As I stepped out into the frigged air illuminated by the fullness of this mornings moon, I noticed the intense aroma of burning black pepper coming from a neighboring home a block or so away. The spicy sent opened up my senses allowing all the wonderful aromas of this morning from coffee brewing to the hot cakes on the griddle leaving me anxious to finish my walk and treat my taste buds to some morning goodness. As I was grinding my coffee beans my thoughts turned to the intense aroma of the black pepper that began this mornings walk.
Pepper is a key spice of bringing out and waking up our senses to receive the intense flavors we associate with the aromas that are in the foods we cook and eat. Not only in the cooked foods we prepare but in the raw foods such as a fruit or a vegetable, sweet treats as well. My heart goes out to those who have an allergy to pepper(s), they are missing out on a whole world of goodness.
Most of our spice racks have several types of dried pepper, from black pepper to red chili pepper flacks and many that go unmentioned in this post.
This morning my thoughts are directed to black pepper and a quick pinch of cayenne which I will mention first. Cayenne pepper is strong, too much can ruin the enhancement of the buds but just a pinch will go undetected as to its hot spicy flavor but will bring out the fullness of the food we are cooking, cayenne is a great anti-inflammatory as well. OK now to the most used pepper in the arsenal of spices.
We grind it, we crack it, we even leave it whole in some applications. I remember when I was fresh in the kitchen prior to becoming a chef when I was a kid, we had gone out for a meal and the tron (waitron) said the soup of the day was Pepper Pot. For some reason this stuck with me, no one at our table ordered it so I did not know the truth of it and in my mind I envisioned a bowl of broth filled with whole peppercorns and cracked pepper. It was when I tried to prepare it in my mothers kitchen that my ignorance was revealed. Hahaha, oh the stories I could tell.
Today in my kitchens I will only purchase whole peppercorns and griding them to the desired grind. There is something that is lost in preground or table pepper so into the spice mill it goes. I believe different grinds crate different flavors of intensity, that some recipes need a coarser ground application such as a Caesar Salad or a Bruchetta en crostini. I will also use the different color peppercorns in both ground and cracked for there different flavors. Some say using a trio-color blend is only for appearance and how wrong they are. Every peppercorn weather black, red or green has a distinctly different flavor an response to the dish in which is being prepared.
Much like the salts I spoke of we will explore the difference in seasoning with different peppers in the very near future but for now I think I shall cook up something other than the usual Oatmeal and treat my senses and taste buds to a little something that a few cracks of the pepper mill will enhance to my satisfaction.
Have a WONDERFUL DAY!!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment