How to spice up your apples

Spices they are many and are everywhere in the world. In days of old they were a sign of wealth. They were traded, and the quest for them has spawned new nations and caused wars.

Today you can use those very same spices to dress up your apple dishes. Here are a few spices that go good with most recipes with apples in them.

Allspice

Allspice has a pleasantly warm, fragrant aroma. The name reflects the pungent taste, which

resembles a peppery compound of cloves, cinnamon and nutmeg or mace.

Anise

The aroma and taste of the seeds are sweet, licorice like, warm, and fruity, but Indian anise can have the same fragrant, sweet, licorice notes, with mild peppery undertones. The seeds are more subtly flavored than fennel or star anise.

Cardamom

The aroma of cardamom is strong but mellow, fruity, and penetrating. The taste is lemony and flowery, with a note of camphor or eucalyptus due to cineol in the essential oil. It is pungent and smoky, with a warm, bittersweet note, yet is also clean and fresh.

Cinnamon

Cinnamon has a warm agreeably sweet, woody aroma that is delicate yet intense. The taste is fragrant and warm with hints of clove and citrus. The presence of eugenol in the essential oil distinguishes cinnamon from cassia, giving it the note of clove.

Cloves

The aroma of cloves is assertive and warm, with notes of pepper and camphor. The taste is fruity but also sharp, hot, and bitter; it leaves a numbing sensation in the mouth. As in allspice, eugenol in the essential oil is mainly responsible for the characteristic taste.

Coriander

Ripe seeds have a sweet, woody, spicy fragrance with peppery and floral notes; the taste is sweet, mellow and warm with a clear hint of orange peel.

Ginger

Whole dried ginger is less aromatic than fresh, but once bruised or powdered it is warm and peppery with light, lemony notes. The taste is fiery, pungent, and penetrating.

Mace

Mace has nutmeg's rich, fresh, and warm aroma, but the smells are stronger and show a lively, floral character with notes of pepper and clove. The taste of mace is warm, aromatic, delicate, and subtle with some lemony sweetness, yet it finishes with a potent bitterness.

Nutmeg

Nutmeg and mace have a similar rich, fresh, warm aroma. Nutmeg smells sweet but is more camphorous and pine-like than mace. The taste of both is warm and highly aromatic, but nutmeg has hints of clove and a deeper, bittersweet, woody flavor.