Old Bay Seasonings
What are old bay seasonings? How can old bay seasonings be used? Just before aswering these questions about old bay seasonings maybe we should see what old bay seasonings are. Well, old bay seasonings are blends of herbs and spices currently marketed in America by McCormick & Company. These old bay seasonings are made in the state of Maryland, in the Chesapeake Bay area where they were developed by a german immigrant called Gustav Brunn. The beginning of the old bay seasonings was in the 1940s. These seasonings are still very popular in this area. At the time, crabs were so abundant that bars in Baltimore, Maryland used to offer them free of charge and seasonings like old bay seasonings were created to get patrons to drink more beverages. Old Bay is just one of many crab seasonings created during those times, yet it is one of a few that survived to the present.
Although old bay seasonings are not overly high in sodium, yet McCormick has recently offered a lower salt version of old bay seasonings. Old Bay Seasoning is named after the Old Bay Line, a passenger ship line which plowed the waters of the Chesapeake Bay from Baltimore to Norfolk, Virginia, in the early 1900s. Gustav Brunn’s company turned into the Old Bay Company, producing crab seasonings in the unique yellow can container. When the company was bought by McCormick & Co around 1990, the old bay seasonings continued to be sold in the classic yellow can.
The old bay seasonings include a mixture of celery, salt, bay leaf, mustard seed, both black and red pepper, cinnamon, and ginger. It is regionally used, specifically in Mid-Atlantic States and parts of the Gulf Coast. Its main use is to season crab and shrimp. Of course this is not the only use of the old bay seasonings. Many people use old bay seasonings as topping on different dishes like popcorn, eggs, salads, french fries, fried chicken, corn on the cob, potato chips or tater tots. Actually there are companies like Herr’s and Utz that make and sell varieties of chips or crab chips seasoned with the old bay seasonings.
Maybe strange to you, but normal to others, old bay seasonings are als used as ingredients in Bloody Marys. Here is one of the recipes for the old bay seasonings, provided by the Moosewood Restaurant: in a spice grinder or small food processor, combine the following ingredients. Grind them well and store the seasoning in a small glass jar. The ingredients and quantities are as follows: 1 tbsp celery seed, 1 tbsp whole black peppercorns, 6 bay leaves,4 whole cloves, 1 tsp sweet Hungarian paprika, 1 tsp whole cardamon and 1 tsp mustard seed.