Last year, skin powders and purees occupied my thoughts. Tomatoes, peaches, plum and lemons are firm favourites. Here are my notes for tomato skin powder What is it? Dried tomato skins, ground and used as seasoning. I combine mine with salt, pepper and other spices Why do you skin the tomatoes? I use tomatoes in […]
Spices
Apple, Cucumber, Green Pepper Salad, with Cilantro
This salad is easy to rustle up, requires no special ingredients or equipment and is a delight to eat any time of day or year – fresh, sweet, crunch, herby, tart, sour, spicy all make an appearance in the combination of apples, pickled cucumbers, green peppers – bell or jalapenos and my all-time favourite cilantro. […]
Finally Named: ‘Umilo/ Omilo’ is Cocoplum, Paradise Plum!
Do you remember these posts I wrote? Pepper Soup Spice Detective: Umilo/ Omilo But… and The Journey to Names and Provenance – Umilo & Gbafilo In both, I tried to find the botanical names for a specific peppersoup spice, umilo/ omilo. There were some conclusions but they were confusing. For instance, I found the supposed […]
On Prekese/ Aidan/ Aridan Fruit
I’ve almost always used the dried version and so haven’t had the opportunity, till recently to truly get a whiff of the buttery, caramel, chocolate notes the aidan pod has trapped within it. A winged pod, with 2 hard, inedible and 2 soft, edible wings, it is a core ingredient in my mother’s pepper soup. […]
Pepperfruit-cured Salmon
Yes. Pepper fruit cured. I knew I wanted to use it for the way I thought the spicy seeds would cut the chewy fish and add aroma. My desire would be to cure white, local fish but this is a good place to begin. And I’m glad to say it worked. Take some processed pepper […]
Spice: More about Nutmeg
I’ve written about Nutmeg before, about discovering it shelled, walled in Dubai. And still there’s more. And Zanzibar served it up, on a Spice Farm tour. Here, I saw the entire nutmeg fruit – nut, shell, mace and all. Our tour guide, Ramadan shared the fruit and more with us. That nutmeg comes ‘as a fruit’ […]
In Season, In Season – Carrot Pepper soup
I’m trying to eat more than carrot cake, delicious as my version of it is – adapted from food52 and topped with the same lemony cream cheese frosting as goes on my red velvet cake. The last time I made some Carrot cake, on Boxing Day. If you didn’t know the origins of Boxing day […]
Golden Turmeric Milk
A few mornings ago, I made some delicious golden turmeric milk. Thank you @afolakea. Turmeric has so many glowing nutritional qualities – from being an awesome antioxidant to boosting immune health and on and on and on. I believe. I heated milk with cloves, green cardamom, grated fresh turmeric, fresh ginger, brown sugar and almonds. […]
The Anatomy of Fresh Turmeric
The rhizomes – small tubers – of Turmeric remind me of Jerusalem artichokes and ginger at the same time, smaller though. There are a few differences I’ve observed – Difference 1 – Anatomy The skin has more ribs than that of ginger and the rhizomes are generally smaller in size. Difference 2 – Colour We […]