What’s the Dill With Pickle Juice in a Cocktail?

/in , /by

By    –   Orange Coast Magazine

Dill-Iciously Spring at Five Crowns

My uncle once told me about his award-winning family-secret margarita recipe. “Just add a little bit of pickle juice and you’ll blow everyone’s minds!” he would say. The thought of citrus, tequila, and pickle juice may seem like an odd combination on paper, but it actually shores up a nice sea-like brininess, enhancing the citrus and agave, bringing the whole drink to a weirdly higher level. But craft cocktails that use pickle juice or dill, I hadn’t seen one until recently and thought this must be some sort of 2018 cocktail trend.

At 320 Main in Seal Beach, co-owner Jason Schiffer just gave me a flashback with his latest drink menu featuring a new whiskey sour called the Dilbert Pickle which contains George Dickel rye, whiskey pickle shrub, Lustau Sherry, lemon juice, and egg white. Why it isn’t called the Dickel Pickle is beyond me, but the drink, served in a tall champagne flute, trumpets fresh oak aromatics through the dense meringue-like head. As if foam that smells of fresh bourbon-soaked oak isn’t goosebump-inducing enough, the finish has a tingle of dill pickle that hits the back of the throat. “Pickles are funny, that’s why I did it,” says Jason. “I like to go around and throw pickles, and put pickles in front of peoples doors, just because it’s funny.” 320 Main, Seal Beach // 320MainSealBeach.com

Several miles south from 320 Main is Corona Del Mar’s landmark restaurant the Five Crowns, and a different kind of dill cocktail hit my paws. “This is Dill-Iciously Spring.” “Well, I should hope so!” I said, not expecting dill puns from such an institution. Dill-iciously Spring, is a gin drink made with Velvet Falernum, elderflower liquor, lime juice, dill, and muddled cucumber. The drink is full bodied, herbaceous, with a kick of that refreshing pre-pickle vibe. Catch this drink on the spring menu, which is created around new executive chef Alejandra Padlilla’s incredible cuisine. 3801 CA-1, Corona Del Mar // lawrysonline.com/five-crowns

Are Jalapenos Healthy For You?

/in , /by

By AREEBA HUSSAIN  –   Reports Healthcare

Fresh jalapeno plant

Jalapeños are those spicy chili peppers that you often add to your favorite fast food. They belong to the hot pepper family and due to their distinctive taste; it is easier to add them to many recipes.

Naturally, they are small and green or red. They are spicier than green chilies. Mexican cuisine is the hub of jalapeños enriched food. The distinctive taste of Mexican food, flavored by jalapeños makes it famous worldwide.

Surprisingly, jalapeños are not just any spice. It has its health benefits to offer. It is loaded with nutrients that are healthy by many ways. This article will explain the hidden benefits of eating jalapeños. Also, it will discuss their possible side effects and suggest you the means to use add them.

High nutritional value

Jalapeños have minimum calories in them. They have high amounts of vitamins, minerals, fiber and antioxidants in them. You wouldn’t believe but following is the list of ingredients in only one raw jalapeño.

  • Total calories:4
  • Fiber:4 grams
  • Vit C:10% of the RDI
  • Vit B6: 4% of the RDI
  • Vit A:2% of the RDI
  • Vit K:2% of the RDI
  • Folate:2% of the RDI
  • Manganese:2% of the RDI

Jalapeño is a spice, but like most of the fruits and vegetables, it has a certain amount of fiber in it. It means that one pepper provides the user 2% of the RDI consuming 2,000 calories per day.

Jalapeño is also high in vitamins like vitamin C and vitamin B6. Vitamin C is found in citrus fruits, it is an antioxidant, which fights against the free radical damage and makes your skin healthy. On the other hand, vitamin B6 plays a key role in more than140 bodily reactions.

Helpful in weight loss

Jalapeños are most likely to help you for losing weight by metabolic boost. They increase your overall fat burn and also play action to suppress your hunger pangs. Jalapeños have a vital compound called capsaicin, and similar compounds called capsaicinoids that are evident to be capable of boost metabolismby 4–5% per day. In this way, it is easy to lose weight when you eat jalapeños.

Additionally, they also help to get rid of the stubborn belly fat and reduce appetite. That is why spices, particularly, jalapeños help to lose weight.

Helpful against Cancer

Many studies show the anticancer capacity of capsaicin. It is so powerful that it can even kill over 40 different types of cancer cells. The best thing is that it has no damaging effect on healthy cells.

As per the study, it can do the following things.

  • Stops the growth of cancer cells.
  • Prevent them from dividing.
  • Prohibits the formation of blood vessels around cancer cells.
  • Prevents the cancer cells to spread in the entire body.

However, the studies proving these effects are not targeted to humans. For the effects on humans, there is a dire of more extensive studies.

Acts as a painkiller

When it comes to medicinal benefits, capsaicin is a highly effective pain reliever when used externally on the skin. It works by soothing the pain by blocking the skin receptors that sense it.

When you apply it on the skin, at first, you may feel a burning sensation. After that, you will feel your skin to be numbed, and the pain is completely gone. For this reason, capsaicin is also used in lotions and patches that are targeted to relieve pain. This pain could be related to anything such as infectious, diabetic nerve pain and chronic muscle and joint pain.

Is helpful against stomach ulcers

There are so many reasons for stomach ulcers to be formed such as;

  • H pylori bacterial infection
  • Stomach acid
  • Disturbed blood flow
  • Excessive NSAID pain relievers
  • alcohol
  • Smoking
  • Stress and fatigue

The capsaicin in all chili peppers is helpful to protect the stomach from developing ulcers. However, it is not clear if jalapeños have sufficient quantity of capsaicin for this effect or not.

Protects the body against infections

Most of the spices and herbs have a traditional use to prevent food spoilage and food poisoning. The compounds of spicy chili peppers such as jalapenos are very helpful to reduce the growth of common bacteria and yeas.

They also help from bacterial toxins to spread and reduce the risk of foodborne diseases. Not just this, capsaicin also helps to prevent other types of infections, such as strep throat, tooth decay, and chlamydia.

But the important thing is that all these studies have used chili extracts and not whole chilis. Also, these tests were conducted in the lab but not on human subjects. Further research is required to study it.

Cardiac health

The biggest contributors of heart problems are diabetes, high cholesterol, and high blood pressure. Research says that capsaicin may be helping reduce the impact of these risk factors and its role in keeping your heart healthy.

Capsaicin is evident to lower cholesterol and lipid levels in animals, but this has not been proven on human subjects yet. It is further explained that this property is due to the lowering in blood pressure by relaxing blood vessels, however, there is no research to prove this to be true in humans.

Possible Side Effects

It doesn’t look like that there will be any side effects of jalapeño. In fact, there are so many promising health benefits of it. But you must know about its potential side effects too.

The most common side effect to get from eating any chili is burning of the mouth. If it is very spicy, there are high chances that it will cause moderate to severe burning. If a person is not tolerant to spices, it is not advisable for him to eat chilies, regardless of their amazing taste.

Take care of the following things before you eat them.

  • Do not scar the chilies.
  • Use gloves whole cutting and handling chilies
  • Avoid using the unwashed hands on any part of the body, particularly eyes.
  • Remove the white membranes inside the jalapeño before using them.
  • In case of burning, drink milk.

People with metabolic problems such as irritable bowel syndrome may experience some unpleasant experiences while using anything spicy. For them eating chilies is not a good choice so it is better to avoid it. The common side effects to hit them are abdominal pain, burning, cramping, and diarrhea.

If you are using dried or stored chilies, there is a high risk of contamination with aflatoxin, which is a particular type of mold that grows on certain foods in exceptional conditions. In all such cases, it is recommended not to use chilies and other types of spices.

Selling pickles like wine: Premium consumer products from Bharat

/in , /by

From local spirits like feni to fine garments, our products with a little more flair without being bashful about the price might just help revive traditional cottage industries.

By Sahil Kini   –   livemint.com

Imagine if we repackage the pickles into beautifully tiny ornate glass jars and sell it in a limited run like ‘small-batch’ whiskies, only in premium stores or directly online. Photo: iStockphoto

My grandmother makes a particular lemon pickle that, in our family, is treated like gold. Aged over years, and in one particular bottle’s case, a decade, the pickle turns dark—almost black—and develops a flavour so complex and intense that one taste of it often sends the eater into a gastronomical trance.

It emerges only on really special occasions, like the meal we had after the birth of my son. An aunt once nearly caused a diplomatic incident when she surreptitiously tried to pocket a small chunk in a poorly hidden glass bottle.

One of my mortal fears is that the pickle will be gone once she is. And wondering about ways to ensure I never run out, got me thinking: Could there be a case for a premium pickle brand?

And in the process of exploring this idea, I want to outline three tenets for consumer products that could work particularly well in the Indian market: (1) Select Bharat-specific categories e.g. pickles, feni (2) Build a decidedly premium brand identity across the board: digital presence, premium packaging and a strong narrative of why these products are luxurious (3) Leverage a cooperative model at the back-end to supply authentic products while creating livelihood improvement opportunities.

This is not a new concept. The Indian apparel sector has almost perfected this model. Brands such as Raw Mango and Fabindia tick all three boxes and have met with tremendous success.

In cosmetics, Kama and Forest Essentials have done the same to the concept of luxury Ayurveda (albeit without the cooperative supply model). But as is the case in consumer products, there’s always more money to be made if you create the right niche.

Now is a particularly opportune time for the space as consumer products are the “it” sector for quite a few venture capital funds. Driven by events like the success of the Pratap Snacks IPO (initial public offering) at home, and Unilever’s billion-dollar acquisition of Dollar Shave Club abroad, venture capitalists (VCs) and start-ups alike are now taking a fresh look at the sector. It’s early days yet, but the emergence of consumer products-focused VCs like Fireside Ventures, and start-ups like Raw Pressery, Bombay Shaving Co., and Moms Co. are indicative of a renaissance in the space.

Most of these companies have chosen decidedly Western categories. We live in an age when a 150g box of ground chickpeas sells for Rs200 just because it has “Hummus” plastered on the label. One visit to a luxury supermarket like Foodhall will reveal an avalanche of pretty jars selling Indian-made versions of foreign goods at ultra-premium price points. But by and large, the absence of products that are from Bharat’s hinterland is the first reason I believe there is space for a premium pickle business.

Secondly, there’s the question of building a brand story. The Europeans have mastered this craft. Selling fermented grape juice like it’s the nectar of the gods, or treating coagulated milk protein on par with bank collateral (no really, there’s a bank in Italy that accepts Parmigiano Reggiano cheese as collateral for loans!); there’s so much we can learn about marketing from them. Concepts like a chateau with winemaking heritage, terroir, ageing, applies to our home-made products too. Then why don’t we sell it like we’re proud of it, at a price point that communicates their true value?

Which brings me to the final point. Most consumer product companies employ a full-stack approach geared towards eventual mass manufacturing. Adopting this approach for products like pickle or wine would be a huge mistake. Wine and cheese aren’t mass produced. They’re made in limited supply by chateaus that have mastered the craft over generations. Their scarcity and brand positioning is what accounts for most of their value.

We should apply the same principles to our products. Grocery stores in older neighbourhoods still sell pickles in plastic jars with handwritten labels. These flavour bombs made by women looking to make a little extra money, are as authentic as my grandmother’s creations but sell typically for under Rs50 for 500g. That is a travesty.

Imagine if we repackage the same pickles into beautifully tiny ornate glass jars, put it in a wooden box with the brand name engraved, slip in a scroll with the name and story of the grandma that made it, and sell it in a limited run like “small-batch” whiskies, only in premium stores or directly online. This way, grandma makes all the money she needs, we get to eat some fabulous pickles from around the country and those pickles will finally be priced like the priceless treasures they are.

My pickle obsession notwithstanding, these principles could apply to many Bharat categories. From local spirits like feni, toddy and mahua liquor, to fine garments, to intricate furniture and jewellery, marketing our products with a little more flair and storytelling without being bashful about the price might just help revive traditional cottage industries while giving us an authentic taste of our heritage.

Sahil Kini is a principal with Aspada Investment Advisors. The Bharat Rough Book is a column on building businesses for the middle of India’s income pyramid. His Twitter handle is @sahilkini