CUMIN, OR CUMMIN SEED Also Caraway, Coriander, Cardimons, Poppy, Aniseed, Saffron and Turmeric Described.

Cumin, or Cummin Seed

The aromatic fruit or seed of a plant of the genus Umbellefera. It is referred to in Scripture (Matt. xxxiii:23). As salt was a symbol of friendship, “shearers of salt and cummin” meant intimate friends. The seeds are linear and flat on one side and convex or striated on the other. Their odor and properties resemble the caraway, or anise seeds, and they are often called bastard anise. They are used in Germany in bread, in Holland they are frequently put into cheese. Norwegian anchovies in kegs are frequently flavored with them, and they are also used in making curry powder, as a carminative flavoring, and in veterinary medicines, etc.

Caraway Seed

The caraway plant has a branching stem 2 or 3 ft. high, with finely divided leaves and dense umbels of white or pinkish white flowers. The leaves are frequently used to flavor soup and the roots, which taper like a parsnip, and when young are boiled and eaten as a vegetable. The seeds are oblong, pointed at both ends, thickest in the middle, striated on the surface and of a crescent shape, they have an aromatic smell and warm, pungent taste. From the seeds is obtained a volatile oil called oil of caraway, of a pale yellow color which turns dark with age; it is frequently adulterated with oil of cumin. After the oil has been extracted the seeds are called “drawn caraways,” and by way of deception are often mixed with good caraway seeds. They can be told by their shrunken, dark appearance. The color of the English caraway seeds is a deep brown, those of Germany and Holland are larger and of a light blue-brown color, while those from Russia, Poland and Bohemia are small, of a blackish brown color, and mixed with a good deal of dirt. There is a variety of a light brown color, about twice the size of the English caraways, imported from Mogador.

Caraway seeds and oil are used medicinally, as a flavoring by bakers and confectioners, in compounding various liquors, particularly that known as Kummel, and in making Scotch cavie, or caraway, comfits; for this purpose the seeds are coated with sugar and colored red, pink, blue, yellow, etc.

Coriander.

The word “coriander” is derived from the Greek word Koriannon, a bed-bug, referring to the disagreeable smell of the whole plant when fresh, but the ripe and perfectly dried fruit has an agreeable smell and a sweetish, aromatic taste. Its an annual or bi-annual plant, of the genus Umbelliferce, native of South Europe, with a branching stem 1 or 2 ft. high. The lower leaves bipennate, the upper ones being more compounded and divided into very narrow divisions. The fruit is globose, containing round slightly ribbed or ridged seeds, about as large as black pepper, very light, of a yellowish brown or straw color externally; inside the husk of each seed are two closely fitting hemispherical mericarps.

The seeds are used in medicine as a carminative. They cover the taste of senna leaves better than any other substance; are occasionally mixed with curry powder; in domestic economy they are used by confectioners and bakers as flavorings, being often mixed with bread in the north of Europe. A cordial is made from them, and they are used for flavoring spirituous liquors, particularly gin.

Cardamons.

Cardamons consist of the seeds of two species of plants, the Elettaria of Malabar and the Amomon of China, Guinea and other parts of the East Indies. As the seeds of the two species differ in some respects we will describe the Ellettaria kind. The plant, which grows 5 to 10 ft. high, has a reed-like habit and bear long, loose racemes of flowers, succeeded by triangular capsules, of a dirty white color, containing a number of dark brown, angular seeds about the size of mustard seeds. The capsules or fruits, which vary from ½ in. to 2 in. in length, are collected from wild plants and also from plantations, the latter being generally laid out in partially cleared forests in which the wild plants are known to occur. When about 3 years old the plants begin to bear. The capsules do not all ripen at the same time, and the harvest lasts for nearly two months. The capsules are gathered before they are ripe and then cured in the sun, after which the stalks and remains of flowers are carefully removed by means of scissors. They are then graded into “shorts,” “short-longs,” and “long-longs,” according to their length; sometimes they are mixed and classed as lesser or greater cardamons. Cardamon seeds are exported in the capsules in order to prevent adulteration. The seeds have a very delicate aroma and are slightly pungent. They were well known to the ancients, and are used at present in medicine, particularly in veterinary practice, also in flavoring culinary sauces, soups, curries, cordials, pastry, and for imparting a factitious strength to vinegar, beer, wines and spirits, especially gin; their use creates a thirst. The seeds depend for their quality on a pungent essential oil, of which they contain about 3 per cent, called oil of cardamons; they also contain about 10 per cent of a fixed oil. The seeds of the “Amomum” species of cardamons are bright black in color outside, white inside and small and angular in shape; they are slightly aromatic, very hot and pungent.

Cardamons are known as grains of Paradise, Melegueta pepper, Guinea grains and Guinea pepper.

Poppy Seeds

Poppy seeds are not unlike fine gunpowder in general appearance, being very small, dark blue—nearly black in color; they are obtained from the same plant that yields opium (Papavar somnniferium, or white poppy.) The seeds are not narcotic, and have a sweet taste, are oleaginous and nutritious. They are largely used in some parts of Europe in pastry, confectionery and as a substitute for almonds. Under the name of “Maw seeds,” they are sold as food for birds during moulting season. Poppy seed oil is sometimes used as an adulterant in olive oil; it is also used as an illuminant and for painting.

Fennel

Fennel is a tall, stout, aromatic herb of the parsley family, with finely dissected leaves, which are boiled and served with salmon, mackerel, etc., as a seasoning; the flowers are yellow. A species—F. dulce—is cultivated in Italy as celery is with us; and its blanched stems are said to be more tender and delicate than celery, with a slight flavor of fennel. The seeds of another species—F. panmorium—grown in Bengal, have a warmish, very sweet taste and aromatic smell, and are used in making betel, in curries, and also used as a carminative. Fennel seeds resemble aniseeds in appearance and taste, and are often sold for such; they are a little longer and of a light brown color. The Indian seeds are the largest, the Italian and Japanese the smallest. They are used in confectionery, cookery and are sometimes chewed by the people of France and Germany. Fennel water is made from the oil obtained from the seeds.

Aniseed

Aniseed is an annual plant of the order of Umbelliferae of the parsley family, a native of Egypt, but also extensively cultivated in Russia, Germany, Malta and Spain. Aniseed is very similar in appearance to the poisonous hemlock seed, for which it has sometimes been mistaken. The seed, which is a little larger than a pin’s head, is of a greyish-green color. They have an aromatic smell, and warm, sweetish taste, and are used in condiments, in cookery and in the preparation of liquors, also in medicine as a stimulative stomachic to relieve flatulence, etc., particularly in infants. The properties of aniseed are due to a nearly colorless or sometimes blue volatile oil. Aniseed oil with water and sugar is much used in Italy as a cooling drink. The leaves of the plant are sometimes used as a seasoning and for garnishing.

Star aniseed, or China aniseed, is the fruit of a small evergreen tree of the order Magnoliacae, somewhat resembling a laurel. It receives its name from the star-like form of the fruit or capsule, which consists of a number (6 to 12) of hard, woody, one-sided follicies or carpels ending in a point, each containing a single brown, shiny seed. Star aniseed is held in high esteem by the Japanese and is planted near their temples, the seeds being burned as incense in the temples and over the graves of relatives. The whole plant is carminative, and is used by the Chinese as a stomachic and as a spice in their cookery. The qualities of the seed and oil closely resemble those of the common aniseed and the oil is exported to Europe for the same purpose—flavoring liquors.

Saffron

Consists of the dried stigmas of the autumn or fall crocus plant (crocus sativus), which should not be confounded with the spring crocus (crocus vernus), to which it is nearly allied. The crocus derives its name from Crogeus—which is from the Greek word Krokus, yellow—the modern Korghy in Cilicune, where it was grown in ancient times. The word “crocodile” is derived from the Greek words Krokos, yellow, and deilos, fearful, on the ancient supposition the animal avoided the place where saffron grows and only sheds real tears when in the vicinity of a crocus field, hence Fuller says: “The crocodile tears are never true, save he is forced where saffron groweth.” The phrase, “crocodile tears,” arose from the idea that the crocodile pretended to cry over the victims it had devoured. Saffron was of great importance ages ago. It is mentioned in the third chapter of Solomon’s Songs; it was in favor among the ancient Greeks as a dye, and with both them and the Romans as a perfume. The streets of Rome were sprinkled with saffron when Nero made his entry into that city. In the middle ages it was employed in cookery and as a drug, and it is on record that as late as the fifteenth century persons were burned alive in Muremburg for adulterating saffron. It was introduced to England in 1339 from Tripoli by a pilgrim who had a stolen bulb in the hollow of his staff. Its main use was to color pastry and confectionery, hence: “I must have saffron to color the warden pies” (Shakespeare’s Winter’s Tale, act 4, scene 1). The town of Saffron Waldron in Essex, derives its name from the fact of its being cultivated in that neighborhood until 1768. The cultivation of the crocus for saffron in England has entirely died out; altho the people of Cornwall at the present day use more saffron than all the rest of Great Britain. It is cultivated in China, Cashmere, Persia, Asia Minor, Egypt, Austria, Hungary, Russia, Italy, France, but the chief source of supply is Spain.

A saffron field is not in full bearing until the end of the second year, at the end of the third year it is exhausted, and it is said that the soil is so poisoned that it cannot be used for any other crops for several years. Each acre produces from 600,000 to 700,000 bulbs and each bulb 2 or 3 flowers. About 150,000 flowers are required to produce 2 lbs. of fresh pistils, which when dried are reduced to one-fifth of that weight.

The small yield, the labor required, the care in culture and the difficulty of preserving the product in a good state renders saffron an expensive article—about 80c an ounce. On the seed-bearer of the flower there is a thread-like hook or fork, which at its upper head terminates in three thick, dark, orange-colored nerves or tissues; to save and collect these tissues the flowers are gathered in the fall, just as they are breaking, or a little before; they are plucked early in the morning, and these little masses are then pulled out with a considerable portion—about 1¼ in. of thread-like stem, to which they adhere. They are then dried over little charcoal fires or in the sun. It is this dried stigma, the trifid orange-colored tops of the central organ of the flower, that is the saffron of commerce. The remainder of the flower is useless.

Saffron as it generaly comes to the trade consists of a large number of crooked and mixed-up threads, of an orange-red color; it has a peculiar, sharp, rooty and pungent smell, and a bitter balsam-like taste; that of a whitish yellow or blackish color is old and inferior. The great solubility of saffron prevents its use as a dye for fabrics, its place being taken by aniline dyes. Its coloring power is remarkable, a single grain rubbed to a fine powder with a little sugar will impart a distinct tint of yellow to 10 gals, of water; soaked in spirits or warm water it will yield three-fourths of its weight of a deep orange yellow coloring matter, which is perfectly wholesome, and if kept tightly corked will keep for some time. The chief uses of saffron are for flavoring and coloring confectionery and culinary articles; it is also used as a perfume and is given to birds during the moulting season. Spanish saffron is divided into five grades, according to the district in which it is cultivated. It is generally wrapped in tinfoil and then in white tissue paper and packed in tin boxes or strong cartons.

On account of its high price saffron is often counterfeited or adulterated with the petals of safflowers, African saffron, Meadow or wild saffron, marigold, arnica, etc. It is also loaded with glycerine, glucose, dyed vegetable filamenta, honey, sulphate of soda, barium sulphate, etc., and exhausted saffron is sometimes re-colored with aniline dye. The stigma of genuine saffron immediately expands on being moistened with warm water, and its form is so characteristic that it cannot be mistaken for the flowerets of any of its adulterates.

Cake saffron is generally made from the dried flowers of the safflowers—a thistle-like plant of the aster family—or the florets of the saffron plants made into a paste with gum-water; it is used for dying and making rouge.

Turmeric

Turmeric is an East Indian plant (curcuma longa) of the ginger family, with the same properties as ginger, only not so powerful. It is also grown in Zanzibar, China and the Malayan archipelago. It is a stemless plant with dark green leaves varying from 6 in. to 24 in. long and 3 in. to 6 in. wide, flowers of a dull yellow color and a tuberous root varying in thickness from that of a quill to ½ in. in diameter and often a foot long, with joints or ring-like swellings at short intervals; of, a yellowish to orange color outside and sometimes white and sometimes orange color inside. They are classed as long or round tubes according to their shape. From the root is made a kind of arrowroot much relished by the natives of India to color their faces. In medicine it is used as a cordial or stomachic; as an anti-scorbutic, and for stimulating the digestive organs. In a fresh state it is given to expel intestinal worms and in diarrhoea. It is used in varnishes and ointments and as a dye for silks and woolens, but it is now chiefly employed in making Indian curries or pickles, mustard, compounds, pudding spices, chow-chow pickles. A kind growing in Bengal, called “Mango ginger,” from its resemblance to the mango, is used for the same purpose as ginger.

Turmeric paper is a bibulous paper, yellow from saturation with the extract of turmeric, used as a test for alkalies, by which it is turned brown or red. Turmeric is also made from the roots of the canna, a member of the same family of plants cultivated at Sierra Leone.

Turmeric is adulterated with yellow ocher and carbonate of soda. Turmeric is insoluble in cold water, only partly soluble in boiling water, but is quite soluble in alcohol, forming beautiful yellow crystals.

Nasturtium

The flower buds and fruits of the common garden nasturtium are often used as a spice after being ground and dried; they are also pickled like capers and used on fish, meats, etc. The name is derived from nausa, nose, and tortus, twist, from the effects of its pungent smell or taste.