Recently, I purchased a large jar of poppy seeds and I proceeded to consume the entire contents. While doing this, I noticed that this was quite easy to do, as the seeds had no discernable flavor whatsoever.
I also noticed that they are grayish-black in color, leaving them with little decorative value.
Why then are these seeds used to garnish baked goods such as muffins and bagels?
I couldn’t detect any flavor at all, even when eating them in large quantities. It’s hard for me to imagine how anyone could notice the flavor of just a small pinch of poppy seeds sprinkled on top of a muffin.
Perhaps it’s just me, but I haven’t had any difficulties tasting other items.
It might be something that was came from Czech or Eastern European baking. Poppyseed kolaches, for instance, are stuffed with a filling made mostly from them. It tastes great and is a lot like chocolate, with whole poppies replacing the cocoa.
Precisely. All the poppy seed recipes I have instruct the cook to step them in scalded milk, for example, to release the flavor. Think of it as an alaogous process to toasting nuts to bring out the flavor.
You won’t tate them so much when they are used to garnish something like a bagel, because of the small amount, but if you try a nice East European poppy seed-filled cake or pastry, you will get a much stronger sense of the flavor. I highly recommend it!
Poppy seeds have a delightful semi-acrid flavor that is a perfect compliment to many baked goods. Just like sesame seeds, they are an abundant and easy to grow food stock. I’ll take a poppy seed bagel over a plain one in a New York minute. You might wish to try a well made poppy seed cake sometime before abandoning this delicious food ingredient.
Until TheLadyLion baked her grandma’s poppy seed struedel for me I only thought of them as something sprinkled on my bagel. I had no concept of pastries that use them as a filling. Her streudel is way yummy and I’m sure it can cause people I haven’t even met to fail a drug test.
Just an FYI: There are opiates in poppy seeds; enough to turn a urine screen positive. But not enough to get an opiate buzz on. Not even if you eat 2 or 3 pounds of them.
I learned an unusual pasta sauce recipe from a Czech girlfriend that’s basically a tiny bit of oil, poppy seeds, and sugar, ground into a paste and tossed with the noodles. Sounds wierd but it’s really good. Kind of like a Bizarro-universe pesto.
Larry Mudd, that poppy seed pesto sounds like it’s either really fantastic or pure sh!t, with no in between. I may have to try it sometime. Thank you for sharing such a wacky recipe.