Cloves
Whole cloves smell like the holidays but earn their place in the kitchen all year. One or two can quietly anchor a braised dish, a pot of rice, or a mug of mulled cider.
What It Is
Cloves are the dried flower buds of a tropical evergreen tree, harvested before they open. They originated in the Maluku Islands of Indonesia and have been a global trade spice for centuries, valuable enough to start wars over. The flavor is intensely warm and faintly sweet, with a numbing quality that comes from a compound called eugenol. That same compound makes cloves one of the most potent spices in the cabinet, which is exactly why you rarely need more than a few.
They hold their flavor far longer than ground cloves do. Whole is the better buy if you use them even occasionally.
What To Do
Add whole cloves to braised meats, bean dishes, or rice as it cooks, then fish them out before serving. They are classic in mulled wine, chai, and ham glaze. Tuck two or three into an onion and drop it into a pot of soup stock for background warmth that is hard to name but easy to miss when it's gone. For baking, grind them fresh in a spice grinder or with a mortar and pestle just before you need them.
Store them somewhere cool and dark, away from the stove. Kept that way, they stay sharp for two to three years.
