Ingredients

“….From the moment I first tasted it, olive oil won over my appetite. I can drink it from the bottle. But for the longest time I hated all but the blandest, the most buttery of olives. If I’ve persevered toward liking them, it was because my tongue knew that somewhere buried in that bitter flesh […]

Cinnamon, the inner bark of a tropical evergreen tree, was used by wealthy Romans as perfume and others as an aphrodisiac. During the rainy season, when the bark is pliable, it is harvested for cinnamon production. As the bark dries, it forms long quills that are either cut into sticks or ground into powder. Two […]

A lemon tree is a subtropical plant, and in its natural habitat, its fruit is green and only slightly acidic. For lemons to develop their tart flavor and yellow color, the temperature must dip below 50 degrees F/10 degrees C but remain above freezing. (If temperatures drop below freezing mature lemons on a tree will […]

Before the well-known English company, Fry & Sons worked out how to manufacture chocolate into a confectionary bar in 1847, chocolate had only been used as a drink for millenia. Chocolate was initially brought back to Europe by the Spanish Conquistador Don Hernán Cortés, who toasted the Aztec King Moctezuma with a gold goblet of his […]

Photo by BocaDorada Bonito is a type of tuna, which is a member of the mackerel family, and one of the most important fish in Japanese cuisine. Rarely eaten fresh, the dark, oily meat is dried into very hard cubes, which must be ground or shaved with a special tool before use. Bonito shavings form […]

Semolina is coarsely ground durum wheat, a highly glutinous (hard) wheat. When other grains, such as rice or corn, are similarly ground, they are referred to as “semolina,” i.e., “corn semolina” or “rice semolina.”

Homemade vs. Store Bought Though a complete list of pasta shapes could take up volumes, there are two basic types available: factory-made, dried macaroni pasta made with flour and water, and homemade “fresh” pasta, made with eggs and flour. The two have different consistencies, textures and uses. They are truly separate and truly equal. Factory-made […]

Photo by Bill Gracey The small yet seemingly impenetrable achiote seed, which is often commonly named the annatto seed, is available worldwide both as a whole seed and in ground form. It is a highly-regarded ingredient in both Hispanic and Indian cuisine for its subtle bitter and earthy flavors along with its gorgeous burnished copper […]

The name coriander does not signify one thing — it represents a seed, a leaf and a powder used in Central America, South America, all of Asia, the Mediterranean basin, the Southwest of the United States, and in any menu that replicates the flavors of one or all of these regions. Coriander-the-leaf is also known as […]

Olive groves line the rocky hillsides of Italy and the Mediterranean coast. For millennia, the region has produced gorgeous olives (they were a favorite street snack in ancient Rome) and olive oils (tools for making olive oil that date back 4500 years have been found in Crete). The average age of southern Italian olive trees […]