Coriander: The Quiet Spice Behind Many Curries

Ground coriander is one of the cookbook’s recurring background spices. It appears with cumin, ginger, garlic, tomatoes, and garam masala in beans, curries, soups, and vegetable dishes.

It rarely dominates the dish on its own. Instead, coriander rounds out sharper ingredients and helps connect the earthy, pungent, acidic, and aromatic parts of a spice base.

The source frequently pairs coriander with cumin. That repeated pairing gives many recipes a stable middle layer before hotter chilies, sweeter aromatics, or finishing herbs are added.

Ingredients

• Ground coriander
• Ground or whole cumin
• Fresh ginger and garlic where called for
• Tomatoes or other moist base ingredients
• Garam masala or chili where the recipe uses them

Method

Add ground coriander after onions or other aromatics have started cooking, usually with the other ground spices. Give it a short sauté so it loses its raw powdery edge, then add tomatoes, stock, beans, vegetables, or other moist ingredients before the spices scorch.