Level up: Spice Blends (and a recipe!)
Want to try new flavors from new places? Start with spice blends.
When I became more curious in the kitchen, I began collecting dried herbs and spices from the grocery store. It seemed like a great place to start, because I didn’t grow up with a lot of herbs and spices beyond the most common (salt/pepper/cinnamon/paprika). We did have the ubiquitous bottle of a well-known Seasoned Salt, but that was really the extent of my experience with “herbs and spices”.
The downside of collecting dried herbs and spices from the grocery store is that they can be expensive, and they can lose flavor quickly. There’s no reliable way to know how long the bottles have been on the shelves, and if they are in clear glass jars they are exposed to bright light the whole time.
Then they sit on your pantry shelves for a long time, because only a small amount is needed for each recipe. Unless you are wildly more efficient than I am, you probably have no idea how long some of your dried herbs and spices have sat in your pantry.
This is compounded when you are trying recipes from other countries and cultures. You may buy a number of jars of spices for one recipe, and then find you never use them again.
Does any of this ring true for you? Premixed spice blends may be a practical alternative. Spice blends are created to bring specific flavor profiles and combinations to the home cook in an easy-to-use format. They are a great shortcut to measuring out 6 or 7 herbs and spices, and having all those spice jars hanging around becoming “dusty” flavored.
But unfortunately, not all spice blends are created equally. Many are predominantly salt. You can tell by reading the ingredient list, as they are listed from largest to smallest amount used. Try to choose spice blends that are salt-free, or very low in salt, because you already have salt in your kitchen. You don't need to pay for extra.
If you’re just beginning to expand your flavor options, start by finding out what’s in the foods you buy that are pre-seasoned. What’s in your jarred pasta sauce? What about the canned soups? Frozen meals? If you buy a lot of Italian prepared foods, you will probably enjoy an Italian spice blend. Do you like spicy foods? Consider spice blends with chiles. Enjoy Indian or Thai food? Curry pastes and blends might be your choice. You get the idea. Start with what you know.
A simple way to taste test a spice blend is to cook something with a neutral flavor, using the spice blend as seasoning. Cook some chicken breast, pasta or rice sprinkled with the spice blend. Use a little oil or butter, because some flavors need fat to fully develop. When you’re feeling ready to leap, try substituting a spice blend into a recipe you cook often, to change the overall flavor. Match the spice blend to the other ingredients in the recipe. For example, tomato-based sauces are used in a number of different regional cuisines, such as Italian, Spanish, and Indian, so a switch-up here would probably work.
Now you might want recommendations. No ads or sponsors here! ;) Some of my favorite spice blends come from Penzey’s Spices. They have a wide variety of both international and American regional spice blends that taste great, and last a long time in my pantry because they don’t sit around getting old. Penzey’s has a website and a bunch of physical locations around the US.
Recently I have been enjoying getting to know the flavors of the countries of Africa and Asia, by collecting spice blends from Mola Foods. The founder, LaFortune Jeannette Djabea, is local to my area, has a storefront nearby, and attends farmers’ markets with her spice blends, chili relishes, and sauces. She also has a website. Every blend is unique and complex, and I have been having lots of fun developing recipes to match them. Two of my Mola-inspired recipes, Onion Mushroom Dal with Sri-Lankan Inspired Seasoning, and Ethiopian-Seasoned Chickpea Vegetable Soup, are already posted on my Substack site. Here’s a third one.
Roast Chicken with Potatoes and Onion Cream Sauce
Ingredients:
2 tablespoons olive oil
6 whole chicken legs (thigh and drumstick)
2 tablespoons seasoning blend of your choice (I used Mola Cameroonian-Inspired Spice Blend. Herbes De Provence, an Italian blend, or Za’atar would also be lovely here.)
1 1/2 pounds baby potatoes
8 ounces frozen pearl onions
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 cup chicken broth
1/4 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup chopped parsley
Method:
Preheat oven to 350 deg. F.
Heat 2 tablespoons of oil in a Dutch oven over medium heat.
Rub the chicken legs with the seasoning blend, to coat evenly.
Lightly brown the chicken on both sides, in two batches, adjusting the heat to prevent burning the drippings. Remove the chicken to a rimmed baking sheet.
When all the chicken is browned, place the baking sheet in the oven to finish cooking.
Add the potatoes and onions to the Dutch oven, and season with salt and pepper. Toss in the chicken drippings.
Pour the broth over the potatoes and onions, stir, scraping the bottom of the pot, and arrange the mixture in an even layer.
Bring to a boil, reduce heat to a simmer, cover, and cook until the potatoes are nearly tender, 10-15 minutes.
Uncover the potatoes, bring the pot back to a boil, and reduce the liquid by half.
When the chicken is done cooking, remove from the oven to rest on the baking sheet.
Remove the Dutch oven from the heat, and stir in the cream and parsley, breaking down the onions to thicken the sauce.
Serve the chicken and potatoes covered with the onion cream sauce.
I’ve been adding recipes to my Substack site, and I’ve created a recipe index to make them easy for you to find. Come check it out! Share this newsletter with anyone you think might like it. I will be working to move more recipes from my blog to Substack, as well as adding photos and videos to Instagram (@marti_kennedy and @lovefrommykitchen1) and Tik Tok. (@mamamarticooks) Thanks for your support. It’s really meaningful and motivating. Let me know if there’s something you want to see here that I haven’t done yet.
Next week CSA season begins! Strawberries are finally in season here! It’s summer in the kitchen at last. Let’s have some fun.