I don't want to imply that I am better than you
simply because I have created my own everything spice.
But it would be false to deny my wellspring of grandeur,
a deeply-seated pride at what I have accomplished
on my own in my kitchen with a tablespoon
and a ravaging of my spice cabinets, plural.
It can't be a surprise, surely,
that I seek unprecedented heights.
Me, the geriatric millennial raised
on a rich diet of voyeuristic reality culinary TV shows featuring
"The World's Most Expensive Ice Cream Sundae!" or
or Tyler's Ultimate filet mignon
with melted onions and bleu cheese pan sauce.
Or Emeril ejaculating, "Bam! Bam! Another Bam!"
Or pedestrian Joes and Bros-style hosts
who would self-tizzify over the prospect
of eating America's (meaning The United States's)
"Best Burrito" or "New York's Finest Slice!"
These holographic professors are the ones
who introduced me to arugula
and stressed the seasonality of produce
and the difference between engineered canola
and cold-press EVOO.
Paired with a steady feed of Ina in chambray
in her sunshine-dappled Hamptons kitchen,
laughing and winking at Jeffrey
while arranging supple slices of proscuitto
or grating the king's cheese into a garden-fresh pesto,
she got me hooked at a tender age
on prized items sold by the gram.
Let's face it, I've no hope but to be obsessed
with a ceaseless quest for food nonpareils.
And so here I am, in the silence of a Sunday
arranging a fleet of contenders on my countertop
determining what flavors will be worthy of my medley.
Conducting the spicy score, I pull:
Petal pastels of Penzey's air-dried shallots,
which I crush briefly in my palms before
sprinkling into my miniature mixing bowl.
Then, sesame seeds, untoasted,
and from rough past lessons are pale,
not noir, now never noir,
as to avoid further accusations of
soiling my baked goods with mouse turds.
= = =
Let us hold a moment of silence:
Pouring a salt shaker out for my much-maligned
yet delicious-if-you-close-your-eyes
tahini chocolate chip and
black sesame-flecked cookies from November 2025.
You were divine, you food inspection day nightmare, you.
= = =
And because no one will stop me, I add instead:
Nigella seeds, geometric-shaped beauties
that taste of onion and tellicherry pepper
in their shape and hue, fraternal twins to the black sesame.
Take that, haters.
But thinking of it,
yes this needs some cracked pepper
so I loosen the grind wheel
to queue up a medium-coarse ground output
and whirl away at my peppermill,
asteroid showering my dish with craters of fragrant heat.
Next, a generous fifteen grams of fennel seeds,
corrugated little tubes of wonder.
(My husband will later remark this was in fact, too generous a pour. I will not yield him this point. Though it is true.)
With a fleeting sadness, I empty the remains
of my Icelandic Arctic thyme sea salt
— that I had hiked down from the waterfall-side gift shop on the Golden Circle —
into the awaiting bowl.
A sniffle for another reminder of the passing of time
and the urge for another trans-Atlantic journey.
What's next, I wonder, referring to the recipe book
and also pulling volumes from the archives of my mind.
It calls for "dried garlic" which, I only have roasted ground.
I pour a bit of this powder into the assemblage
and watch with predictable dismay as it runs like sand
through the larger seeds to settle, in isolation, at the bottom.
("Hey Siri!!! Add 'AIR-DRIED GARLIC FLAKES' to my PENZEY'S LIST!" I bellow into the air, my desperation noted, but not mentioned, by my unseen agentic house manager.)
Something feels missing,
and it's not pumpkin seeds
(sorry, cookbook, that will not fly in my household).
To really drive this into epic territory,
I need to make it Maldon.
I grab the stool, climb up to find
my secret stash of pyramidal salt.
Once I cascade crystals over top
the assembled spices in my vessel
now, only now has
my mere E.T. bagel topping
reached peak perfection.
You may feel I'm over-the-top,
but.
I was raised for this moment.
So you can roll your eyes,
as I toss my melange
and roll in the glories
of gilding every culinary lily
that graces my kitchen bench.
Sprinkle, sprinkle, bitch!
= = =
As Inspired by:
🎶 "Colours of the World!
(Spice up your Life!)
Every boy and every gahl!
(Spice up your life!)
People of the world!
Hai, sÃ, ja! Hold tight! 🎶
Spice Girls, "Spice Up Your Life," Spice World, 1997
