Spices to Pep Up your Pumpkin!

Since the dawn of cooking, people have been coming up with their own ways to prepare foods and drinks. Differences in the ingredients used, amount of time taken and cooking method (stove, oven, open fire, etc.) all contributed to the cuisine of each family, clan and group. In some regions of the world a matter of several blocks can offer entirely different recipes that are fiercely defended.

In a standard pumpkin spice blend, if there is such a thing, ginger, nutmeg, cinnamon and cloves all come together in a harmonic autumnal hum to spice everything from lattés to pies. Every individual spice blend will have their own proportions and may even include several other spices, notably allspice and cardamom.

Whenever something becomes trendy, be it a food, a drink, clothing or otherwise, the question always inevitably arises about staying power. When it comes to pumpkin spice the general prediction around here is it will never truly go away, but rather fade into relative seasonal obscurity while making room for the next big fall flavour to make its way onto the scene. What might that be you ask? Your guess is as good as ours!

Our Recipe:

4 parts powdered ginger

2 parts each cinnamon and nutmeg

1 part ground cloves

Shake or otherwise mix until uniform.

Creating your own signature pumpkin spice blend can be a fun and rewarding experience. It is best to work from a recipe and customize it from there. Initially, when exploring the world of pumpkin spice we discovered a fair amount of cardamom; finding it undesirable, we have discarded the spice and you can do the same. As with any growing experience in life, take what you like about it and change what you don’t.