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| Cardamom plants (I am not sure about botanic identity, though) |
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| Cardamom, flowers and unripe fruits |
In Ethiopia, preparation of coffee plays an important rôle and involves highly developed rituals (“coffee ceremony”). Coffee beans are always toasted immediately before usage, often together with spices (cloves, cardamom). After letting them cool, they are ground, and the coffee is prepared. On serving, other flavourings might be added, e.g., fresh leaves of rue.
Yet not all cardamom is consumed for coffee in Arab countries; it is also used for cookery. The spicy mixture baharat (see paprika) from the Arabic peninsular contains cardamom as well as the fiery paste zhoug (see coriander) from Yemen.
Cardamom is often employed for Oriental rice-and-meat dishes, e.g.,
Arabic kabsah [كبسة] or
machboos [مجبوس]
(see also rose). To prepare these, meats (more rarely vegetables)
are braised in a thick, aromatic sauce; then, uncooked rice is added
and cooked slowly so that it absorbs the sauce and all its flavour.
Indian biriyani (see also saffron), on the other hand, is made by placing
layers of cooked rice and aromatic meat or vegetable stews in a large pot;
after addition of dried fruits (e.g., raisins, fresh or dried
pomegranate seeds), nuts (e.g.,
almonds) or even
saffron water, the pot is sealed and heated in the
oven so that the different flavours mingle.
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| Cardamom flower and fruits |
Furthermore, cardamom is a popular spice in Northern Africa and Eastern Africa, where population is predominantly Arabic: It appears in the Moroccan mixture ras el hanout (see cubeb pepper) or the famous Ethiopian spice berbere (see long pepper). In Europe, cardamom is rather unknown, but may appear in some cookie recipes (for example, German Lebkuchen). Nevertheless, usage is low, except in Scandinavian countries, where cardamom is popular not only for cookies and sweet breads but also for pastries and sausages; see also allspice.
In the Moghul cuisine (Northern India, see black cumin), cardamom is abundantly used in the delicious rice dishes called biriyanis (see Indian bay-leaf), but it is also found in several mild meat dishes from the same region; typically, the pods are fried together with onion, Indian bay leaves and other sweet spices to intensify their fragrance. For a Southern Indian rice dish, see coconut.
In Sri Lanka, the pods are added to fiery beef or chicken curries, together
with cinnamon. Cardamom-flavoured sweets are found
all over the Indian subcontinent, e.g., gajar halva, a creamy
dessert made from milk, grated carrots, palm sugar
and ground cardamom.
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| Greater cardamom, sterile plant |
Sometimes, curry powders (see curry leaves) contain small amounts of cardamom; cardamom is also frequently added to the Northern Indian garam masala (see cumin), especially in Kashmir, where the Moghul influence is particularly strong. Kashmiri people like sweet green tea flavoured with cardamom pods; no-one who has ever visited Kashmir and lived in one of the famous house boats of Srinagar will ever forget its taste, but for the rest of his life associate this tea with Kashmiri family life and endless talks and discussion in front of the fuming water pipe (hookah).
In the rest of India, black tea is much more common than green tea; spiced tea is, however, not so common in India as its popularity among Westerners in Indian restaurants might suggest. Spiced tea (chai masala [चाय मसाला]) is, in India, a luxury one cannot afford every day; the most common flavourings are cardamom, cinnamon, cloves and even black pepper. To prepare, water, milk, sugar, tea leaves and spices are boiled together for a few minutes; after straining, the tea is ready to drink. See also star anise for Thai spiced ice tea (cha dam yen) and epazote for more on the word “tea”.
Cardamom seeds lose their flavour quickly when ground; even if left whole, the seeds show a loss of about 40% of the essential oil per year. Therefore, only whole cardamom pods should be bought; before usage, the pods should be crushed. Green pods are significantly superior in fragrance to the yellow or white bleached ones.
Black cardamom (or brown cardamom) is a collective
name of several cardamom related plants growing in mountains from Central
Africa to Vietnam. Most frequently, the Nepalese cardamom is traded in the
West. This spice's taste differs drastically from that of green cardamom;
neither can act as a substitute for the other.
