A Guide to Buying and Cooking with Winter Spices

Enlarge Image Image Gallery The traditional pie spices (back to front: star anise, allspice, nutmeg with attached mace, green cardamom and cloves, surrounded by cinnamon sticks) deliver warm, wintery flavor to sweet and savory dishes. Photo courtesy Jupiter Images

Don’t let the lack of fresh produce in winter dampen your love of flavorful food. What the winter pantry lacks in ripe produce, it makes up for in rich spices. Now is the perfect time to allow the sweet scents and warming flavors of allspice, cardamom, cinnamon, cloves, coriander, ginger, nutmeg and star anise to elevate standby foods. Known collectively as the “pie spices,” these flavors are indeed wonderful complements to pies and other baked goods, but they’re also excellent companions to root vegetables, roasted meats, sauces, gravies and more.

Winter spices offer bold flavors. For pie crusts and savory dishes, use a light touch. Fruits and sweets are better able to stand up to these rich spices, so you can use a heavier hand in pie fillings, fruit custards and other desserts. When flavoring, it helps to think of allspice, cinnamon and nutmeg as sweet; cardamom, cloves, ginger and star anise as pungent; and coriander as peace-making. Be sparing with the pungent spices, and add coriander whenever you want to bring sweet and pungent notes into harmony. Spices’ flavors come from their volatile oils, which dissipate in time as they are exposed to air. All spices should be stored in airtight containers away from extremes of light, heat and humidity. Whenever possible, buy small quantities and grind your own whole spices to ensure fresh flavor.

ALLSPICE is the cured berry of an evergreen tree that thrives in Jamaica (though it is cultivated in many tropical countries). The trees can be fussy if not handled gently, and the Jamaican Ministry of Agriculture is vigilant about protecting them.
Buy it: Look for dark, red-brown spheres with a rough surface. You should hear the inner seeds rattle when shaken. Ground allspice should be rich, dark brown, highly aromatic but not musty, and a bit oily, never dry.
Eat it: Use whole berries if you want to avoid adding a brown tint to foods. Try allspice in sweet baked goods, Jamaican jerk seasoning, tomato and barbecue sauces, seafood, red meat and curry blends.

CARDAMOM is called the “Queen of Spices” in its native India. It comes in brown and green forms. While brown has long been considered inferior to green, its smoky flavor is wonderful when used appropriately, as in Indian tandoori dishes, rather than simply as a substitute for green cardamom. Green cardamom is the traditional winter spice.
Buy it: Cardamom pods should be whole, slightly oily and lime green, not pale.
Eat it: Cardamom is delicious in sweet and savory foods, especially in curries and rice, and with citrus. Ground cardamom loses it volatile oils (and therefore its flavor) quickly. You can get better flavor by adding the whole pods, slightly bruised, to dishes cooked with liquids (remove pods before serving). Or split pods to remove the sticky, black seeds and grind seeds in a coffee grinder.