Recently, some tenant(s) who moved out of our apartment building left behind a box of foodstuffs which I took home. Besides some canned goods ranging from mundane to unheard-of, thhere were several plastic packages of various ground spices which I subsequently discovered were of Tunisian origin. The cumin and turmeric I recognized by sight, and I figured out that “fenoiule moulu” means “ground fennel”, but that still leaves me mystified as to the contents of the following:
2 Spices,which is a kind of khaki green color; the spices in question aren’t listed on the label.
4 Spices, sort of rusty orange, ingredients likewise unspecified.
One package each of “Piment Fort” and “Piment dour”, helpfully translated (not!) as “Hard Pimento” and “Soft Pimento” respectively – not very informative to a guy who thinks of pimentoes as what olives are stuffed with .
Something called both “Corete” and “Corette” on the package label, a dark green powder that my partner sampled a bit of, and said tasted like seaweed. I gather from the few online references to either spelling that it’s a thickener of some kind but that’s about all I can tell.
There’s a website address on the packages (www.elkhabia.com), but when I went there it was not at all informative even if you took into account that it was translated to rather sketchy English from the original Tunisian or French.
Help me fight my ignorance of these exotic spices, educated Dopers, s’il vous plait! What’s in them? And what good use can I make of them without learning to cook Tunisian food?