Ingredients C

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Cabbage | Calamari | Capers | Carrots | Cassava | Cheese | Cherries | Chicken | Chickpeas | Chocolate | Cilantro | Citrus fruits | Clams | Coconut | Coffee | Corn | Cornmeal | Cranberries | Cucumber


Cabbage

One of the oldest of cultivated vegetables, cabbages started as a weed on the coastlines of Europe.  Cabbage belongs to the genus Brassica, which also encompasses broccoli, kale, turnips, bok choy and cauliflower.  The cabbage form of the plant itself is said to have originated in Germany.  It still features prominently in middle and eastern European cuisine.

There are really four main types of cabbage on the Western market today.  Green cabbage is the most common, and is known for its slight bitterness.  Red cabbage has a flavor very similar to green cabbage, but cooks up with a sweeter taste.  It is often used for color in salads.  Savoy cabbage has a crinkly texture and mild flavor.  Chinese cabbages are similarly mild flavored and also have a more delicate texture.

Cabbages come into season in the late fall and early winter.  They, like many Brassicas, benefit from a hard freeze.  This makes them sweeter.  Cabbages are good shredded for salads, sautéed, and especially braised.  The leaves can be blanched and stuffed with meat or grain mixtures.  Pickled cabbage also features prominently in some cuisines.  Germany has its sauerkraut.  And kimchee is a hallmark of Korean cuisine.

Calamari

Capers

Capers are the pickled flower buds of a Mediterranean prickly shrub.  They are green and range in size from that of a pencil eraser to caper berries that can be as big as a grape.  Capers have a strong, slightly bitter taste that is similar to gherkin pickles.  They are used extensively in Mediterranean cuisine, especially in Italy, France and Spain.  They add zest to salads, sauces and pasta dishes.

Capers are preserved either in a brine or in salt.  In the U.S. the brine variety are far more common, but those preserved in salt are considered far superior.  If you can find them, pay a little extra money and buy them.

Capers are available in any supermarket.  But if you don't have them, chopped pickles can substitute.

Carrots

Cassava

Cheese

Cherries

Cherries in their wild form originated around the shores of the Caspian and Black Seas.  After its domestication in the 1st millenium B.C., the cherry spread slowly westward.

There are two main types of cherries:  sweet and sour.  Sweet cherries, Prunus avium, are the type most commonly found fresh in markets.  They are primarily used for eating out of hand and can range in color from almost black to bright yellow.  Some common varieties include Bing and Rainer.  Sour cherries (Prunus cerasus) are similar to sweet cherries except that they retain a sharp acidity after ripening that makes them ideal for baking and desserts.  Familiar varieties are Morello and Montmorency.

Cherries are especially popular in Central Europe.  Hungarians use them for a refreshing cold soup.  Schwartzwalder Kirschtorte (Black Forest cake) is a specialty of southwestern Germany.  Cherry clafouti is a famous French country dessert.  And kirschwasser is a cherry brandy distilled from cherry fruit and pits.  Cherries are often used for pie or tart fillings.  They can be canned, frozen and dried with excellent results.  This fruit goes well with pork, lamb and game.  The flavors of almonds and cherries have an affinity for each other.  Cherries come into season in late spring and last throughout the summer.

Chicken

Chickpeas

  • Falafel (Middle Eastern fried chickpea patties)
  • Gundi (Jewish chickpea & chicken dumplings)
  • Hummus bi Tahini (Middle Eastern chickpea & sesame dip)
  • Minestra di Ceci (Italian chickpea & pasta soup)
  • Musaka'a (Palestinian eggplant baked with tomatoes & chickpeas)

Chocolate

Cilantro

Citrus fruits

Clams

These shellfish are found in shallow coastal waters and are harvested at low tide from the sand or are scooped up from beds where they are farm-raised.

The main clam harvested on the Atlantic coast is Mercenaria mercenaria, known by the Indian name quahog (KOH-hog).  Quahogs are categorized by size into littlenecks, cherrystone and chowder clams.  Littlenecks are the smallest and sweetest, best for eating raw on the half shell.  Medium-sized cherrystones are good in soups or stuffed in their shells.  Larger chowder clams are tougher and, as their name implies, are usually chopped up for use in soups and chowders.  Other clams found in the Atlantic are the softshell, or steamer, clam (Mya arenaria), excellent for steaming, and surf, or sea, clams (Spisula solidissima), which are harvested commercially for canning and frying.

On the Pacific coast, the Pacific littleneck is good for steaming and eating on the half shell.  Another Pacific clam is the cartoonish geoduck (GOOey-duck), Panopea abrupta, with its oversized siphon, sometimes more than one foot long.  This siphon, when sliced thin, and the clam's belly meat make good eating and are used in stews or sautéed.  The razor clam (Siliqua patula), shaped like an old-fashioned razor, is found along the coast from California to Alaska, and digging for them on the beach with the family is an old pastime.  Two other clams on the Pacific coast are the butter clam and the Pismo clam.  These are small, tender and delicious but are becoming more and more rare.

Small clams can be eaten raw on the half shell with some lemon.  Larger clams can be chopped or sliced for use in chowders, soups and stews.  Clams can be steamed, sautéed, poached, battered and fried, or stuffed in their shells.  Whole clams in their shell can even be grilled over a flame until they open.  Clam juice is often used as substitute for fish stock.  It is important not to overcook clams as they can become tough and rubbery.

Clams are sold live, frozen or canned.  If you buy them in the shell, make sure they are displayed on ice.  The shells should be tightly shut. They should smell like the sea and be neither too heavy nor too light for their size.  To store them properly, clams must be kept very cold.  Cover them with a damp cloth in the coldest part of the refrigerator for up to 5 days.  Use a clam knife to open the shells and have a bowl underneath to catch any juices.

Clams are in season year-round on the East Coast.  The best quality clams on the West Coast are found from November through April.

Coconut

Coffee

Corn

A New World crop, common corn (Zea mays), is the only major grain used both as a starch and as a vegetable.  The earliest signs of corn cultivation appear around 3,500 B.C. in central Mexico.  From there its use spread into South and North America.  With the European conquest of the Americas, the crop was spread throughout the world.  Apart from the America's, the use of corn as a grain is also popular in sub-Saharan Africa and in northern Italy. Corn has been so thoroughly domesticated that its original form no longer exists in the wild.  This crop is categorized either by color - yellow, white, blue, Indian - or by sugar content.  Recent hybridization has produced super-sweet varieties.  Corn should be eaten as soon as possible after it is harvested.  Once picked, sugar in the kernels begins to turn to starch, and the corn loses sweetness.

Ground dried corn forms the base for the tortillas & tamales of Mexico, the polenta of Italy, the ugali of Kenya, and for American cornbread (see cornmeal).  Fresh corn, picked when still immature, is a favorite summer vegetable in the Americas.  Corn on the cob can be boiled, steamed, grilled, roasted or cut into pieces and stewed.  Kernels off the cob can be roasted, fried with butter, mixed with tomatoes or beans, stirred into cornmeal batters, used in relishes or added to soups and stews.  When cutting fresh kernels off the cob, make sure to scrape the cob with a knife to extract all the sweet, milky juice you can.  Baby corn is a common ingredient in stir fries.  Huitlacoche, or Mexican truffle, is a fungus that attacks corn.  A delicacy in Mexico, it is used in quesadillas and soups.

Cornmeal

Cranberries

Cucumber

  • Acar Ketimun (Indonesian cucumber pickle)
  • Arjard (Thai cucumber dipping sauce)
  • Cacik (Turkish yogurt-cucumber salad; see Tzatziki recipe notes)
  • Gazpacho (Spanish chilled tomato-cucumber soup)
  • Horiatiki Salata (Greek tomato, cucumber & olive salad)
  • Mast-o Khiyar (Iranian yogurt-cucumber salad; see Tzatziki recipe notes)
  • Misozuke (Japanese miso pickle)
  • Mizeria (Polish cucumber & sour cream salad)
  • Tzatziki (Greek yogurt-cucumber sauce)