• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

The flavors of all seasonings are built from a complex of chemical compounds. Sometimes a single compound provides the entire flavor. Anise, for instance, owes its sweet, floral, licorice-like flavor to the chemical anethole. The flavor of clove comes largely from eugenol, and mustard and horseradish both get their pungency from thiocyanate compounds. But the flavor architecture of most herbs and spices is far more complex, built from an interplay of many chemical compounds.

The following chart gives you the general flavor structure of common herbs and spices. If two seasonings have many flavor components in common, chances are they will substitute for one another easily, especially if they have the same distinctive flavor components. Keep in mind that any substitution will make a difference in flavor, but when two seasonings are similarly structured that difference should not be large or unpleasant.

* * *

FLAVOR COMPONENTS OF SEASONINGS

* * *

CULTURAL FLAVOR SYSTEMS

People cook with what they have, imprinting the flavors and ingredients that grow in their land, and the cooking techniques that come from their history, into their food. European cuisines generally have more herbs than spices, because most herbs grow in a temperate climate and most spices are tropical. Mexican food has a large Spanish influence, stemming from the Spanish invasion in 1521, but it is much spicier than the food of Spain because of the chiles that were native to the New World from before the Spanish arrived. Spanish food is spicier than French food because the Spanish were influenced by their connection to Mexico. However, it is not as spicy as the food of the Far East, where chiles caught on when they were brought there by Spanish and Portuguese traders in the seventeenth century, probably because the flavor of chiles was reminiscent of native pepper berries.

Because every part of the world has its own geography, climate, and history, it has developed a cuisine and a system of flavors specific to those conditions. There are overlaps because of interchanges between cultures (Spain and Mexico), geographic proximity (Thailand and Vietnam), and similar climatic conditions (southeastern France and northern California), but speaking in the broadest terms, people of a particular culture prepare their food with a palate of seasonings that defines their cuisine and separates it from all other cuisines in the world.

The following chart roughly outlines the general seasoning components in regional cuisines, starting from the southern shore of the Mediterranean and traveling westward around the world, ending on the European side of the Mediterranean.

* * *

SEASONINGS USED IN REGIONAL CUISINES

* * *

PEPPER

There are two types of pepper. Black pepper is native to Asia, spreading west about 3,500 years ago; chile peppers are native to South America and traveled around the world during the sixteenth century. Today, both families of peppers are eaten everywhere, but tropical cuisines tend to gravitate more toward chiles, while black pepper has become the preeminent pepper in Europe and North America.

The active agent in chiles, capsaicin, is so potentially irritating that one would expect that anyone who wanted to avoid pain would shun it. Paul Rozin, professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania, has postulated that the experience of eating chiles gives us excitement because it exposes us to pain that we know won’t really hurt us. Like bungee jumping, eating chiles allows us to experience danger within safe limits. It’s also likely that the sensation of pain from chiles may cause the brain to release pain-relieving chemicals that remain in our system after the heat sensation of the chiles has passed, leaving us with a mild sense of euphoria. Whatever the reason, the present-day consumption of capsaicin peppers compared to black pepper is 20 to 1, and it is a principal flavor component of the cuisines of Central and South