I don’t usually espouse buying spice mixes and blends that can be put together quickly at home, but pumpkin pie spice is an exception even though I don’t use it in pie; my favorite recipe uses individual spices instead. I do use it in other baked goods. It’s a smart buy not only because it uses spices some people tend not to keep on hand, but also because three leading brands are all quite different. One is bound to be to your taste.
First, let’s look at the standard substitute. Thousands of recipes tell us if pumpkin pie spice isn’t available, use 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon, 1/4 teaspoon of ginger and 1/8 teaspoon of allspice to stand in for 1 teaspoon of the blend. Some call for cloves instead of allspice. But even the simplest commercial blend, McCormick’s, has four ingredients: cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and allspice. This is a fine blend I’ve used for years and it’s readily available everywhere in America.
More complex is Penzey’s blend, which uses China cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg, ginger, mace and cloves. It smells divine, although I didn’t buy any. Penzey’s is known for mail-order and a link to their online store has been on my Useful Links page since day one, but the company does have brick and mortar stores in about half the states now. Often though, there’s only one or two per state; little Maryland has one, near Washington, but Texas has only two, in Dallas and Houston. Their website has a list of stores and if ordering online, their service is top notch.
The most complex pumpkin pie spice is from Trader Joe’s, again with stores in about half the states but without online ordering. This blend uses cinnamon, ginger, lemon peel, nutmeg, cloves and cardamom. This has the most subtle smell, perhaps because of the absence of allspice and inclusion of cardamom, a terrific baking spice often used in Scandinavian recipes but frequently overlooked in America. I did buy this to try in a new cake recipe, and I think the touch of ground lemon peel will perk things up.
You can always use the three-ingredient substitute, of course, but these are economical alternatives that forego the chance that one of the individual spices might have lost its punch before the others. And now that you know what big companies put in theirs, you can experiment to come up with your own blend that suits your palate to a tee.
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I’ve been in a Penzey’s store once. I thought I’d died and gone to heaven!
Kathy G´s last blog ..A Celebration Of Those Who Have Gone Before Us
So true! They’re like playgrounds for foodies!
Trust TJ’s to have a unique take on this. I’ve never bought it, as I don’t really enjoy pumpkin thingys and don’t make cake, but I have used other spices of theirs. I find their cinnamon particularly fine, very flavorful.
MusEditions´s last blog ..The dark time: El día de los Muertos
I’ll have to try their cinnamon. I brought an unopened jar of Vietnamese with me, but when it’s gone I’l remember this. Their spice prices are excellent, to boot.
Did you know TJ’s ground beef is included in the e.coli recall on the east coast? I wonder if the Nov flyer will mention it?
I did not know that about the ground beef! Somehow, I expected TJ’s to be above that sort of thing. I don’t buy beef, anyway, but for those that do!!!
Their cinnamon is from Madagascar, I think. I can never go back to Schilling or whatever after this. It is clearly superior.
Nearest Penzey’s is up the road a piece (2 hours) but next time I’m in Scottsdale, I’ll go sniff around.
MusEditions´s last blog ..The dark time: El día de los Muertos
I was kind of surprised about the beef too, especially because I’ve shopped in every store on the list save one, and TJ’s meat prices are way higher than most of the others. I generally grind or chop my own since reading Fast Food Nation when it came out years ago. It finally made me understand how 1 cow can contaminate 1 million pounds of ground beef.
Yes, Schilling is McCormick west of the Mississippi. Their premium line of herbs and spices ( black cap, if the packaging is the same) is quite good and worth the extra money, imo. For people who shop only in big chain supermarkets, it’s their only option for things that aren’t on the herb and spice greatest hits list. (Your nose will be soooo happy in Penzey’s….)