[Sca-cooks] grains of paradise
Lilinah
lilinah at earthlink.net
Fri Aug 8 09:30:35 PDT 2008
Ian Kusz wrote:
>Okay, dumb question. What are grains of paradise, where are they from, what
>food do they feature in, what do they taste like (so I can figure out what
>complements them), and how much is necessary for a dish?
My favorite source for spice info is Gernot Katzer's Spice Pages
http://www.uni-graz.at/~katzer/engl/
all sorts of botanical info, names in myriad languages, color photos
of the plant and the spice, history, and more. Unfortunately, one
cannot smell or taste spices over the web, or i'm sure Gernot would
have included those, too.
Here is his page on Grains of Paradise:
http://www.uni-graz.at/~katzer/engl/Afra_mel.html
Grains of Paradise are pungent, and while they may be used where one
uses black or white pepper, they taste nothing like them. They are an
ingredient in some actual historical recipes for "Fine Spice", which
is generally used in "period" savory dishes. Besides using them in
savory dishes, I think they might be tasty used with fruits like
cherries or peaches.
I don't know where you live (well, i know you're in Alaska, but
that's a big place). Whole Foods sells them now - or at least several
i've been into in California and Pennsylvania - i dunno if you've got
one near you... otherwise, the internet is your friend, as i'm sure
you already know.
--
Urtatim (that's err-tah-TEEM)
the persona formerly known as Anahita
My LibraryThing
http://www.librarything.com/catalog/lilinah
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