| Turmeric |
| Gurkmeja |
| Spice: Turmeric, (Curcuma longa) is a rhizomatous herbaceous perennial plant of the ginger family, Zingiberaceae which is native to tropical South Asia. |
| Season: Available all year round ground and pre packaged. |
Indispensable in curry powders and Indian cooking. Good in salad dressings, eggs and rice dishes. Its rhizomes are boiled for several hours and then dried in hot ovens, after which they are ground into a deep orange-yellow powder commonly used as a spice in curries and other South Asian cuisine, for dyeing, and to impart color to mustard condiments. Its active ingredient is curcumin and it has an earthy, bitter, peppery flavor and has a mustardy smell.
Possible Substitutes:
Turmeric comes mostly dried and stores well. Sangi, a town in the southern part of the Indian state of Maharashtra, is the largest and most important trading center for turmeric in Asia or perhaps in the entire world.
Turmeric (coded as E100 when used as a food additive) is used to protect food products from sunlight. In non-Indian recipes, Turmeric is sometimes used as a coloring agent. It has found application in canned beverages, baked products, dairy products, ice cream, yogurt, yellow cakes orange juice, biscuits, popcorn-color, sweets, cake icings, cereals, sauces, gelatins, etc. It is a significant ingredient in most commercial curry powders.
Turmeric can also be used to deter ants. The exact reasons why turmeric repels ants is unknown, but anecdotal evidence suggests it works.
It is only in recent years that Western scientists have increasingly recognized the medicinal properties of turmeric. According to a 2005 article in the Wall Street Journal titled, "Common Indian Spice Stirs Hope," research activity into curcumin, the active ingredient in turmeric, is exploding. Two hundred and fifty-six curcumin papers were published in the past year according to a search of the U.S. National Library of Medicine. Supplement sales have increased 35% from 2004, and the U.S. National Institutes of Health has four clinical trials underway to study curcumin treatment for pancreatic cancer, multiple myeloma, Alzheimer's, and colorectal cancer.