Spice Nook: Cardamom

Cardamom is a favourite spice of mine. I grew up with the familiar aromatic taste of it in certain dishes, teas, coffees and desserts. Cardamom is native to India, Pakistan and Nepal. It is often used in Southern Asian and Middle Eastern cuisine and is gaining popularity in other world regions. Once an overlooked spice, Cardamom is now appreciated and cultivated in many parts of the world, including Guatamala, which is now the top global exporter.

There are two types of Cardamom - green and black.

For the most part, they taste identical, however the black cardamom has a smokiness to it. Both green and black pods contain seeds. Those seeds can be used on their own, or pulverised into a dust. I enjoy crushing the pod with the back of my knife and throwing it in while cooking. I love using cardamom with rice. I use it in rice pudding and garnish alongside with chopped pistachio's and honey. Also, I use it when I make coconut rice because it adds that something extra.

If any of you have tried Arabic/Turkish coffee, you will know that green cardamom is often ground up with the beans and packaged together. It offers a unique spice and scent to the coffee that puts this Java in a world of its own. It's also one of the top spices when making a garam masala for Indian cuisine alongside with black pepper, cinnamon, cloves and cumin.

Cardamom has also been used as traditional medicine in Asia for many years. Some of the claimed benefits of Cardamom are:

• Offers relief of sensitive tooth and gums (when chewed)

• Helps to speed up digestion

• Natural oil in seeds offers relief from gastritis irritation by coating and soothing stomach lining

• Offers anti inflammatory properties

• Produces circulation of blood in lungs which assist in asthma and cough

• Packed with essential minerals and electrolytes to help fight anaemia 

• Helps to break down kidney and gall stones

• Known to lower blood pressure

• Fights bad breath
• Once thought to treat snake venom (still used for this purpose in parts of India)

If you're new to trying cardamom, remember, next time you make a cup of tea, or order a cup of Turkish coffee, make sure to have this spice dropped in. If you like the flavour, start experimenting with your cooking.

Enjoy!

EASY Caramel

Making caramel is fun. Making it when it's super easy raises the question, "Why not make this more often?"
Well, the answer is because it's SOOOO sweet and addictive..


BUT, if you're looking to make this decadent stuff to spread on or within a cake, to dip fruits in, or to eat straight out of the can (I won't judge,) here is an easy recipe you can follow. Just make sure you have time to keep a watchful eye on this.

Ingredients
1 can of sweetened condensed milk



Directions
Remove label from can of sweetened condensed milk. Drop in deep pot of water. Let simmer/light boil on its side for 2-1/2 to 3 hours. Turn off heat, drain water and let can sit out for 6+ hours before you open it.
My advice is to boil 2 or 3 cans at once because it does use up burner electricity. You can store unopened cans away for a few weeks, so why not?

Caution! DO NOT open after boiling. If you open can too early you will risk burning yourself. Also, DO NOT let the water in the pot boil off. Add water from time to time to make sure can(s) are fully submerged. Not doing this will cause the can to explode if the water boils off.

Happy Carameling!

Enjoy!

Easy Nutella Brownies

In honour of World Nutella Day, I thought I'd share this very simple brownie recipe that has the rich creamy nutella taste. These brownies are sinfully good! They wont stick around too long once out of the oven.

Ingredients

2 cups nutella

1 cup flour

1 tsp salt

4 large eggs

1 cup brown sugar

2 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 cup melted butter

3/4 cup crushed hazelnuts

(you can substitute coconut flakes or chocolate chips instead of hazelnuts)

Preheat oven to 325F. Combine flour and salt in bowl. In another bowl, on medium speed with an electric mixer, or in your stand up mixer, beat eggs, nutella, brown sugar and vanilla until smooth for about 2 minutes. Slowly add the flour/salt and melted butter and mix until incorporated.

Grease a 8" pan or any square brownie pan you have. Pour batter into pan and bake for 50 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean.

Let cool for at least an hour. Spread nutella over the top. Cut, serve and enjoy!