What makes “Chile, Clove and Cardamom” a valued addition to the kitchen shelf isn’t simply delicious, accessible recipes, and beautiful photography.
The latest tome from James Beard-lauded authors Gary Nabhan and Beth Dooley speaks to the future of cooking and how we can and could be eating given water scarcity and warmer climes.
But the cookbook goes beyond that potentially stark scenario and touches on why we should be eating closer to the earth. Which is for our health.
“Look at the indigenous people. They were healthy until colonization,” Dooley said in a phone interview. Where native cultures once ate from the land—appropriate to environmental conditions and evolutionary constructs—today’s meal options, for all of us, are contrived and homogenized.
Dooley, a Minneapolis food writer and teacher, and Nabhan, a Patagonia ethnobotanist, challenge us with this book to reclaim our food heritage and, in doing so, our health. For this, we must look at history, the spice trade and migration that is part of our human history.
“As much as I like to celebrate things that are grown locally, this book was a wake-up call in that food has traveled around the world—seeds on the wings of birds and on the shoes of people from other places,” Dooley said.
Plants and people adapt to a plethora of conditions which result in the creation of dishes that are different yet similar. Take a baked eggplant dish ordered in an Armenian restaurant near the Lebanon-Syria border. The dish arrives and, instead of the anticipated moussaka knockoff, it’s a food identical to chiles en nogada—Mexican stuffed peppers in a creamy walnut sauce. The waiter guarantees it is the eggplant dish, aubergine substituted for the chile pepper.
That’s how the food world works—ceviche in Mexico is escabeche in the Canaries. Different but same.
So that cooks aren’t left to their own devices, “Chile, Clove, and Cardamom” includes a prescription for building a desert pantry. You learn about “aromatic triads,” complementary threesomes of herbs and spices that bring flavor to meals. And there’s a section on online sources for desert ingredients, although you may be surprised what can be found at the local market. Dooley was.
“I had to go out and seek out some of these spices,” Dooley said. She found many at her Minneapolis Co-op. That experience – ingredients under our noses—is not dissimilar from that fact that many of us “walk over” more than 250 Sonoran Desert edible species.
However, some of those plants are not what people want to eat given our contemporary palate, said Carolyn Niethammer, the Tucson author of “Cooking the Wild Southwest: Delicious Recipes for Desert Plants.” Niethammer appreciates how Dooley/Nabhan were able to fuse contemporary cuisine with, perhaps, unfamiliar flavors.
“Anybody who is willing to go to a cookbook like this is going to be willing to make a foray with one new ingredient,” Niethammer said. “The recipes look good.”
As a “gateway into desert cuisine,” Dooley recommended ‘starter’ recipes like Spiced Orange Chicken, Sticky Lamb Ribs and Turkey Tacos.
“Explore,” Dooley encouraged. “Don’t be afraid. You can be a world traveler in your own kitchen.”
Following is a recipe from “Chile, Clove, and Cardamom.” It is printed with permission from the publisher.
Turkey Tacos
(Tacos de Guajolote)
This recipe for turkey carnitas, or “little meats,” can be made with any meat, but it’s a great way to dispatch a leftover Thanksgiving turkey or a roast chicken. Be sure to sizzle the meat until it’s nicely browned and super crisp. Serve on corn tortillas and top with your favorite prepared or home-made salsa, chopped onions, cilantro, and lime.
2½ to 3 cups cooked shredded dark turkey meat
1 teaspoon dried oregano
½ teaspoon ground cumin
Coarse salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Zest and juice of 1 navel orange
1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
1 white onion, chopped
5 garlic cloves, smashed
1 cinnamon stick, broken into 2 pieces
1 bay leaf
¼ cup sunflower oil or any neutral oil
Warmed corn tortillas
Chopped white onion, chopped fresh cilantro, lime wedges, and cranberry salsa (optional toppings)
In a nonstick skillet, combine the turkey, oregano, cumin, and salt and pepper to taste, and toss to coat the pieces. Add the orange zest and juice, lime juice, onion, garlic, cinnamon stick, and bay leaf and toss together. Drizzle the oil over the meat. Set over medium-high heat, bring to a boil, reduce the heat, and simmer until the liquid evaporates. Increase the heat and cook the turkey, pressing it down on the skillet, until it begins to brown. Break it up and continue cooking, stirring, until the pieces brown and become crisp, 8 to 10 minutes. Remove and serve with tortillas, garnished with the desired toppings. Serves 4.
