Not peppercorns

They aren't peppercorns, but they have a peppery flavor. They aren't pink, exactly, but rather red. Still, we call them "pink peppercorns" and the French call them baie rose which means "pink berry." In the U.S. we have a frozen yogurt company called Pink Berry, but as far as I know this spice is not available as a topping. But! If they only knew...

...that the berries of Schinus molle, or Schinus terebinthifolius, both species of the cashew tree family, have an incredible floral flavor - sweetly rosy and peppery - but without the hot bite of true peppercorns. I would go to Pink Berry immediately if I knew they had spices like this as a topping. But they aren't just good on ice-cream —

Scent of the Unknown

"If there are words for all the pastels in a hue—the lavenders, mauves, fuchsias, plums and lilacs—who will name the tones and tints of a smell?" - Diane Ackerman

My mother and I did some macaron shopping while in Paris last week. While standing at the counter of Ladurée staring at all the brilliantly colored cookies as though they were jewels and trying to decide which flavors Mark would prefer (salted caramel? bergamot and rose?) I faintly heard the sales clerk over the din of my own brain.

"quel parfum voulez vous?"

Winter Calls for Lemon

“The very nature of the lemon is mysterious.” - Waverly Root

I have been lucky to escape the cold cruelty of Boston this past month, where a whopping 93 inches of snow has fallen so far. Just for reference - I am 64 inches tall.  

While my escapes were fruitful (so to speak) i’ve still managed to enjoy blizzards Juno and Marcus and several snowstorm in between. It’s been scary to see our grocery stores swept clean of bread, water and meat, and our public transportation system transformed into a dysfunctional adolescent who puts her headphones on and slams the door of her room, only reappearing at odd hours for Doritos and pee breaks.

Celebrating Two Years

Two years ago this January, this blog was born! The word, aromatum, from the phrase "Navigatio ad loca aromatum" (which I found in this book), seemed to fit perfectly with my desire to see the world according to scent. The phrase means: navigate to the places where the spices are. Despite being a travel directive, often on these pages I am merely seeing the world from my apartment. I still marvel at the power of language to teach us, the power of scent to trigger memories and evoke emotion.

Creatures of the Night

Last night I had a dream I was harvesting matches from a tree. Each branch's terminal bud was a match, red tipped and smooth with a slight roughness. Climbing the tree, pockets full of matches, I would snap one and then another, collecting them like berries. But I was sweating, my heart racing, because one slip and I could set the entire tree aflame. 

My life feels like this.

Starting 2015, I have felt the weight of what lies ahead, trying to be as careful about each step that I make, trying to take into consideration each "match" that I gather, so I can use it later, or trade it, or whatever, and not burn it up. It's an exhausting business, and I should probably start meditating.

Nigella Seeds

A balmy Boston Christmas this year tricked the trees into blossoming and the daffodils into pushing their way up through the dirt. Not their moment to shine, but still I had to pause and study their strange beauty.

New plans afoot

Greetings from snowy Somerville! I have been quiet here on the Aromatum front lately due to a current project I'm excited to tell you about. Since returning from Asia this past summer, I've been working on creating a business. A spice business to be more precise, set to launch next summer in 2015. The mission of the business is to source sustainably grown and fairly traded spices to offer an alternative to the majority of commodity spices on the market today.

Sweet Fenugreek

Lately I've been excited about spices that seem extraterrestrial. Unearthly flavors so strange and wonderful that they must have descended from outer space or attached themselves to the feet of the ESA space probe from the dark shadowy shores of a comet. ("Comet dust" as new culinary ingredient has not yet reached FDA approval.)

On Sunlight & Spices

I bought a daylight lamp for the first time. I bask in it's artificial light every morning, still in my groggy, grumpy state when it's best if I don't interact with humans. I've been using it for two weeks now and I have to say, it's making me feel a little better about heading into the dark tunnel of New England winter. Weirdly, I feel more like a species of plant than a person under the light—I feel it entering through the pores of my skin (even though it acts functionally through the eyes) creating some kind of useful sugar that feeds my heart.

 from an airplane over Pennsylvania last week

I remember interviewing a famous photographer when I was in high school for a school newspaper. His name was Galen Rowell and he died tragically in 2002 (the same year I graduated high school) so the fact that I got to meet and talk with him sits even more crystalline in my mind. When I asked him what was most important to him in his photography, he paused and just said:

"Everything is light."

The Pickled Apple

Mark & I found this sign while apple picking in Connecticut yesterday. I think it was meant to encourage pickers to explore more of the orchard, but I saw it as a quiet, more figurative reminder.