NEWSLETTER: Autumn 2008

• Food in the South of India
• World Spice Congress
• Sudan Red
• What's New

Here we are at the end of summer again … and what a summer it’s been, with many areas happily seeing much-needed rain and rivers flowing again after the long drought.  It’s been a while since we’ve had to clean mould off household surfaces!

Our Spice Discovery Tour to India has become an annual event, and we had a great time with our 16 travellers.  For the first time we visited the Rajasthani village of Pushkar, where we over-nighted in luxury tents and drove in camel carts out into the desert.  We dined under bright stars and a full moon whilst being entertained by local gypsy dancers and musicians, as well as some fireworks, and kept ourselves warm with the mellow locally-produced Old Monk rum – all in all, a fabulous experience!   

As regular visitors to India, we are constantly impressed by the work being done to maintain and restore the old historic buildings, especially in the north where the history and architecture is so rich.  Visiting these relics of Mughal splendour is always a highlight, as was drifting for five hours through serene Alleppey backwaters.

The food in the south of India is dominated by coconut in all its forms – either oil, milk, cream, water or flesh.  A typical example is this delicious vegetarian dish that our friend Maggie made for us in the kitchen of her home in the mountain town of Kumily.  Every year she opens her home to our bunch of inquisitive Aussies and takes us through some of the lesser-known dishes that are used regularly in households throughout Kerala.

ERASSERY (pronounced E-razzer-ry)

The small dried beans that Maggie used were unfamiliar to us, being somewhere between a black-eyed pea and a cannelini.  I use a blend of canned red kidney and cannelini beans.

            100 g small red beans, uncooked, or 1 can red kidney or cannelini beans

            100 g peeled pumpkin in 2 cm cubes

            2 cups water

            2-3 tsp salt

            ½ coconut, grated (about ½ cup)

            1 tsp MadrasTurmeric

            2 tsp cumin ground

            1 red chilli, chopped

            2 cloves garlic, chopped

FOR TEMPERING:

            1-2 Tbsp coconut or canola oil

1 small onion, peeled and grated (about 2 Tbsp)

            2 Tbsp sliced shallot

            1 sliced red chilli

            18-20 curry leaves

            2 Tbsp grated coconut

Cook beans and pumpkin in salted water for 20 minutes in a pressure cooker.  Cooking time will vary depending on whether you are using raw or canned beans, or a normal lidded saucepan rather than a pressure cooker.   When beans and pumpkin are tender, mash roughly.   Place coconut, spices, chilli and garlic in a food processor and whizz into a paste.  Stir the spice paste into the beans. 

Heat a small pan and add all the tempering ingredients.  Fry until onion is cooked, then add to vegetables.  Serve with an Indian bread such as chapatti or appam, or with rice.

After we saw our travellers safely headed for home from Cochin, we jumped on the overnight sleeper train and arrived the next morning at Goa just in time for the 2008 World Spice Congress, hosted by the Indian Spices Board.  The subject of global harmonization was hot, that is, having uniform requirements for spice standards throughout the world.  Some years ago, residues of undesirables such as pesticides used to be measured in parts per million.  However, as laboratory equipment has become more sophisticated, residues can now be measured in parts per billion, or even parts per trillion.  Imagine getting your teaspoon of ground cumin seed and dividing it into one billion parts … that’s pretty insignificant!  In some countries, spices with a very low part-per-billion count of glutens can still be labeled as gluten-free as the count is deemed to be below any risk, however in other countries, any count at all, no matter how small, must still carry a gluten warning.  If a field of seed spice is downwind of a field where wheat is being harvested, just the wind-borne wheat dust is enough to cause a gluten reading in the spice.

Do you use our website for ordering your spices, or just for accessing information?  There are many people who are wary of spice blends that are very salty.  When you open our website, www.herbies.com.au, the home page is larger than what appears on the screen.  You can scroll down to see much more information, and in the bottom left-hand corner you will find a link to a list of all our spice blends that contain no salt at all.  Late last year, we did a general update of the website, and improvements continue to be forthcoming to make your shopping quicker and easier.  We pride ourselves on a quick turnaround of orders, so if you order from us on a Monday, you can be fairly confident that you’ll have it within a couple of days.

What’s new at Herbie’s?  We always listen to you when you ask for something you haven’t been able to find, and coming up you’ll find a great Masaman curry powder, and – at last, we hear you saying – a Portuguese spice so that you can cook your Portuguese-style chicken or steak without any of the nasties such as MSG and salty artificial flavourings.  As usual, we’ve put a recipe on the back of the pack, but feel free to try your own spin on things, though, because we always love to hear what you’ve been doing in your kitchens.

We don’t advertise our Spice Discovery Tour widely to the public, however we can send information to anyone who is interested.  Dates for next trip have already been set for 10-24 January 2009.  Hope the year ahead is filled with good experiences and fabulous tastes …. Happy spicing!                                                   

                                    Liz and Ian