Description
Cuminum cyminum
As indispensible as coriander for any curried dish, with a strong pungent aroma that lingers on the palate and a unique, easily recognised, spicy flavour. Use it for salads, couscous, chilli con carne, pastries, cakes and breads, add it to brine for salting, to sausage meat particularly for making spicy merguez sausages, serve it with cheeses from Alsace (or elsewhere for that matter).
NB it's simple to check whether you have caraway or cumin seeds - simply count the number of ribs on each seed (preferably with a magnifying glass). Caraway seeds have 9 slightly hairy ribs (5 main ones and 4 minor) whereas cumin seeds only have 5 all in all.
Associated recipes
