THE NIBBLE Gourmet News & Views
Trends, Products & Items Of Note In The World Of Specialty Foods
Read all of our content on TheNibble.com, the online magazine about specialty food.
Archive for Salts/Seasonings
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June 25, 2008 at 9:15 am
· Filed under Salts/Seasonings
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Want to add more flavor to your foods, quicker, easier and with minimal expense? Try Amore pastes—all-natural concentrated flavor in a tube. Just squeeze a bit of anchovy, garlic, hot chile pepper, pesto tomato or the other flavors in the line. The pastes are imported from Italy, where great cooking is a matter of national honor. They’re a very welcome addition to our kitchen.
Few things are as convenient as a product that can sit in the fridge for months, ready to add exciting flavor to any number of dishes at a moment’s notice. That’s why we love Amore’s gourmet pastes, which are available in seven varieties: anchovy, black olive, garlic, hot pepper, pesto, sun-dried tomato and tomato. They come in handy for everyday cooking, especially when we’re low on spices and aromatics—or just in a hurry. A mere squeeze of the tube gives sauces the tang of fresh tomato, dressings a garlicky zip, and marinades a rush of hot pepper heat. |
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 These squiggles are a lifesaver in the kitchen. Photography by Saidi Granados. |
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The concentrated pastes, which come from Italy, add complexity and character to other foods too. They’re great in dressings and sauces, stirred into soups, on pizza or anywhere you need a hit of flavor. In some cases, they can even be used on their own as spreads. A note: The pastes we tried tended to be already salted, so be sure to taste as you go, before adding additional salt to your dishes. Consider this saltiness yet another convenience—you might not even have to bother with extra seasonings.
Amore is made by Gia, a company located in Sant’Agostino, a municipality in the province of Ferrara in the Italian region Emilia-Romagna, home to balsamic vinegar and Parmigiana-Reggiano cheese, among other delicacies. (Gia also markets a line o pastes in a tube under the Gia brand.) The pastes add negligible calories to dishes—about 15 calories a teaspoon—and are cholesterol-free and sugar-free.
Read about our favorite pastes and some great ways to use them in the full review on TheNibble.com.
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June 10, 2008 at 8:43 am
· Filed under Salts/Seasonings, Tip Of The Day
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| Today is Herbs & Spices Day, so be sure to season liberally! Become a spice mixologist and create your own custom blends. Rosemary and thyme work well together, as do dill and tarragon; but these are just two of countless starting points. Experimenting is key—you may have to adjust proportions and combinations numerous times before you strike gold. Another tip: Make sure your spices are fresh. They aren’t meant to last forever. Check out THE NIBBLE’s spice care courtesy of McCormick. |
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Always make sure to use fresh spices and adjust seasoning blends to your personal taste. |
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March 18, 2008 at 6:45 pm
· Filed under Salts/Seasonings, Tip Of The Day
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 Alaea red lava salts from Hawaii are colored and flavored by clay in the local water. Photo courtesy of Saltworks.us. |
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Bid adieu to one of America’s food icons, the Morton Salt Girl, whose iodized salt is too salty. Instead, accent your food with the far more vivid flavors of sea salts. There are dozens, each with its own flavor and beauty. Some of our favorites are grey Celtic salt, coral-hued Hawaiian sea salt, beige and ochre smoked sea salts and Himalayan pink salt. These are general categories: Each type of salt can be found under different brand names. Sea salts are not as refined (processed) as table salts, so contain nutritious traces of calcium, iodine, iron, magnesium, manganese, potassium and zinc (that also add to the color). They have bright, pure, clean flavor and the flavor subtleties from the minerals. The grains are generally too large for salt shakers, so take pinches from salt dishes, like great-grandma did. It makes it all the more a gourmet experience, and you’ll notice flavors in your food you never have before. You’ll have a great time perusing our glossary of artisan salts in the Salts & Seasonings Section on THE NIBBLE online magazine. |
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February 6, 2008 at 12:06 pm
· Filed under Salts/Seasonings, Diet Nibbles
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 In the freezer, ready to thaw.
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Having fresh herbs in one’s kitchen at all times is a nice fantasy, but in reality, those pricey herbs often wither away before they are put to use (or, before the three-quarters of them that remain after you’ve used the first few tablespoons’ worth are used). Daregal Gourmet has solved our fresh herb woes with herbs that are pre-chopped, frozen and packed in space-saving boxes. Take out the amount you need, let it thaw, and it tastes almost as good as fresh herbs—and a whole lot better than dried herbs. They jazz up bland pasta, meat or fish dishes and also serve as lovely plate garnishes (see our article, Garnish Glamour for additional tips). They work well with vegetables too. Our favorites are the individual herbs (basil, cilantro and parsley) but people who enjoy spice blends can opt for Grilling, Italian and Original. Find a store locater on the website, DaregalGourmet.com. Find more of our favorite spices in the Salts & Seasonings Section of THE NIBBLE online magazine. |
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January 27, 2008 at 9:28 am
· Filed under Salts/Seasonings, Oil/Vinegar/Dressing, Tip Of The Day
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| To enjoy some heavenly truffle flavor without breaking the bank, black or white truffle paste can be spread like a condiment on canapés, roasted meat and poultry. Stir a spoonful into risottos and sauces—it works wonders. We toss angel hair pasta with butter and truffle paste (you can use truffle butter to achieve the same effect). The tube or jar has a shelf life of a year and lasts about a week once opened. It’s a wonderful little luxury and a great birthday gift for your favorite foodie. If there’s any left, spread it onto your morning toast.
- Try a tube. A tiny tube adds a lot of flavor.
- Read about our favorite, addictive truffle butter.
- Learn more about truffles in our exciting Truffle Glossary.
- Go truffle crazy with this wonderful truffled caviar (made with truffle oil). |
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The most precious of the fungus among us: The black Périgord truffle and the white Alba truffle. Read more about them in our Truffle Glossary. |
Any or all make sexy Valentine’s Day dishes. Add some truffle cheese to the cheese plate, while you’re at it.
What about truffle oil? Caveat emptor. One day, we hope to have enough money to buy them all and do a big review in THE NIBBLE. Here’s a quick introduction. There are two types of truffle oil. The better kind is produced by infusing a high-quality oil, such as extra virgin olive oil, with the flavor from truffles. Truffle bits are soaked in the oil until it absorbs flavor and aroma. However, the vast majority of truffle oil is a chemical infusion that approximates the aroma and flavor of truffles. Some companies do it better than others. The oil can be used to add truffle flavor to a variety of foods; however, it must be sprayed or dribbled on, since heating the oil causes the flavor and aroma to dissipate. Similarly, once the bottle is opened, the flavor and oil will fade quickly. So only buy small bottles and don’t save the oil for special occasions once you open it—go truffle crazy and spray it on everything from salads to toast. Truffle oil on vegetables is terrific, and truffled mashed potatoes, celestial (substitute the oil for some of the butter). |
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January 5, 2008 at 9:41 am
· Filed under Vegetables, Salts/Seasonings, Diet Nibbles, Kosher Nibbles
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 Delicious Birds Eye Steamfresh veggies steam fast, with no pots to clean. |
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Most people we know want to eat healthier and lose weight. Everyone wants to fight childhood obesity. Yet, when you suggest eating lots of healthy, low-calorie, steamed vegetables, there are more excuses than Brussels sprouts. Major food companies have listened, and have provided convenient, flavorful solutions for better steamed vegetables, plus fish and other proteins. You now can have delicious, low-calorie veggies in as little as one and a half minutes, for meals or snacking, and entire steamed meals in five to eight minutes. So put that old-fashioned steamer away: Here are healthy foods a 10-year-old can prepare:
- Birds Eye Steamfresh, the first product in our lineup, are frozen vegetables that steam in the microwave (certified kosher).
- McCormick Veggie Steamers provide seasonings and microwaveable bag units that take the guesswork out of cooking: Just add the specified amount of vegetables or fish and your meal is ready pronto.
- Ziploc Zip ‘n Steam Bags provide just the bag: Add your own ingredients. The bags are preprinted with cooking times for standard foods. Glad makes a similar product. |
| More good news: No pots to clean. Full steam ahead! Read the full review and find more of our favorite products in the Vegetables Section of THE NIBBLE online magazine. (Looking for low-calorie foods? Check out Diet Nibbles.) |
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January 4, 2008 at 6:43 pm
· Filed under Salts/Seasonings, Tip Of The Day
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| Here’s some sage advice: Every January, toss out all of your old herbs and spices and start the year with fresh ones. After jars are opened, ground spices and dried herbs lose their potency—that’s why those jumbo jars are rarely a bargain. Buy only what you use regularly. If you rarely use mace, e.g., wait until you need it for a recipe. Even never-opened jars of spices and herbs will degrade on the shelf after a couple of years. If exposed to heat or light, they deteriorate even faster (store your spices away from the stove and oven, and avoid countertop spice carousels). Whenever you can, buy whole spices and grind them in a spice mill as needed. We use a peppermill, a nutmeg grinder and a multipurpose spice and herb grinder. Learn about checking the freshness of your spices. Read more about different spices in the Salts & Seasonings Section of THE NIBBLE online magazine. |
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From the day they’re dried and packaged, herbs and spices loose their flavor. Read the article to see how long you should keep them before you may as well use nothing. Photo of cardamom by Kristian Birchall | SXC. |
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December 29, 2007 at 9:35 am
· Filed under Salts/Seasonings, Bread, Crackers, Muffins, Tip Of The Day
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 Whole nutmeg: Once you try it freshly-grated,
you’ll never go back to pre-grated.
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Just as freshly-ground pepper bears no resemblance to the bland, pre-ground powder, freshly-ground nutmeg is a vibrant spice that perks up sweet and savory dishes alike. We use it to flavor apples and other seasonal fruits (pies, compotes, sautéed sliced fruit), to make cookies and pastries and in custards. We love it in egg dishes and vegetable purées. It’s our favorite seasoning with spinach in any form, and on pasta with broccoli rabe. For beverages, use it in addition to (or instead of) cinnamon on hot chocolate, coffee, cappuccino, mulled cider, warm milk, cold milk, chocolate milk and of course, eggnog! |
| While some cooks grate the whole nutmeg against a fine plane kitchen grater, we value our skin and use a nutmeg grinder or mill—the same principle as a peppermill, but accommodating the larger nutmeg, which is the size of an unshelled hazelnut. If you’ve had the nutmeg for several years, you can check the quality by piercing it with a needle. If the skin pierces slightly and a drop of oil flows out, the nut is still fresh. If the skin won’t pierce, it’s dried out. (See how to check your other spices for freshness.) The nutmeg is the seed of an evergreen tree fruit. The tree, botanically known as Myristica fragrans, is indigenous to tropical southeast Asia and Australasia. Mace is the milder-tasting dried hull of the nutmeg—the part you peel off to get to the nut. |
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December 9, 2007 at 1:44 pm
· Filed under Salts/Seasonings, Gourmet News, Books
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| The weekend edition of The Wall Street Journal devoted a lot of space to an article called “A New Taste Sensation,” umami. This was news two years ago when Anna Kasabian and David Kasabian wrote their seminal book on the topic, The Fifth Taste: Cooking with Umami. It was the talk of gastronomy circles, and THE NIBBLE wrote a long article on umami. But, like sous vide and Gewürtztraminer, it didn’t trickle down to most fine food enthusiasts—it’s just a bit too east of mainstream. We have often thought about teaching a course on umami, because the fifth taste is not as easy to understand as the other four: sweet, salty, sour and bitter. Want to taste sweet? Sugar is unmistakable, and you can find that same taste in baked goods, fruit and other sweet substances. The same with salt, the sourness of lemon juice or vinegar, and the bitterness of arugula. But there is no one umami flavor (the word itself means “deliciousness”), even though it is described as “brothy.” Umami foods are characterized as having a high level of glutamate, an amino acid; MSG, a manufactured form of it, adds flavor to food, just as sugar adds sweetness, salt adds saltiness and vinegar adds tartness—all heighten the flavors of the foods they enahnance. |
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Parmesan cheese: salty or umami? |
| Yet, back to the argument: We can identify sweet, salty, bitter and sour. What does umami taste like? You can name foods and dishes that contain umami flavor, but cannot point to any single, easily-recognizable flavor attribute. Here are some of the cornerstone products that showcase umami: MSG, Parmesan cheese, anchovies, soy sauce, dried mushrooms, ketchup and konbu, a large seaweed used to make dashi. What do they have in common? If you asked, what do ice cream, chocolate, orange juice, cherries and marzipan have in common, one might say “sweetness” or “sugar.” What about ketchup and Parmesan, seaweed and anchovies? One might describe the first four umami ingredients as salty, and try as we can, we still can’t get brothy out of a tomato or konbu, until they are made into broth. And this is why umami, the fifth taste, has not “broken out” in the West. You can train people how to combine ingredients for heightened umami flavors, you can hand out umami-enriched recipes, you can print lists of umami-rich foods for people to memorize, but you can’t train them to identify them “umami taste” as you can sweet taste, salty taste, etc. If someone had you taste watercress, it wouldn’t be too hard to classify it as bitter. If given bacon, ham, salt pork or sausage, you’d put them in the salt category. But, umami claims them as well. We would find a tomato sweet; umami calls it umami. See? None of this is addressed by The Wall Street Journal article or any other article we’ve read. We lack the scientific expertise to say that umami isn’t the fifth taste, experts say that it is. We just think that it double dips. It seems to us that every food that umami claims as its own can fall within one of the four existing classes, whereas sweet, salty, sour and better are completely discrete. All comments are welcome. |
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December 5, 2007 at 2:05 pm
· Filed under Salts/Seasonings, Kosher Nibbles
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| Saltworks, a leader in bringing fine artisan salts to the U.S., announces that its house line, Artisan Sea Salts is now certified kosher by the Orthodox Union (except for the smoked sea salt, which is awaiting certification). The non-smoked varieties include Alaea (fine and coarse), Cyprus Flaked Salt, Fleur de Sel, Flor de Sal, Flower of Bali, Kala Namak, Murray River Salt, Peruvian Pink Salt, Sel Gris (fine and coarse) and Sel de Mer (fine and coarse). On this, the second (of eight) days of Chanukah—there’s still time to send gifts to kosher friends and business associates. THE NIBBLE loves the selection of beautiful salts at Saltworks. The company offers a wide variety of premium gourmet salts from around the world. Last year, we recommended the Ultimate Salt Collection in our holiday gift lists. A 5-ounce, cork-topped bottle is $14.99 to $15.99 at Saltworks.us. Read more about artisan salts in the Salt Glossary of online magazine. |
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Some of Saltworks’ kosher-certified Artisan Salts line. |
| Due to the busy holiday season, the kosher certification won’t appear on the website until after the New Year; but customers requiring a copy of the certificate can contact Customer Service. |
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