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On Spices and Adventure

December 23, 2012 •

Photo of star anise spiceMy kitchen glows with warm bak­ing smells, pun­gent spices and exotic fra­grances from many lands.  What is it about the hol­i­days that causes bak­ers like me to indulge in spices and fla­vor com­bi­na­tions that we use at no other time of year? In our home car­da­mon, freshly ground nut­meg, crys­tal­lized gin­ger and other spe­cialty items grace our kitchen, but espe­cially at the hol­i­day sea­son…

Today’s bak­ing treats go beyond my nor­mal hol­i­day spice palette. These “triple gin­ger cook­ies” are densely nuanced with lay­ers of fla­vors and spicy aro­mas, sourced from plants that grow in places once roman­ti­cally named the East or West Indies — fan­tas­ti­cal des­ti­na­tions that required multi-year sail­ing voy­ages from which not all sailors returned.

Ingre­di­ents for today’s cook­ies (full recipe) were once unusual, exotic lux­ury items reserved only for the wealthy or pow­er­ful. Today they’re eas­ily come by if you live near nat­ural food stores or high-end gourmet mar­kets for food­ies. The com­bi­na­tion is amaz­ingly fra­grant:

  • Star anise, ground by hand with a mor­tar and pes­tle
  • The zest of two lemons
  • Three types of gin­ger: freshly grated, pow­dered, and crys­tal­lized — the pow­er­ful base notes to these cook­ies
  • Molasses as well as “nat­ural cane” or turbinado sugar

Through­out the bak­ing process the mélange of these ingre­di­ents fills our kitchen with aro­mas you can almost see and taste. They trig­ger sense mem­o­ries, reminders of Christ­mases past.

As I put the cookie sheets in the oven, I find myself rem­i­nisc­ing about child­hood Christ­mas rit­u­als and fam­ily vis­its. On the Sun­day before Christ­mas, no mat­ter the weather, my par­ents would drive an hour or so each way, on snowy New Eng­land back roads, to visit and exchange gifts with my pater­nal grand­par­ents and aunts, uncles and cousins. We chil­dren would be packed like sar­dines in the sta­tion wagon (pre-SUV days). Instead of our usual sotto voce bick­er­ing, we’d sing Christ­mas car­ols en route; snooz­ing on the way back, bel­lies full, dream­ing of Grandma Wilson’s steamed plum pud­ding with hard sauce.

Today’s spice com­bi­na­tion for the triple gin­ger cook­ies is much more pun­gent and sophis­ti­cated than any­thing my grand­mother would have served to New Eng­land chil­dren. I can’t imag­ine she’d com­bine star anise with almost a cup and a half of gin­ger in var­i­ous forms…

Exotic Spices, Ocean Voyages

The aro­mas from these cook­ies are so cap­ti­vat­ing it’s easy to imag­ine why the quest for exotic spices per­suaded mer­chant mariners to invest in long, high-risk ocean voy­ages into uncharted waters, hop­ing to con­nect with traders who could offer spices like these. The quest for spices (and streets paved with gold) per­suaded mon­archs to invest in adven­tur­ers like Christo­pher Colum­bus who was look­ing for a shorter route to the Spice Islands.

Maps and celes­tial nav­i­ga­tion emerged in response to man’s need to return, pre­dictably, to the sources of exotic trad­ing goods, like silks or the spices that pre­served meats or masked ran­cid fla­vors before peo­ple had access to refrig­er­a­tion. For­tunes were made for a mil­len­nium through com­merce in spices. Gen­er­a­tions of men adven­tured to for­eign lands to bring spices like these back to their home­lands. Lives were lost…

No won­der these pow­er­ful hol­i­day spices cap­ti­vate us, spark our imag­i­na­tions or trig­ger mem­o­ries and sto­ries of fam­ily feasts and hol­i­day reunions.

What I learn from shar­ing hol­i­day meals with friends is that we all have favorite hol­i­day spices and fla­vors, pref­er­ences that reflect our dif­fer­ing regional, eth­nic or reli­gious back­grounds.

So many rea­sons to be thank­ful for spices and won­der­ful tastes and tex­tures at the hol­i­days!

About This Blog

Reflec­tions on life, travel, books, and yoga. Think­ing out loud about the pur­suit of mind­ful­ness and well-being.

Learn­ing how to recover from the loss of a beloved spouse, and then to find a trans­for­ma­tive path for­ward.

About Me

Semi-retired marketing exec, transitioning from a career in high tech. Now "managed" by two Tonkinese cats. Missing travel and friends on the West Coast. Avid reader and foodie. Staying active with long walks, biking, kayaking and yoga.

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