Flavorings Category

This is a grape variety which produces an excellent red wine that's very dark and often described as "peppery." Don't confuse Petite Syrah with Syrah, another red varietal wine.

This is a brand of bitters that's a bit hard to find outside of New Orleans. It's sweeter than Angostura bitters, and has more of an anise flavor.

This goes especially well with ham.

Pickle relish is typically a sweet relish of chopped pickled cucumbers. It is very popular in America on hamburgers and hot dogs.

This is similar to table salt, but lacks the iodine and anti-caking additives that turn pickles dark and the pickling liquid cloudy. Pickles made with table salt would still be good to eat, but they wouldn't look as appetizing. Pickling salt is available in large bags or boxes in supermarkets, but it's hard to find in cities. In addition to pickling or canning with it, you can also use pickling salt just as you would ordinary table salt, though without the anti-caking agents it may get lumpy if exposed to moisture. To prevent lumps, put a few grains of rice in your salt shaker. To get rid of lumps, spread the salt on a cookie sheet and bake in an oven. Don't substitute reduced-sodium salt for pickling salt when making pickles.

Pil pil is a basque sauce made from skin-on salted cod, olive oil, garlic and chili peppers. After cooking, the fish is removed and the reminder emulsified into a sauce. The pil pil sauce is them poured over the cod or other seafood.

Look for cones of this in Mexican markets.

This is used in Mexico, but hard to find in the United States. Grab a bottle if you can find it, for it's reputed to be quite good.

Pink peppercorns aren't true peppercorns, but they have a very mild, peppery flavor.

This is a good, but unexceptional, dry white wine that's good with seafood and poultry.

This is a dry white wine that goes especially well with seafood. Pinot Grigio is the Italian name, Pinot Gris the French.

This earthy red varietal wine goes best with beef, ham, poultry, salmon, or tuna. Unfortunately, making it is tricky business, so the quality varies tremendously. A good one will be expensive and sublime.

This Hispanic paste is made from ground pumpkin seeds mixed with oil, chiles, sesame seeds, and other ingredients. It's used to make rich, creamy sauces.

This Mexican herb tastes a bit like cilantro and mint.

This is a fiery Portuguese sauce. To make your own: See the Piri Piri Sauce recipe posted on RecipeSource.com.

This Peruvian brandy is based on Muscat wine.

Distilled from plums, plum brandy is usually colorless and quite potent. Slivovitz = slivovic = slivowitz ( SHLIV-uh-vits) is made in Serbia and Bosnia from blue plums, and is very highly regarded. Other varieties include mirabelle (made with yellow plums), quetsch (Alsatian plums), pflümli, and light green prunelle.

These are wines that are made from plums. Some producers leave the stones in while the plums are fermenting, giving the wine a bit of almond flavoring as well.

Don't confuse this unsweetened juice with grenadine, which is a heavy, sweet syrup. Look for it in health food stores and Middle Eastern markets. Knudsen is a well-regarded brand.

This tart Middle Eastern syrup became trendy a few years ago when Western cooks discovered that it adds zing to meat glazes, sauces, and soups. It also makes a wonderful topping for ice cream, and it can be mixed with soda water to make a tasty non-alcoholic drink. Look for bottles of it in Middle Eastern markets or gourmet stores. Store it in the refrigerator, where it will keep almost indefinitely. Don't confuse pomegranate molasses with grenadine, which is much sweeter.

Bits of pomegranate pulp remain on the seeds as they dry, so they're a bit sticky and serve as a souring agent in Indian cuisine. The seeds also come ground.

This orange-flavored bitters is made in the Netherlands and Germany. It comes in red and green versions.

Ponzu sauce is a dark tart lemon juice based sauce. It is usually made by combining soy sauce, lemon juice, vinegar and sometimes kelp, bonito flakes or mirin.

This table salt has very fine grains, which adhere better to popcorn, potato chips, and French fries.

Eastern European cooks like to put this into their pastries and cakes.

These tiny, nutty seeds are typically used in baked goods, but some cuisines also use them in savory dishes. Europeans prefer black poppy seeds, while Indians prefer white, but the two kinds can be substituted for one another. Since poppy seeds are high in fat, they tend to go rancid quickly, so buy small amounts and store them in the refrigerator. Consuming poppy seeds can result in a false positive on a drug test.

This is a sweet Portuguese fortified wine that's sipped as an after-dinner drink, or used as a cooking ingredient. Vintage ports are the best, but they are very expensive. The sediment at the bottom of the bottle is a sign of quality. Crusted or late-bottled vintage ports are both less expensive and less elegant. Cheaper yet are the lighter and fruitier wood ports, which include the tawny ports and the lowly ruby ports. Wood ports don't age well in the bottle, so try to drink them within a year or two of purchase. Once opened, port should be consumed within a week or so and stored in the refrigerator.

This is an area in the Burgundy region of France that's renown for its exquisite white wines. Made with Chardonnay grapes, these wines are great with seafood and hors d'oeuvres.

This is a highly regarded dry white wine.

See also Powdered Sugar Replacement page for diabetics, and the Powdered Sugar Replacement page on www.vegweb.com.

This paste is made with almond or hazelnut butter and sugar, and it's used to make candy and other desserts. It's hard to make yourself, since homemade nut butters tend to be gritty. Unfortunately, it's also hard to find commercially prepared praline paste, though you can order it online at www.kingarthurflour.com. The oil sometimes separates and rises to the top, so stir before using.

These are lemons that have been preserved in a salty brine for one or two months. They're a staple of Moroccan cuisine and somewhat hard to find in the U.S.

These opaque salt crystals are used to coat pretzels