Baharat spice blend

This spice blend is used in Lebanese sfihas—spiced meat in a bread dough basket. It can be used as a dry rub for virtually any fish or seafood.

Time

20 minutes total: 5 minutes attended, 15 minutes unattended

Storage notes

keeps for 3 months in an air-tight container out of direct sunlight

Difficulty

easy

Yield

36 g (servings 4 )

Ingredients

Weight

Volume

Procedure

Cassia bark, whole

6.5 g

2½ tsp

Coriander seeds, whole

3.7 g

2 tsp

Black pepper, whole

6.9 g

1 tbsp

Cloves, whole

2.2 g

1 tsp

Cumin seeds, whole

5.3 g

2½ tsp

Cardamom, seeds only, whole

0.3 g

⅛ tsp

Roast in a dry pan in a 170°C / 338°F oven for 15 minutes, stirring every 3 minutes.

Transfer to the bowl of spice grinder.

Sumac (optional)

2 g

1 tsp

Nutmeg, freshly ground

2.2 g

1 tsp

Paprika

1 tbsp

Add to bowl and grind to a fine powder.

Pass through a fine sieve.

Repeat step 3 and step 4 for additional yield.

Original: 2013.

Notes

Roasting whole spices and grinding them yourself will give you a much better result than any pre-ground spice. The method of roasting in the oven in a dry pan gives us more control and consistency, but still requires vigilance to avoid burning.

You can use a mortar and pestle to grind this blend, though it would be useful to pound on the cassia bark for a while before adding the other ingredients.

It is not necessary to pass through a fine sieve, but we find the sumac has an undesirable mouthfeel if not ground finely.

You will need to process the cardamom before anything else, if using whole pods, to extract the seeds from the pod. Gently crack open the pods to extract the seeds and discard the husk. You will need quite a lot of pods to get the right amount of seeds. (They can be purchased as seeds only.)

Making ahead

Prepare the whole recipe ahead of time and store in an air-tight container out of direct sunlight. Alternatively, roast the spices and store, ready to grind just prior to use.

Food pairings

Sfihas

Drink pairings

Syrah

Nutrition

Serving size 9 g; calories 27.5 kcal, kilojoules 115 kJ, protein 0.9 g, carbohydrates 2.7 g, sugar 0.3 g, fat 1.1 g, saturated fat 0.3 g, unsaturated fat 1 g, trans fat 0 g, fiber 2.9 g, cholesterol 0 mg,

Type spice blend

Author bhsimon

Yield

Servings

Serving size 9 g

Serve	Per serve
Energy (kcal)	27.5
Energy (kJ)	115
Protein (g)	0.9
Fat (g)	1.1
Carbs (g)	2.7
Sugars (g)	0.3
Fiber (g)	2.9
Sodium (mg)	6.2
Cholesterol (mg)	0

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