What is the Best Cumin at the Supermarket?

well the ancient egyptians purportedly used this for mummification process but we use it to make tacos it's cumin and jack's here and he's going to tell us which one we should buy we'll leave that has mummies and tacos we use it in so much more than just tacos everywhere it is everywhere i think this is the spice i use the most because it's used in so many cuisines indian cuisine middle eastern cuisines mexican cuisine you can use a fair amount of it as opposed to some spices where you know i like to think of like allspice an eighth of a teaspoon is plenty so these are all ground cumin that we heated in oil and then tossed with rice a little blooming there little blooming you get the flavors to come forward you're looking for earthiness roastiness citrus is okay you don't want bitterness that's not a nice note no we did a salad we did a spice rub i felt like this was actually the most representative way to taste it in the salad it was raw it was in a vinaigrette and it really didn't get all of the flavors that come out from heating and the chicken there's a lot else going on this is pretty plain with the white rice so we looked at all of these different ground cumin the texture did vary some of them were a little gritty and some of them were finer but all of them are recommended so did you know that instead of salt and pepper in ancient rome they had salt and cumin on the table cumin was the default i think because cumin makes things more interesting without being a bully because a lot of other spices honestly it feels like you're tasting that spice right as opposed to the cumin which is a team player right we're looking at you clove right yeah i mean i think i still have like the same jar of cloves that i had 20 years ago because how much of it can you possibly use so this is really difficult yeah i'm going to throw a hint if it gets really bitter because you know you can go from earthy and roasted to bitter that's a a flaw and it shouldn't really be better it also should have a lot of personality i mean yes it's cumin and it's relatively mild-mannered but it shouldn't be bland there's nothing else here except for oil and rice it's really hard for me to pinpoint specific flavors in here this one i don't know if i'm looking for it but there's a little bit of a tannic thing going on so maybe that's the bitterness not quite sure this one it's amazing that there's the same amount of cumin in these i asked the same question when these samples came out and they're like yes jack we measured them very carefully they're all exactly the same this one is a little bit bland to me but i'm really being picky here this one i think has a bit of a more assertive flavor but i'm getting texture if i had to like say we were on national television and i had to pick one i wasn't going to tell you yes you're forced here to pick something i think i would pick this one but i would be really happy with all of them i might have to use a little bit more of this to get more assertive flavor so the good news is you agree with the studio audience and the expert panel okay you picked the winner simply organic we felt like it was the best of what were all good choices it's delicious and it has a really nice flavor works salads roasted dishes spice rubs balanced yeah it's great all right and this one mccormick i'm sure you have lots of mccormick spices in your pantry i have this one no it was middle of the pack it's fine i mean as i said these are all recommended it had a bit less personality than the simply organic all right and then this one this one had some of the you said tannic the expert panel said bitter notes it wasn't bad again it still ended up being recommended but it was our least favorite among the choices still totally suitable yeah it's still cumin i would still eat that chili yes i'm sure you would well there you go the winner of the cumin testing was simply organic ground cumin and it's 8 59 for a bottle [Applause] thanks for watching cook's country from america's test kitchen so what'd you think leave a comment and let us know which recipes you're excited to make or just say hi now you can find links to today's recipes and reviews in the video description and don't forget to subscribe to our channel see you later alligator

Channel: America's Test Kitchen

Views: 83,465

Keywords: cooks country, americas test kitchen, cooks illustrated, cumin, spices, taste test, tasting, best cumin

Id: j5McQUmA8TY

Length: 4min 15sec (255 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 31 2021