Tag: allspice

German Red Cabbage
Although I often focus on main dishes (especially one pot meals), there’s a lot of value in being able to provide the perfect foil to your piece de resistance. This recipe is simple, but cooking shredded red cabbage for over an hour with vinegar, sugar, apples, and a few key spices makes for a delicious side. I ate this tangy sweet cabbage alongside a simple combination of sausage and white beans, and I think it would serve as a good complement to any kind of beans or any kind of pork. The vibrant purple of the resulting dish also makes it an easy way to provide a often much-needed visual pop to a meal.

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May 7, 2012
Ethiopian Berbere
Growing up in DC (home to the largest Ethiopian population outside of Ethiopia), I’ve gotten used to a city with a plethora of cheap and delicious Ethiopian restaurants. My favorite place is a mere half mile from me and offers up a vegetarian platter big enough for two or three people for ten dollars. So it’s understandably difficult for me to motivate myself to try cooking Ethiopian food. But I might not be in this city forever, and the flavorful filling stews and spongy sour bread has become somewhat of a comfort food for me so I recently decided to try my hand at making them. The very first step in cooking delicious Ethiopian food is the spicy and fragrant spice mix known as berbere. This deep red mixture is vaguely reminiscent of Indian garam masala with warm sweeter spices like cinnamon, cloves, allspice, and nutmeg playing a role on top of spicy chiles, cumin, fenugreek, cardamom, and coriander. Berbere adds a large amount of paprika to these spices for a unique and unmistakable flavor that serves as the base for many different Ethiopian stews.

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February 27, 2012
Butternut Squash and Chickpea Salad
Around this time of year, I find myself unable to resist the gorgeous butternut squashes piled high at grocery stores and farmers’ markets. I always buy a few, tempted by vague thoughts of meals with the squash’s sweet richness and autumnal orange hue. Then I find myself at home trying to come up with the best ways to actually use my newly acquired ingredient. This warm salad is a somewhat unusual combination of flavors, with chickpeas, allspice, and tahini as major players alongside the butternut squash. The result is fantastically addictive and a great alternative to the more common recipes using butternut squash. This salad works equally well as an appetizer or main course.

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November 14, 2011