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Finishing with spices

Also called finishing spices, garnishing with spices, sprinkling over

Quick answer

Adding a spice at the very end or at the table, uncooked, so that its aroma, colour and texture arrive intact.

What it does to spices

Every earlier stage of cooking costs a spice some of its volatile aroma. Finishing spends none of it: a pinch of roasted cumin over yoghurt, sumac over hummus, za’atar or chaat masala over a finished dish, or gochugaru and sesame over a Korean plate is tasted at full strength, and on the surface, where the tongue meets it first. It also keeps texture and colour — the crunch of sesame, the red of Aleppo pepper — that cooking would soften or dull. Spices chosen for finishing are those that are pleasant raw: already roasted, acidic, or salty.

Culinary conventionConsistent practice across Levantine, South Asian, Korean and Japanese cooking, and following from the volatility of aroma compounds recorded on the compound pages.Sources: On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore o…

Why it works

Volatile aroma compounds are lost steadily to heat; added after cooking they reach the nose intact. Surface seasoning is also perceived more intensely than the same amount mixed through, because it dissolves on the tongue before the food does.

Reasonable evidenceSources: On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore o…

How it goes wrong

  • Finishing with a spice that needs cooking to taste good, such as raw ground cumin or raw fenugreek, which taste dusty or bitter.
  • Finishing with a spice blend meant for the pan, where it tastes raw.
Culinary conventionFollows from which spices are palatable uncooked.

Spices it matters for

The tools it is done with

The equipment used for this technique, and the forms it takes in the kitchens that use it.

  • Pepper caster and pepper box

    Also called pepper pot, pepper shaker, pepper box

    A small lidded vessel with a pierced top, from which ground pepper is shaken over food at the table. One museum describes a Boston silver caster of about 1720 as made to spread a finely ground substance, probably pepper. It is the vessel that made ground pepper a seasoning each diner adds, as distinct from one the cook measures.

    Reasonable evidenceSources: The Cleveland Museum of Art — Open Access c… (Object 1940.273: caster with lid, Boston, c. 1720, silver; catalogue description); The Metropolitan Museum of Art — Collection… (Object 48.187.114a–c: pepper caster, 1704–8, silver)

    Made in silver, stoneware, pottery, glass · Attested in museum collections from 1704–8, with a Roman precedent

    History:

    Silver pepper casters and pepper boxes survive from the first decades of the 18th century: one of 1704–8, American boxes made in Boston and elsewhere between about 1720 and 1775, and a London caster of 1731/32. Cheaper materials followed, in salt-glazed stoneware by 1740–60, pottery around 1800 and pressed and blown glass in the United States in the 1880s. A dispenser for pepper at table is far older than these objects: a complete silver table service of the Roman Empire is described as including pepper dispensers.

    Reasonable evidenceSources: The Metropolitan Museum of Art — Collection… (Object 48.187.114a–c: pepper caster, 1704–8, silver); The Metropolitan Museum of Art — Collection… (Object 33.120.215a, b: pepper box, American, 1720–35, silver); Art Institute of Chicago — collection recor… (Object 1955.1264a-b: pepper caster, London, 1731/32, silver); The Metropolitan Museum of Art — Collection… (Object 34.165.66: pepper castor, ca. 1740–60, salt-glazed stoneware); The Metropolitan Museum of Art — Collection… (Object 46.140.562a, b: pepper caster, American, ca. 1888, pressed glass); The Cleveland Museum of Art — Open Access c… (Object 1956.32: spouted pitcher, 300–600 CE; description of a Roman table service)

    Used for Black pepper, White pepper

Where it is used

The pairings that specifically call for this technique.

  • Gochugaru with sesame seed — The standard Korean finish: chilli flake and toasted sesame scattered together over a dish at the end. The sesame’s roasted oiliness rounds the chilli’s edge, and visually the two are what make a Korean plate look finished.
  • Cumin with yoghurt — Roasted ground cumin over yoghurt — raita, or simply seasoned curd — is a standard South Asian preparation. Yoghurt's acidity and fat both suit cumin, and the roasting is essential: raw ground cumin in yoghurt tastes dusty.
  • Sumac with chickpeas — Chickpeas are starchy, mild and slightly sweet, and readily taste flat. Sumac supplies acidity and colour on the surface, where it is tasted first, without thinning a purée the way lemon juice would.
  • Sumac with tuna — Sourness is what oily fish wants, and sumac supplies it dry — so it can be scattered on at the end without softening a crust or thinning a dressing. It is a Levantine habit that transfers well to a seared steak.
  • Ramsons with eggs — In a Slovenian survey of wild food plants, ramsons was among the commonest wild greens, used in egg dishes as well as soups, salads and spreads.
  • Kanzuri with soup — The Japanese agriculture ministry’s register of local dishes lists hot pots and ramen first among its uses, as a hidden flavour stirred in. A little gives a broth heat, salt and the savouriness of the long fermentation.
  • Kanzuri with chicken — The ministry’s register names grilled chicken skewers among the foods it is added to, in small amounts.

Questions this page answers

  • which spices to add at the end of cooking
  • finishing spices
  • spices to sprinkle on food