Recipes with cumin

Cumin is the spice that traces trade routes best. It turns up in the Maghreb, the Levant, India and Mexico, and in each of those kitchens it plays the same part: giving depth to pulse dishes that would otherwise fall flat.

The Maghreb and Egypt treat it as the default seasoning for purées of dried pulses: ful medames, bessara, Tunisian lablebi and Turkish lentil köfte all take it, often with a separate bowl on the table for more. It also goes with the long-cooked tomatoes of taktouka, zaalouk and shakshuka. On the other side of the Atlantic, it is what gives chilli sin carne its recognisable smell, and it follows beans as far as Cuban moros y cristianos.

As with sesame, everything happens in the dry pan: whole seeds toasted then crushed in a mortar bear no resemblance to shop-bought powder, which loses its scent within months. If powder is all you have, add it near the end of cooking rather than at the start — it will hold better.