Kosher at The Spice House

Posted on March 2, 2011 by Tom

Kosher Spices from The Spice House

Most of our customers who keep kosher already know that the Spice House offers kosher spices. Our Milwaukee customers in particular may have noticed the symbol on their spices consisting of an outline of Wisconsin containing a “K”, indicating kosher certification. However, we are often asked why spices from our Milwaukee store bear a kosher symbol while spices from our other locations do not.

Though the basic principles of kashrut (kosher law) are simple, the interpretation and implementation of these rules can be quite complicated. Fortunately, since vegetable material is generally considered kosher by default, most whole spices can be assumed to be kosher without specific certification*. For the most part, kosher certification for spices means supervision of how the processing is done.

The Chicago Rabbinical Council considers the following spices to be kosher without specific supervision (original at http://www.crcweb.org/spice_list.php):

Allspice
Cumin
Peppercorns (Any Color)
Anise
Dill
Pepper
Basil
Fennel
Rosemary
Bay Leaf
Fenugreek
Saffron
Black Pepper
Garlic- whole or powder (not toasted or roasted)
Sage
Caraway
Ginger
Salt
Cardamom
Lemon Grass
Savory
Chervil

Mace
Sesame Seed White & Black (Raw only)
Chili Peppers
Marjoram
Sumac (pure)
Chives
Mustard Powder and Mustard Seed
Tarragon
Cilantro
Nutmeg
Thyme
Cinnamon
Onion (not toasted or roasted)
Turmeric
Cloves
Oregano
White Pepper
Coriander
Paprika
Cream of Tartar
Parsley

(source: http://www.crcweb.org/spice_list.php)

Spice blends and some whole spices do require rabbinical supervision to be considered kosher. For this reason, Rabbi Tuvia Torem visits the Spice House in Milwaukee every few months in order to oversee their operations and certify the products as kosher.

Each Spice House location contains its own processing facilities. Most of our ground spices and all of our spice blends are processed “in house” in the store at which they will be sold. Currently, only the Milwaukee Spice House has its facilities certified by a rabbi. What this means is that, although all of our locations sell “Sunny Spain”, only “Sunny Spain” produced in Milwaukee is certified Kosher.

All of the Spice House locations obtain their spices from the same sources, and process spices in much the same ways. The reason that only the Milwaukee Spice House has rabbinical supervision is simple; kosher certification in Wisconsin is much less expensive than certification in Illinois, and the staff in Milwaukee are more familiar with kashrut requirements.

Those customers seeking spices with rabbinical kosher certification should call the Milwaukee Spice House and place orders with them directly. They can be reached at 888-488-0977.

Our Kashrut Certificate can be viewed at: http://www.thespicehouse.com/file/misc/kosher-cert-2011-12

*It is important to note that, except in our Milwaukee store, our spices may have come into contact with equipment that is not considered kosher.

Our Spice House founder, my Dad, William Penzey Sr, dies.

Posted on September 25, 2010 by Patty

It is with an extremely heavy heart that I share the news of the death of the founder of The Spice House, my father. Our loss is magnified in that we have also lost our mentor, the man who taught my husband Tom and I our craft, his teaching has been an evolving process, one that we did not see coming to an end so soon. My Dad never stopped reaching out to us, pushing us to go further, look harder, re-examine our dedication to quality, to our customers, to our staff. He constantly challenged us to explore other vendors, new countries of origin, different connections, a twist in flavors, novel combinations. Yet his teachings were not just contained to the spice world, he also had some strong feelings and connections to, the inner spiritual world, and his tendencies toward philosophical teachings were perhaps the place where we struggled the hardest as his students. He believed that the spices had music in them, if you just knew how to listen. Our thoughts are that his spice work continues on through our stores, this gives us great comfort, and something to strive for.

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Celtic Seasoning

Posted on July 2, 2010 by Patty

A story in yesterday’s Chicago Tribune listed some bests of the Taste of Chicago. “Best vegetable: O’Brien’s Celtic corn on the cob. Whatever spices are hiding in O’Brien’s “Celtic Seasoning” shaker sure do bring out the flavor of those juicy corn kernals.” Guess who makes that blend for our neighbors in Old Town? I have wished on more than one occaison that we had a patented system for each blend we seek to create, but each seasoning seems to come with it own formulation of trial and error. We might want to create a new blend because it is the hot trend of the year, or people are doing more ethnic cooking from this country, this year, there are a whole variety of reasons we might choose from for making new blends. Rarely is it to honor the request of our landlord! “So, you guys are masters of spice, why don’t you come up with a Celtic blend that we can shake on O’Brien’s Irish corn that we grill during all of our summer festivals. We will buy it, the lable will have your name on it, and it will be a great way to drum up business.” We have a very savy landlord in Peter O’brien and he has always been good to us about giving us business. So off we went to create our Celtic seasoning. I did my diligent research, knowing already that spices do not actually grown in Ireland, the climate needs to be very tropical. Continue reading →

Baconfest – and a recipe – cool email connections!

Posted on April 8, 2010 by Patty

A most wonderful byproduct of answering the company email is learning how many customers of ours are doing really fun and interesting things. Recently a total stranger and I became acquainted via this email.

“Hello, I wanted to let you know that a recipe i created using your King Creole Spice has been selected as one of 5 finalists at the Nueske’s Amateur Cook-off at Baconfest Chicago on April 10th. Here is the link to my Recipe.

Here is the link to the Baconfest announcement http://baconfestchicago.com/2010/03/22/announcing-the-5-finalists-for-the-nueskes-amateur-cook-off-competition/
I really enjoy the quality and freshness of your spices and have featured them in other recipes on my food blog as well.
I’m hopeful that the King Creole Seasoning will help my recipe shine above the competition! Have a great day.

Brad”

Okay, we are from Wisconsin, where it goes without saying that Nueske’s bacon is THE BEST. Also, no one loves chicken wings more than I do. I had never dreamed of putting the two together. Add King Creole seasoning, and I have to believe in this recipe. Go Brad.

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Is it important to personally answer the company email?

Posted on April 6, 2010 by Patty

As the owners of The Spice House, my husband Tom and I often wrestle with time management issues, there simply is not enough time in the day for all of the hats we must wear. We have learned that, while painful, you can delegate chores. They might not be done to the standard to which we aspire, but they can come close enough. I personally answer the company email for hours every day, and we have discussed whether this is something that could be given to one of our staff members. Many of these emails are very simple, but others are quite complex. Often times, simply out of politeness, unless my box has over 200 emails to get through, I will seek out an answer for someone who is looking to find a product we do not carry, or a recipe. I sometimes wonder if it is possible that so many people out there have no idea how to google the information they need. Or perhaps I have unwittingly turned myself into a Ready Reference resource. Growing up, before the days of computers, we used libraries and reference books. The families that could afford encyclopedias invested serious money in these books which their children could use as a valuable resource for schoolwork. Tom even sold encyclopedias on the road awhile in his youth, if you want a good laugh ask him about those ?good old days?! If you were not lucky enough to have some serious reference books at home, the library had a Ready Reference number you called for help. The person who answered was not hooked into any computer, she would leave the desk, go get a book, and look up the answer for you. So, on the most generic level, I may now be this person. HOWEVER, on the most valuable level, I can?t tell you how many emails I read that are written by remarkable people.

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Boxes of Beautiful Vanilla Beans

Posted on December 10, 2009 by Patty

Everyone is familiar with the excitement of opening beautifully wrapped presents during the holidays. What lovely treasure might be discovered in the box? Maybe a beautiful jewel of a gift, sometimes a dud. We are fortunate to experience that anticipation year round, here at The Spice House, when we open our bulk packages of spices, that come to us from exotic ports all over the Earth. Some hand picked cloves come to us in beautiful wooden crates, stamped with a colored ink design of a ship sailing the ocean. The wooden box is necessary to keep the hand select cloves in perfect condition. Cinnamon from Ceylon comes in five foot tall bundles, the long quills are carefully wrapped and then burlap is sewn around them. Saffron comes from Spain in decorated tins, depicting the harvesting of saffron. Cardamom comes from India, in a box stamped with an elephant, and even through the box, the heady aroma emerges. My favorite box to open is those filled with vanilla bean. We just received a shipment this last week.

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Anticipation

Posted on November 25, 2009 by Patty

It occurs to me that anticipation might be one of the most wonderful things in life. Anticipation is a positive energy of its own volition. Currently we are anticipating Thanksgiving dinner, as the host, my brother, is a fantastic cook! He makes three or four different turkeys, and then packs everyone a leftover care package. We also have business anticipations for the holidays. We are in a nice position, because of the uniqueness of our business, that PR really just floats in to us, usually via email these days. Each holiday season, we get some press for our spice themed gift boxes . We never know where these mentions will come from, and it is always with great anticipation that we look forward to them, whatever the venue. This year we are excited to have several connections working for us, including Saveur Magazine and a new television show about comfort food hosted by Art Smith.

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Anticipation

Posted on November 19, 2009 by Patty

It occurs to me that anticipation might be one of the most wonderful things in life. Anticipation is different from expectations. Expectations can be fulfilled or not fulfilled, and leave you disappointed, while anticipation is always something you look forward to. No one anticipates a trip to the dentist, for example. Anticipation is a positive energy of its own volition. Currently we are anitipating Thanksgiving dinner, as the host, my brother, Bill Penzey Jr., is a fantastic cook! He makes three different turkeys, and then packs everyone a leftover care package. We also have business anticipations for the holidays. We are in such a nice position to have this unique business, that PR really just floats into us, usually via email these days. Each holiday season, we get some press for our spice themed gift boxes . We never know where these will come from, and it is always with great anticipation that we look forward to these press mentions. This year we are excited to have several connections working with us, including Saveur Magazine! and a new television show about comfort food hosted by Art Smith.

We sent gift boxes to the editorial staff of Saveur magazine, and have recently had word that we have been selected to be in their gift guide. We have also sent boxes to be considered for the USA today.com gift guide. In addition, a new show on The Learning Channel, that is doing a show about comfort food, has asked if they can come in with Art Smith on December 19th to film our Chinese 5 Spice being created. Paula Haney, of Hoosier Mama Pie Company uses this blend to create an amazing apple pie. That Saturday is the busiest Saturday of the year, but who says no to a television spot?! One of my alltime favorite anticipations of the year is an episode of Good Eats with Alton Brown which is about free range fruitcake, where Alton filmed a segment in our Evanston shop. The first year it aired, the Food Network had not yet been picked up in Chicago. Much to my surprise, the following year the episode aired again. And it has aired ever since. My hope is that it will continue to air until something about fruitcake changes! Will it air again this year? Is my anticipation warrented? Since I just put in the above link, all I can say it HOORAY, we love you Alton Brown!

When a seed begins to sprout -

Posted on October 1, 2009 by Patty

Two summers ago I fell in love with the city of Madison, Wisconsin, while attending a governor’s conference for Slow Food. While Chicago hosts no shortage of fine farmer’s markets, I was blown away by the Madison farmer’s market, held in a square anchored by the glorious capitol building. One of my twin nieces is attending college there and she has a strong interest in environmental sciences. While we had lunch, I tried my best to coerce her into joining the University of Wisconsin chapter of Slow Food. We had all agreed at the conference meetings that it is extremely important to the future of the Slow Food movement that its vision is embraced by these young students, whose vibrancy and energy will lead to the dedication to continue the cause. At the time I tried to view my suggestions through her eyes, the intellectual college student listing to her aunt, most likely humoring her. I figured that my suggestion probably got lumped into one of those categories of helpful advice like ?If your room was neat and organized, you would not believe how much easier it would be to concentrate on your homework!? So I was delighted to receive an email the following year (a seed takes awhile to sprout) saying she was going to a Slow Food potluck that night.

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The Flavor Bible – Happy One Year Anniversary!

Posted on September 15, 2009 by Patty

The folks in this photo are waiting in line at the Milwaukee Public Market to have authors Karen Page and Andrew Dornenburg autograph a copy of The Flavor Bible. This was about a year ago when the book was first out. We were lucky enough to have this dedicated couple do book signings for us in not just one, but THREE different Spice House locations!

Since we are a spice store, not a book store, we are extremely selective about which books we carry. We choose only four titles a year, as the books will use up valuable shelf space that is very necessary to showcase our 400 plus spice products in our tiny shops. We usually swap out books from year to year, yet The Flavor Bible remains on the first string roster. Simply put, this is an AMAZING book. It is a classic reference guide that is a must for any kitchen, from the uninitiated cook to the most seasoned veteran. When I need a thank-you or hostess gifts for chef friends who already possess all things culinary, this is what I bring. All the chefs I have given it to loved it, with the exception of Carrie Nahabedian. I tried to give the book to her before I read it; it ends up that she is one of the experts quoted in the book and naturally she had her own supply of the book! EVERYONE loves this book. Why does The Flavor Bible earn such high praise and accolades, enough to keep it a hot seller even after a year on the market?

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