Cumin - Spice

Cumin

Botanic name: Cuminum cyminum
Family name: Umbelliferea

Origin: India, Egypt, Arabia and the Mediterranean countries

Cumin can be grown almost everywhere as long as it needs a warm equable climate to flourish. Cumin is a part of the parsley family. Cumin comes from a plant which grows to approx. 30 cm high. The flower s color is rose pink to white. It was in earlier days used instead of black pepper in ancient Rome and was used as paste for spreading on bread. The extracted oil is today used in the perfume industry and it is believed that it has a medical properties.

There are two different sorts of cumin which is white cumin seeds (most used sort) and black cumin seeds. The seeds are boat shaped and have nine ridges. Cumin are often confused with Caraway, but cumin are lighter in color. The black cumin are smaller and has a sweet aroma, black cumin are often confused with nigella seeds as nigella sometimes is called black caraway in Indian cooking.

Cumin has a strong, spicy, sweet aroma but slightly bitter and a pungent taste. You can especially in ground cumin feel the pungent and bitter taste. Often is it used with coriander seeds, as the second most used spice, in Indian curries. Cumin is best if you dry fry it until aroma are released and then ground. Cumin is often used in sauerkraut, pickles, sausages, Munster cheese, Mexican dishes as chili con carne, couscous, meat stews and tomato based sauces. See elsewhere on this block for a recipe for curry with cumin.

Recipe: Panch phoran

1 tablespoon of each cumin seeds, aniseed, wild onion seed, black mustard seed, fenugreek seed, and 25 g garlic powder. Mix together and store dark in an airtight container. Before use dry fry and ground the mix.