The Spice is Right IX - Warm me up baby - It's cold outside...

Hello Folks!

Way back when, I agreed to help my fellow Ohioan, Barbara of Tigers and Strawberries host her fabulous monthly event – The Spice is Right...

Barbara has her hands full with the latest addition to her family – if you haven’t had a chance to ooooo and ahhhhhh, stop by Tigers and Strawberries for your cute baby fix!

This month’s challenge is: Warm me up baby! It’s cold outside…

When your drab mid-winter dinner needs a little fire – who is there help you out?

Spice!

When you are sitting on the couch all bundled up against the cold –who is there to warm you up?

Spice!

When you mother-in-law is knocking at the door – who is going to save you?

Spice! That’s who!

As the mercury plummets, and the snow flakes flutter, those of us here in the northern hemisphere need all the help we can get to chase away the shivers – whether it is the palate searing heat of a chili pepper, the scent of cinnamon and cloves warming the cockles of your heart (what the hell is a cockle anyway?) or that blast of fiery aerosol propellant into your mother-in-law’s eyes…ummm well..that warms my cockles just thinking about it…

So all you civic minded folks out there - have some pity on us poor winter bound souls - send in your best “warm” recipes…

Email me your name, a link to the post, and any unposted photographs you would like me to use in the round-up at rosieinthekitchenATgmailDOTcom by midnight on December 15, 2006.

I stole these rules from Danielle over at Habeas Brulee – who has generously hosted the round up the preceding two months…

In Barbara’s own words (with some edits by Danielle), here are the general rules:

1. Email me your entry with your name as you want it to appear on the round-up, the url to the entry and any unposted photographs you may want me to use, on or before the 15th of every month so I can do an efficient round-up post. Your post can occur wherever you like in the month–I don’t care when, just send it to me on, by or before the 15th at helgardeATgmailDOTcom rosieinthekitchenATgmailDOTcom. Include a link back in your entry to this post announcing “The Spice is Right” so that if other folks read it and want to play, they know where to go to find the rules. One entry per blogger, please. If you have no blog–email me a photo and a description and I will include you in the roundup anyway. (Or, be like the rest of us food-obsessed geeks and start a blog!)

2. Your entry should include some background about the spice you have chosen to highlight. Whether this is something you learned from books, or that was passed down from your grandma or is from your own experience, tell us about it. Tell us why you chose this particular spice to highlight on this particular month. Describe how it tastes, and why you like it.

3. The recipe does not have to contain only the one spice you are posting about, however, the flavor of that spice should predominate. Say, you have chosen cardamom, and want to post an Indian dish featuring it. You could choose kheer–Indian rice pudding–which is predominately flavored with cardamom, which is fine, but you could also choose sindi elaichi murgh– a dish which has other spices in the masala, but the cardamom flavor soars above the other flavors, supported by their presence.

4. Finally, the definition of a spice that we will be using for the purpose of this event is as follows: “Any aromatic substance, fresh or dried, that is derived from the root, rhizome, bulb, bark, woody stem, flower, fruit or seed of a plant that is used to flavor foods.” You will notice that I left out soft stems and leaves–that is because those are herbs. I didn’t want to step on Kalyn’s toes with her Weekly Herb Blogging event at Kalyn’s Kitchen. I am also not counting minerals, such as salt, as spices, though we may have a special “salty” edition of the “Spice is Right” challenge someday in the future.