Monday, March 30, 2009

All Natural Cilantro And Cilantro Powder For Your Recipes!

Happy Monday Bloggers!


From all your health nuts here at herb and spice headquarters http://www.sharpweblabs.com/ and http://www.floridaherbhouse.com/ we welcome you to our blog. April we hope will bring more spice business in as the spring approaches and the outdoors become active again with picnics, parties, and fun filled festivals! With all these come of course what else.... Food, Food, and more Food. With food comes chefs be it beginners or the most seasoned cook out there (No Pun Intended). With cooking comes new recipes and wit new recipes comes our spices. With now over 600 specialty organic certified and natural herbs and culinary spices we are excited to welcome to our herb house our newest member Cilantro and Cilantro Powder!


We have been unable to get a quality cilantro spice that passes all our quality and taste tests but we have finally found one and expect it on our shelves by mid April 2009. So for those who have little or know real knowledge of this award winning spice lets talk about it!


Our good friend Branford who makes his own line of marinades, hot sauces, and barbecue sauces recently came out with a new cilantro sauce. We must say that is tasted better than it sounded and we wish Branford from BranfordsOrginals web site great success with this new creation!

Cilantro is from the parsley family but has an entirely different taste so we try not to use the two terms together much. Two terms that can be used together are corainder and cilantro. Actually the leaves from the corainder herb plant are called cilantro. The corainder plant that develop more slowly produce the leaves we harvest as cilantro. The plants that are allowed to develop longer have their seeds used as corainder seeds.

Cilantro is very popular in Mexico, Asia, and Italy as a garnish for delicious salsa, sauces for chicken and pork, and other great cuisines. Cilantro is usually added to recipes at the end to preserve its flavor.
Below is our favorite cilantro recipe!


Ingredients:

4 pork chops, trimmed of excess fat

Salt and pepper, to taste

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

1 bunch fresh cilantro, coarsely chopped and divided

1/2 red onion, chopped

Salt and pepper to taste

2 teaspoons ground cumin, divided

2 teaspoons chili powder, divided

2 medium tomatoes, coarsely chopped

Directions:
Heat vegetable oil in large non-stick skillet. Rub pork chops with salt and pepper. Place on hot skillet. Sear each side 2-3 minutes. Meanwhile, place half of the chopped cilantro, red onions, half the cumin, half the chili powder, and salt and pepper in bottom of crockpot. Place seared pork chops on top. Place chopped tomatoes, remaining cilantro, remaining cumin, remaining chili powder, and salt and pepper on top of pork chops. Cook on HIGH for 3-4 hours. Serve with Spanish flavored rice and steamed broccoli.


Have A Spicy Day!


Sincerely,


Stephen C. Sharp

FloridaHerbHouse

SharpWebLabs

Thursday, March 12, 2009

Fenugreek Seed Powder - March Herb Of The Month

Happy Thursday Bloggers!

With this crazy recession and other horrible events occurring real time we pray for all who are suffering during these very hard times. Our sales at our nutrition wholesale discount stores http://www.sharpweblabs.com/, http://www.floridaherbhouse.com/, and http://www.kissmybees.com/ are down but we are working extra hard to weather this nasty economical storm.

For March Fenugreek has won our approval for our best selling herb. We have moves several hundred pound of this fantastic herb off our shelves this month. For those who are focusing their attention on health and well-being as so many are during these troubled times we are here to help you with any question you may have about our 700+ herbs, spices, seaweeds, seasonings, tinctures, and more!

We believe the rise in Fenugreek sales are due in part to many people simply switching to all natural health and healing alternatives. The maple aroma and flavor of fenugreek has led to its use in many baked goods, chutneys, confections, and imitation maple syrup. For culinary purposes, seeds are ground and used in curries. Young seedlings and other portions of fresh plant material are eaten as vegetables. The plant is quite nutritious, being high in proteins, ascorbic acid, niacin, and potassium.

Fenugreek is also used as a livestock feed. Fenugreek is generally recognized as safe for human consumption as a spice or natural seasoning and as a plant extract. Fenugreek also appears to be the herb that is most often used to increase milk supply. It is an excellent galactagogue, and has been used as such for centuries. Mothers generally notice an increase in production 24-72 hours after starting the herb, but it can take two weeks for others to see a change. Dosages of 3000mg-4000mg's per day are common. One way to determine if you're taking the correct dosage is to slowly increase the amount of fenugreek until your sweat and urine begin to smell like maple syrup. If you're having problems with any side effects, discontinue use.

Fenugreek can be used either short-term to boost milk supply or long-term to augment supply and/or pumping yields. There are no studies indicating problems with long-term usage. Per Kathleen Huggins "Most mothers have found that the herb can be discontinued once milk production is stimulated to an appropriate level. Adequate production is usually maintained as long as sufficient breast stimulation and emptying continues"


SharpWebLabs.com