http://www.spicelines.com/ en Copyright 2008 Sun, 11 May 2008 18:28:31 -0800 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/ http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Fresh curry leaves, plucked in a Hindu family's garden in Kerala, lend a pleasingly bitter edge to fish, coconut and vegetable curries. They have nothing to do with curry powder. Fresh curry leaves are one of the more mysterious ingredients in Indian cooking. These green, almond-shaped leaves have nothing to do with curry powder, of course. Nor are they related to the lacy, pale grey curry plant that appears at herb stands in early summer. But curry and curry leaves do have one thing in common: the word “curry” which derives from the Tamil kari, meaning soup or sauce. And it all makes sense when you discover that the fresh leaves are widely used to season the fish, coconut and vegetable curries of South India. ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/05/curry_leaves_a_mystery_ingredi.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/05/curry_leaves_a_mystery_ingredi.htm Spices: Curry Leaves Sun, 11 May 2008 18:28:31 -0800 Diary of an obsession: It took four weeks and a dozen failed attempts before I was able to replicate the sumptuous red snapper curry I tasted in India. This is what happens when I become obsessed with a recipe: In the last few weeks, I’ve cooked 9 pounds of red snapper, cracked open 13 coconuts, and bought so many fresh curry leaves that Thomas and James, the owners of our local Indian grocery, thought they’d found the promised land. I flew through the kilo of dried Kashmiri chilies I hand-carried back from Goa, then spent days calling and emailing around the country looking for more. I fried so much chili paste that the house filled up with eye-watering fumes. Doors slammed, imprecations were muttered. And let’s not talk about clogging the sink with grated coconut, or the many sample containers that clogged the refrigerator. ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/05/recipe_kerala_red_snapper_curr.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/05/recipe_kerala_red_snapper_curr.htm Wed, 07 May 2008 15:18:03 -0800 In Coatepec, Veracruz, Don Ruperto Opoch now sells Altura coffee to buyers in South Korea. A post on SpiceLines brought him to their attention. You’ve heard of the “butterfly effect,” haven’t you? It’s the idea, put forth by Conrad Lorenz, that the whisper soft beating of of a butterfly’s wing may stir up air currents that create a storm thousands of miles away. Something like the butterfly effect seems to have happened in Veracruz. And it’s very good news. Two years ago, I wrote about the plight of Don Ruperto Opoch, a genteel third generation organic coffee farmer whose story nearly broke my heart ("Veracruz: Great Coffee If You Can Find It; a Grower’s Lament"). "We are starving," he told me with simple dignity. After a lifetime of hard work and passion for his craft, he was slowly watching his entire world slip away. ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/05/spice_news_this_blog_helps_ver.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/05/spice_news_this_blog_helps_ver.htm Sun, 04 May 2008 14:02:29 -0800 The best juleps are homemade, of course: Here, sipping quality bourbon, simple syrup, and fresh mint in a silver cup. April showers, sometimes tropical, have propelled the garden mint skywards. A few days ago there were just a few paltry shoots poking out of the ground. Now a towering phalanx of purple-stemmed English peppermint with the most luscious fragrance has slipped through the boxwood hedge and is engulfing the jalapenos. Just in time for the Kentucky Derby this Saturday. Will Recapturetheglory nose out bookmakers’ favorites like Big Brown or Colonel John? I have no idea. But I do know one thing: All that mint is just calling for a julep. Or two. ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/05/the_perfect_mint_julep_shave_t.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/05/the_perfect_mint_julep_shave_t.htm Thu, 01 May 2008 08:56:40 -0800 Susana Trilling's Chile Lovers' Tour is among the culinary vacations featured in the May 2008 Gourmet. Here, a pail of rare chilhuacle chiles harvested in the fall. Photo credit: www.seasonsofmyheart.com Somehow we wound up at a raucous baptism, drinking shots of mescal and dancing to pulsating music. A few years ago, I took a summer cooking class in Oaxaca with Susana Trilling. One day there was a surprise invitation to a fiesta. After driving aimlessly around a colonia on the outskirts of town, we heard music and let our ears take us to the party. Susana’s friends welcomed us warmly into their backyard and sat us at a round wooden table. We got to kiss the young man whose baptism we were celebrating—a sturdy, two-year-old riding on his grandmother’s hip. ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/spice_news_cooking_classes_for.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/spice_news_cooking_classes_for.htm Spice News Sun, 27 Apr 2008 18:32:57 -0800 Signs of spring: fresh soft shell crab and green garlic from the Farmer's Market. Yes, spring is here. The herb and vegetable garden is ready for ex-pat transplants: Black Russian tomatoes, French tarragon, Mexican poblano chiles. And sometimes, a purely local meal comes together in a most unusual fashion. ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/spring_market_breakfast_sizzle.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/spring_market_breakfast_sizzle.htm Local Flavors Spices: Garlic Where to Eat, Drink & Shop in the Triangle Sun, 20 Apr 2008 18:02:11 -0800 At the Rice Boat restaurant in the Taj Malabar, spicy meen mulagittathu, a delicious fish curry flavored with Kashmiri chilies, is served with basmati rice. First taste of India: a delicate coconut cookie, thin with buttery crumbs. When I open my eyes, there are sunrise views of the Arabian Sea. My fourth taste: a sumptuous fish curry. Chunks of tender red snapper swimming in bright orange broth burnished with Kashmiri chilies, crackled with mustard seeds and curry leaves. ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/in_india_the_scent_of_sandalwo.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/in_india_the_scent_of_sandalwo.htm Wed, 16 Apr 2008 12:12:37 -0800 Bittersweet chocolate truffles from La Maison du Chocolat on Madison Avenue are dusted with cocoa and filled with coffee-flavored dark chocolate ganache. B returned from New York Thursday night, bearing surprise early birthday gifts—forty-eight, to be exact, and all in one box. The surprise? Oh, just a quarter pound of the most exquisite bittersweet chocolate truffles from La Maison du Chocolat on Madison Avenue. Two layers of handmade cocoa-dusted morsels, filled with unctuous dark chocolate ganache subtly flavored with coffee. Unwrapping the signature cocoa-hued box, tied up with a café au lait-colored ribbon, was almost as delicious. ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/la_maison_du_chocolat_in_new_y.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/la_maison_du_chocolat_in_new_y.htm Spice News Sat, 12 Apr 2008 10:39:52 -0800 Denise Vivaldo of L.A.-based Food Fanatics dishes about food styling: "I always tell the actors the food is poisoned so they can't eat it. If they have to nibble on camera, I serve them a few salad leaves." Here’s what I did last weekend: Blow-torched a nearly raw chicken into gleaming submission, sealed limp hamburger buns with Scotchgard, built a toothpick scaffolding to prop up a collapsing wedge of chocolate cake. Then there was the no-melt “ice cream” made from a blend of Crisco, powdered sugar and cornstarch, and… Well, you get the picture. ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/my_day_with_denise_food_fanati.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/my_day_with_denise_food_fanati.htm Mon, 07 Apr 2008 12:54:59 -0800 Gerard Vives, photographed in Paris last spring, sells 19 varieties of extraordinary peppercorns to the top chefs of Paris--and to you, if you know where to shop. In Paris last spring I finally had breakfast with Gerard Vives, I’d been on his trail for over a year. Or maybe five. That’s when I first ran across his peppercorns at Maison Izrael. Izrael is Paris’s most venerable spice shop, stuffed to the rafters with dusty packets, jars and bottles, and that wintry Friday afternoon rue Francois-Miron was thronged with weekend chefs, stocking up on hard-to-get ingredients. (One kitten-heeled woman asked for Mazola as if it were the rarest huile d’argan.) The place was mobbed and how my eyes ever lighted upon the slim box inscribed Le Comptoir des Poivres I’ll never know. ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/a_conversation_with_gerard_viv.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/a_conversation_with_gerard_viv.htm Conversations with Cooks and Writers Fri, 04 Apr 2008 12:31:49 -0800 “How sophisticated we all felt back in the dark days of the 1970’s when the moustachioed Italian waiter approached our table with a three-foot-tall, polished-wood pepper mill…” writes Charles Campion in “Real Food: Hot Stuff,” at Independent.co.uk (March 29, 2008). “Black pepper became the mainspring of fine dining and…the ingredients list of every recipe…tailed off with an identical mantra—add salt to taste and freshly ground black pepper.” ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/spice_news_the_many_flavor_of.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/spice_news_the_many_flavor_of.htm Spice News Wed, 02 Apr 2008 11:26:48 -0800 A school of caramel "carp" with dark chocolate scales are a sweet April Fool's Day prank. Photo credit: www.patrickroger.com Oh, to be in Paris today, scooping up these cunning faux carp from Patrick Roger. Not that they would actually fool anyone. But with their caramel filling, black chocolate scales and googly white eyes, a netful of these little darlings would make a delectable April Fool's Day prank. Roger, one of Paris’s top chocolatiers, has a passion for sculpting fish and other whimsical creatures out of his favorite medium. When I was at his Boulevard St. Germain boutique last spring, schools of bright tropical fish were swimming through one window while life size penguins perched on ice floes in the other. A few weeks later, wicked caricatures of Nicholas Sarkozy and Segolene Royal, on bowling pins made of chocolate, danced across his website. Go here to read more about Patrick Roger on Spicelines. And for the dark (not chocolate) side of April 1 pranks, read “April Fool! The Purpose of Pranks” by Benedict Carey, in today’s New York Times, Science Times, pp. D1 and D5. ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/for_april_fools_day_faux_fish.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/04/for_april_fools_day_faux_fish.htm Tue, 01 Apr 2008 08:23:53 -0800 “You are going to India?” be asked. “Then you must bring back some Kashmiri saffron because no more is coming in.” He thought for a moment. “And you must try black spot fish. Very delicious.” He thought a little more. “You are going to Kerala? This is the most beautiful part of India.” So! I’m leaving for the west coast of India tonight. My head is spinning with visions of rosy peppercorns ripening on the vine and winged fishing nets on the vast Arabian Sea. Dreaming of idlis and appams, coconut curry and green chilies, a hundred varieties of bananas. Portuguese churches and pork vindaloo. Elephants, temples and rose-flavored kulfi. Bollywood bangles, scents at the attarwalla. I’ll be back in March. See you then… ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/02/gone_to_india.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/02/gone_to_india.htm Tue, 19 Feb 2008 07:16:05 -0800 A teaspoon--or even a baby spoon--makes short work of peeling ginger's gnarly skin. When I peel it, I use a sharp paring knife. But a recent peek at Apartment Therapy's Kitchn revealed a new way to remove ginger’s gnarly skin—with a spoon. Could it be? I went right down to my own kitchen, pulled a knob of fresh ginger out of the fridge and began scraping with a teaspoon. In moments the fragrant root was naked, ready for grating or chopping. This is an easy alternative to peeling with a knife, especially if your blade is a bit dull. For best results, use a teaspoon with a thin or tapered edge—Alexandra’s silver baby spoon, which I now use for serving condiments, was ideal. And if you’re wondering how best to grate ginger once you’ve peeled it (or not), see SpiceLines' Tools of the Trade on our grater competition. ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/02/a_new_way_to_peel_fresh_ginger.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/02/a_new_way_to_peel_fresh_ginger.htm Basics Sat, 16 Feb 2008 07:37:14 -0800 Riffling through the latest Saveur 100 List, my eye was riveted by No. 94—a short but rhapsodic piece by Madhur Jaffrey on the wonders of turmeric. In “Super Spice,” the actress and Indian cookbook author raves about the culinary and medicinal properties of turmeric, praising the “pungently woody, earthy aroma” it adds to salads, relishes and curry pastes as well as its near miraculous ability to heal inflammation. “I use turmeric sparingly in cooking,” she writes, “often dusting it on fish along with salt and red chili powder.” I was thinking about this warm spice blend a few days later while reading “Spain’s Hot Potatoes,” (The Wall Street Journal, January 19, 2008, p. W4). William R. Snyder tracks the frenetic competition among Barcelona tapas bars for the most delectable patatas bravas, or fried potatoes. Normally the potatoes are served with two sauces, one white with garlic, the other red and spicy. But I had another idea. Why not dredge potatoes in turmeric, red pepper and salt, and then deep fry them? ]]> http://www.spicelines.com/2008/02/recipe_indian_fried_potatoes_w.htm http://www.spicelines.com/2008/02/recipe_indian_fried_potatoes_w.htm Mon, 11 Feb 2008 14:19:03 -0800