Why You Should Use Hispanic Seasonings

Ever wonder why Hispanic cooking is so rich and flavorful? When compared to classic American cooking, Hispanic cuisine is known for using an array of seasoning. Classic American cooking mainly consists of two spices, salt and pepper. While salt and pepper certainly can pack a lot of flavor into a dish, it fails in comparison to Hispanic seasonings. These seasonings are widely distributed and in most cases you can often find these seasonings in your local super market in the ethnic aisle next to the canned products, rices and soups.

Famous Hispanic dishes are Tacos. Tacos are a Mexican staple and is widely known, there is even an entire fast food chain in America based solely on this Mexican dish, tacos. The restaurants name is Taco Bell. Although there are not many other restaurants based solely on the foundation of one Hispanic dish, there are Spanish restaurants which specialize in Hispanic cooking. Rice and beans is a classic Hispanic dish, very rich in flavor and not lacking much in texture either. You may have noticed that eating rice and beans made from an Americans hand, and eating rice and beans made from a native Hispanic or Latinos hands, the difference in flavor is very noticeable. The difference is Hispanics use Adobo and sofrito in their cooking. Incorporating these two seasonings into your dishes will give you the same flavor effect and it is not hard at all to accomplish this.

Adobo- Adobo is widely used in Hispanic cooking, there are many flavors. You will find this used very often in Mexican cuisine. Adobo's main purpose is to season meat but can be used to infuse flavor into dishes such as soup, beans , rice. Basically, anything you can think of. Adobo has flavorings of salt, pepper, lime, and garlic. Using Adobo will enhance the flavor in any dish and bring out its natural richness.

Sofrito- Sofrito is thrown into anything and everything in Hispanic cooking. Most commonly, you will find it in yellow rice, certain soups, as a marinade for meat, and in beans, personally, I throw it into my stirfyes, it complements the earthy flavors of the vegetables perfectly. I also use it when making scrambled eggs it adds a Mexican flavor that would be hard to accomplish without incorporating Sofrito into my recipes. Sofrito has a base of green vegetables, and it is very heart healthy.