Food startups bring new life to Detroit’s century-old Eastern Market

21 October 2016 – Eater

Forr most of his life, Patrick Schwager was, by his own admission, “a pizza guy.” He’d grown up in a middle-class suburb of Detroit called Garden City (home to America’s first Kmart and Little Caesar’s) raised by a Mexican-American mother (his grandmother had come to Detroit in the 1920s) and a father whom he describes affectionately as “a white guy.”

Like most people in suburban Detroit, Schwager spent very little time in the city growing up. Now he spends his Saturday mornings in the recently opened commercial kitchen at Detroit’s 125-year-old Eastern Market, tinkering with recipes for salsa and guacamole that he sells under the label Aunt Nee’s. It’s one of the 20+ small businesses participating in the Market’s non-profit incubator program, Detroit Kitchen Connect.

Get to know India’s souring agents

7 October 2016 – Saveur.com

It’s a safe bet that when you think of India, you think of spices: cardamom and cloves and peppercorns, cinnamon and cumin and coriander, fennel and mustard and turmeric. And while Indians use these aromatics with as much delicacy and finesse as anyone, they’re far from the only ones that do. Indian spices are world-shaping commodities that have lured colonists and built empires obsessed with the flavors that at one point were only found on the subcontinent and in Southeast Asia.

But it’s a different story for India’s souring agents—twangy sources of acidity that define regional Indian cooking just as much as some key spices. Where an American cook may brighten a sauce with a squeeze of lemon or dash of vinegar, and Indian might turn to powdered green mango to tart up a kebab spice rub, or add a curl of tamarind-like kokum to a seafood a curry.

Since these flavors never really traveled beyond India’s borders, they may not pack the romantic punch (or heady nose) of a north Indian garam masala. But they’re at least as central to Indian cooking—and undoubtedly more unique—than the spices that first made India rich. Here are seven worth knowing.