cut the seedy part out, leaving a ring.

I sprayed a baking pan with non-stick spray, then placed the squash coins on the pan.  This was a small, tender squash, so I didn't even need to peel it. I sprinkled the slices with a packet of Smart Spice curry powder, and roasted them at 375 degrees for a little more than 30 minutes. 

These squash coins were delicious, and lovely to look at.  I plan to include them as a side dish at my next dinner party because they were beautiful, tasty and most important, easy!

--Katie

Herb-Stuffed Eggplant

As fond as I am of fresh herbs, I love the strong flavor -- and convenience -- of dried herbs. Drying concentrates the flavor of an herb, lending depth to any dish. For the past few weeks I've been making use of dried herbs in cooking the produce we're picking up each week from our CSA. One of my favorite recipes is Herb-Stuffed Eggplant, adapted from the wonderful book, "Cucina Fresca," (Harper & Row, 1985), by Viana La Place and Evan Kleiman. It's a perfect way to use the lovely eggplants from One Straw Farm.

The recipe in the book calls for a mixture of fresh herbs (your choice -- basil, oregano, mint, marjoram, etc.) If you're using fresh herbs, you'll need about 1 1/2 cups altogether.

The first time I made the recipe I used some fresh basil and fresh oregano with a teaspoon each of dried basil and oregano. The results were good.

The next time I skipped the fresh stuff altogether and the results was even better because the herbal flavors were more pronounced. I like that extra burst of flavor, so I have continued to use only dried herbs in this recipe, although fresh herbs make a nice garnish for the finished dish.

Here's my version:

Herb-Stuffed Eggplant:

3-4 Japanese eggplants, or 2-3 very small eggplants

Coarse salt

3 tablespoons olive oil

3-4 teaspoons dried herbs (your choice)

1/4 cup wine or water

Cut each Japanese eggplant in half lengthwise, but do not remove the stem. If you are using regular eggplants that are very round, cut them lengthwise into quarters. Score the eggplants by making diagonal, shallow slashes into the flesh. Salt the eggplants and let them sit for 20 minutes so that the water comes to the surface. Blot the eggplants dry with paper towels, removing as much salt as possible. While holding the eggplant so that the slashes are slightly open, fill the slashes with the herbs.

Heat the olive oil in a large skillet. When the oil is hot, place the eggplant halves cut-side down in the oil. Fry for 5 minutes over high heat. Pour the wine or water over the eggplant, cover, lower the heat, and braise for 5 to 10 more minutes or until the eggplants are tender. Remove the cover. If any liquid remains, turn up the heat and cook until it evaporates.

Remove the eggplants to a platter. Cool and serve at room temperature. 

Makes 4 to 6 servings

 --Sara
 

 

A boost for fresh basil

It has been a hot, hard summer for our backyard basil. This time of year, it's typical for a few of our plants to be losing their color and generally looking like they've run their course. But this year, practically all of them seem to be well into an end-of-summer swoon, still weeks before the first frost. So the secret we learned long ago about cooking with fresh basil -- boosting it with dried basil -- is coming in handy.

Even when basil is splendidly green and fresh, we've learned that a teaspoon of dried basil is a delicious addition to pesto or our other favorite fresh-basil recipes. Both dried basil and fresh basil are delicious, and each has strengths.

Fresh basil is, well, wonderfully fresh-tasting. Dried basil is intense, with a concentrated flavor. Added to fresh basil, it creates a deeper layer of flavor, like a good bass line in a melodious tune. 

So, as you harvest your own basil, or take advantage of a fresh bunch at a farmers market or the grocery store, remember that you can boost your basil flavor by adding a teaspoon or two of dried basil. And if your dried basil is organic, you get 100% pure flavor, no additives or fillers to dilute the pleasure.

--Sara

A late-summer salad

Our CSA has been offering some beautiful seeded watermelons, a fat, round, heirloom variety called Moon and Stars. I can't resist a good watermelon, especially in the waning days of summer. And despite the bother, I'm firmly convinced that seeded watermelons taste better.

The farmers' market is also teeming with beautiful heirloom tomatoes, and they are worth the wait.

Either of these fruits (yes, tomato is technically a fruit) is delicious all on its own. But a couple of years ago I came across a recipe for watermelon-tomato salad and was delighted with the combination.

I tried recreating the salad and remembered why we liked it so much in the first place. My version included a couple of different kinds of tomatoes, along with fresh basil and mint from the garden, a handful of crumbled feta cheese, and a red wine vinaigrette.

What I didn't add, and what the salad needed, was some concentrated basil flavor -- organic dried basil. I added a teaspoon, and it made all the difference. Yet another reminder that despite all the fresh herbs in the garden there's a place in summer cooking for fresh-tasting dried herbs -- organic, of course.

--Sara