CARDAMOM

Cardamom is a spice with a strong, warm scent, offering notes of cocoa, dark chocolate, and fruity, spicy and lemony flavors with a minty freshness. It comes from the fruit of cardamom, an herbaceous plant from the Zingiberaceae family, native to South Asia and India. The fruits are picked, dried, then used as a spice. They are sold in capsules to preserve their flavor, although ground cardamom is more practical for certain culinary preparations.  There are two types of cardamom, the green, native to Sri Lanka and southern India, which offers an intense scent of eucalyptus, cinnamon, ginger and cloves, and the black, from the Eastern Himalayan, with a similar but less intense flavor, often used in Asian broths and curries.  Cardamom has many health benefits, including aiding digestion, preventing acid reflux, and providing analgesic properties useful for oral infections. It is also rich in vitamin B2, calcium, magnesium and zinc, and helps fight bad breath thanks to its minty freshness.  Green cardamom is popular in India for drinks like lassi and Masala Chai, as well as kulfi sweets, kheer, sheera and sandwiches. It is also used in bread, biscuits and pies in Nordic cuisine. Black cardamom is suitable for cooking Indian savory dishes such as biryanis, pilafs, curries and stocks. It can be added at the end of cooking in ground or crushed form to vary the intensity of the flavor.  To reveal the full flavor of cardamom, it is recommended to store it in pod form, fry it before crushing it, then use both the pods and seeds. For sweet recipes, it goes perfectly with cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg and turmeric. At the end of preparation, cardamom pods are often added to coffee or tea to provide a unique flavor and aroma. Cardamom is a versatile spice that enriches many cuisines and brings a unique flavor to many dishes.