cumin
Cultural layer
Cuminum cyminum L. (Plants of the World Online, Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, accessed 2026-10-03)
Gran Cocina Latina (Maricel Presilla, 2012)
Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking (Madhur Jaffrey, Barron's)
Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cookery (Madhur Jaffrey, 1982)
Route
PendingThe routes are written. They are not yet mapped.
This entry's cultural layer already names where it came from and how it moved. What it does not yet carry is that movement as structure: ordered waypoints with real coordinates, and a mechanism on each leg. Until it does, the layer stays an empty slot rather than a drawn line, because a map built from prose would be a guess with a projection under it.
1 of 409 entries carries a mapped route · nutmeg is the prototype
- Waypoints
Ordered places, each with its kind
- Coordinates
Real positions, with the gazetteer they came from
- Segments
From, to, and the mechanism that moved it
- Confidence
Documented, attributed or contested
- Summary
What the route argues, in a sentence
Names · co-equal, marked by how each one travelled
FoodwayPresent as a living food culture.
No names recorded.
Connections
38 bonds · 37 sourcedKhatte chhole: a tablespoon of ground cumin in the sour chick peas.
Relocated in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, page 127, and page 40, cumin seeds with the chick peas in the pork chop stew; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
Ful medames, the Egyptian breakfast.
Read in Helou's Feast, 2018, page 300, ful medammes, which Helou calls the Egyptian breakfast par excellence: in the Egyptian style the mashed beans are sprinkled with cumin round the edge of the bowl.
Set in bold capitals in The Flavor Bible: very highly recommended by a large number of the chefs it surveyed.
Read from the entry for cumin in the 2008 edition.
Jeera tadka, bloomed in ghee.
Read in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, page 119, the ghee heated and the cumin seeds dropped in, then poured over the lentils. The book calls it baghaar, page 211; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
Masoor dal tadka.
Read in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, page 119, the recipe is called Red Split Lentils with Cumin Seeds, masoor dal; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
The anticucho and adobo marinade.
Read in Acurio's ¡Buenazo!, 2017, page 122, the anticucho marinade, ají panca with cumin; page 134, the adobo of pork belly in chicha and ají panca with cumin and oregano; the cited Peru: The Cookbook was not the copy in hand.
One is an ingredient of the other
A sazon component.
One is an ingredient of the other
A chermoula component.
Read in Helou's Feast, 2018, page 342, sardines chermoula (hût bel chermoula), whose chermoula is garlic, grated onion, cilantro, cumin, paprika, red pepper flakes, olive oil and lemon juice, spread between butterflied sardines before they are floured and fried.
The base masala.
Read in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, pages 74 and 176, cumin and cayenne mixed into the same spice base; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
The base masala.
Read in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, pages 124 and 126, the ground cumin, turmeric and coriander mixed before they go into the oil; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
Dhana-jeera, the base blend.
Read in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, pages 98, 114 and 127, ground cumin and ground coriander going in together as the base; the glossary gives them as zeera and dhania, pages 203 and 204; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
The Goan vindaloo paste: fenugreek seeds ground with cumin and the rest.
Relocated in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, page 38, where cumin seeds, red chillies, peppercorns, cardamom, cinnamon, mustard seeds and fenugreek seeds are ground together. The book's fenugreek is the seed, page 204, not the leaf; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
The tadka.
Read in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, pages 101 and 114, the mustard seeds and cumin seeds into very hot oil, the cumin going in as the mustard begins to pop; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
Frijoles.
Read in Los clasicos de la cocina mexicana, page 19, the beans, the cumin and the chipotle mashed together for the chimichangas; the cited Diccionario Enciclopedico was not the book in hand.
The tadka.
Read in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, page 98, Cauliflower with Cumin and Asafetida, heeng zeere ki gobi, and page 119, where both go into the hot ghee. The book calls the technique baghaar; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
Recado rojo.
Read in Los clasicos de la cocina mexicana, page 72, the rojo antiguo tabasqueno: achiote, pepitas, cloves, peppercorns, cumin, oregano, cinnamon, garlic and onion; the cited Diccionario Enciclopedico was not the book in hand.
The dry okra: ground cumin, ground coriander and amchoor together.
Relocated in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, page 106. Chaat masala is not in this book; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
The Venezuelan yuca mojo carries cumin.
Relocated in Gran Cocina Latina: Venezuelan yuca mojo, page 142. The Cuban mojo, page 140, is garlic, bitter orange and oil.
Raita and marinades.
Read in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, page 213, where the book says we always make yoghurt relishes with cumin that has been roasted first and then ground, and nothing else will do; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
Garam masala.
Read in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, page 205, the garam masala recipe: cardamom seeds, cinnamon stick, black cumin seeds, cloves, peppercorns and a nutmeg; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
Set in bold in The Flavor Bible: recommended by a number of the chefs it surveyed.
Read from the entry for lamb, in general in the 2008 edition.
Set in bold in The Flavor Bible: recommended by a number of the chefs it surveyed.
Read from the entry for carrots in the 2008 edition.
Score unexamined
Seasoning blends.
The mole spice mix.
Read in Los clasicos de la cocina mexicana, page 60, a teaspoon of whole cumin among the spices blended for the mole poblano; the cited Diccionario Enciclopedico was not the book in hand.
Saag paneer and paneer tikka.
Kaleji: cumin seeds and kalonji into the oil together.
Relocated in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, page 22. Panch phoron is not in this book, and on page 91 cumin is offered as a substitute for kalonji rather than a partner to it; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
Besan pakora and chilla.
Kashmiri masala.
Methi sabzi.
Paratha and snack masala.
Set in plain type in The Flavor Bible: suggested by one or more of the chefs it surveyed.
Read from the entry for cauliflower in the 2008 edition.
Kseksû bel hût, the coastal fish couscous: cumin in the sauce the grain steams over.
Read in Helou's Feast, 2018, page 274, Moroccan couscous with monkfish (kseksû bel hût): cumin and paprika in the tomato sauce in the bottom of the couscoussière. The grain itself is dressed with basil pounded into olive oil, not cumin.
The two okra dishes, both started with cumin seeds in hot oil.
Relocated in Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking, page 104, sweet and sour okra, and page 106, the dry okra; the cited Indian Cookery, BBC 1982, was not the copy in hand.
Score unexamined
Score unexamined
Seasoned millet.
Set in plain type in The Flavor Bible: suggested by one or more of the chefs it surveyed.
Read from the entry for beans, kidney in the 2008 edition.
Bonds are drawn from culinary literature and origin-tradition references, tiered by source. Origin means a reference from the place. Witness means the pairing is the place's own and the reference documenting it was written from outside.
The score is cultural weight: how central a pairing is in the tradition that documents it. It is not a prediction of how two materials behave in a formulation and not a measure of chemical affinity. The scale is ordinal, because centrality is a judgement rather than a measurement: 1.0 where the pair is the dish, 0.9 a fixed named form, 0.8 a canonical dish, 0.7 recurrent across many dishes, 0.6 common, 0.5 attested, 0.4 marginal or compound-led.
Each score is set against a named dish and carries that dish in its note. Where a score has not been examined it says so, because an inherited figure and a researched one should not look alike.
The dish is named by a reader who knows the cuisine and cites a source appropriate to it. It has not yet been confirmed inside that source page by page, so a note records what supports a score rather than what has been checked in the book.
Studio Culinar-E, "cumin", Pantry Archive, Studio Monk-E, 2026. https://studioculinar-e.com/archive/cumin
/archive/cumin
Bonds are tiered by source, origin-tradition references first.