Spice routes and detours

More and more countries are discovering that packaged Indian spices are contaminated. Back home, they're so convenient and trusted, we didn't think to look closer. It's time to rework this recipe

- VIR SANGHVI

It saddened me to read about the global uproar about the contamination of spices by some of our most popular brands. What was sadder still that the contamination was not caught by our own authorities, who should have been protecting Indian consumers, but by foreign governments.

Not everyone loves packaged spice blends, but the one thing we were all agreed on, until the latest scandal, was that if you bought your spices from a well-known brand, you had some guarantee of quality, authenticity and safety. Now, even that seems doubtful.

The commercial spice blend is a 20th-century phenomenon. Our grandparents would blend their spices at home or, at least, would go to a local masalawala they knew to blend masalas for them.

As the packaged spice blends have caught on, they have influenced the nature of our cuisine. Chefs, caterers and home-cooks will tell you that the most popular pre-packaged masala blends do not conform to the original taste of the masalas. And many foodies bemoan the day when things like prepackaged chaat masala became available. (Its popularity dates only to the 1970s/1980s.) Many restaurant chefs will use chaat masala in a variety of dishes to which it is clearly unsuited.