Cumin is also a fairly indispensable ingredient in chili. (Yes, yes I know, the only absolutely indispensable ingredients are capsicum peppers in some form, and meat.)
If you have deep pockets you could always get some saffron. Can’t get anymore exotic than that.
In Amanda Hesser’s Cooking for Mr. Latte: A Food Lover’s Courtship, with Recipes, the author worships at the altar of Grains of Paradise, aka Aframomum melegueta, aka Guinea pepper. I had a chance to get a couple of grams of it free when I placed an order from myspicesage.com. It’s related to cardamom. I’ve used it on pork chops a couple of times, but my husband doesn’t care for it and I can’t say I don’t agree. But you might want to give it a try. It’s not cheap, but buy just a little and see if you like it.
Oregano!
Marge Simpson, reading a spice bottle label: “Ore uh gahn oh? What the hell?”
:eek: Dayum! I never connected those two things! Was Crystal Gayle friends with Frank Herbert?
I’m familiar with some of the spices here. Wife and I have several recipes that use (not necessarily at the same time) garam masala, cumin, and coriander. Bought saffron a couple of years ago for a recipe, but haven’t used it in anything else.
I will check out some of the others the next time I’m in the spice shop.
The spice…must…flow…
Aleppo Pepper. If you like crushed red pepper flakes, give this a try. More depth of flavor.
BTW, what is the difference between an herb and a spice?
An herb is a leave, a spice a seed.
Not quite. A spice can be bark (cinnamon), the dried fruit (paprika), roots (turmeric), the flower (saffron), etc. Basically, any part of the plant that is not a leafy part (which is an herb.)
Depending on your local Mexican market, you may be able to find fresh epazote, too, in the fresh herb section. Around here, for instance, it’s almost a given to find it. It should be noted that it can be a bit of an acquired taste.
how about silphium. so exotic it is extinct.
It’s the secret to my spaghetti sauce, Andy!
Someone really needs to put out an herbs and spices Scratch ‘N’ Sniff. I would gladly pay $10 for one. I’d love to try some of these flavors but I can’t afford to buy them all.
Shadow Benny, stuff grows freely and wild in a lot of Trinidad and I love the smell when someone has just cut their grass and it was full of this. It has a strange kind of savory taste, hard to describe. Note some recipes say you can use cilantro instead, they taste nothing alike at all.
Asafoetida for proper tasting Indian curries. It really rounds out the taste of curries, although it is stinky as all fuck.
Sorry, forgot to look for the alternate spelling.
Consider this a seconding.
Look for annato seeds to make achiote paste. Or buy is already prepared.