Butterbrot Spice

Butterbrot Spice from Altes Gewürzamt, salty and smoky

Butterbrot Spice from Altes Gewürzamt is a seasoned salt made with two salts: Luisenhall deep salt and smoked Salish Alderwood salt. A trio of caraway seeds, lemon peel, and garlic turn a slice of bread and butter into a perfect little snack.

The Butterbrot Spice is a coarsely ground seasoned salt from Altes Gewürzamt in Klingenberg am Main. In addition to the two salts, it contains caraway, cumin, black pepper, coriander, nigella, nutmeg, lemon peel, and garlic—with every individual grain clearly recognizable.

Salty, smoky, with a trio of caraway seeds

The Butterbrot Spice has a hearty and inviting aroma, as the smoked salt imparts a warm smoky note to the other ingredients.

On bread, the interplay of the three types of caraway unfolds, accompanied by the freshness of lemon peel and the subtle spiciness of nigella and garlic. Salty, smoky, hearty—sometimes all you really need is a good slice of bread and the right salt.

Strictly speaking, the three types of "caraway" in the list are three strangers held together only by their name. While caraway and cumin both belong to the Apiaceae family, they taste completely different: one is earthy and anise-like, the other warm and resinous. Nigella (black caraway), on the other hand, is a member of the buttercup family and thus a close relative of love-in-a-mist.

The base consists of two salts from different parts of the world, each with its own method of production. Luisenhall deep salt comes from Göttingen, where brine is slowly evaporated in open pans, while the Salish Alderwood salt comes from the Pacific Northwest, where sea salt is smoked over alder wood. The mixture has ten ingredients, and these two support all the others.

On butter, radishes, and eggs

Good bread with butter, plus radishes, cucumber, or a boiled egg—this seasoned salt doesn't ask for much more.

Salted butter with a few radish slices already makes a complete snack, and scrambled eggs or avocado toast also handle the coarse texture just as well. Generously sprinkled over butter, the salt retains its structure. You can find more for snack time in the classics of German cuisine section.

This mixture loves fat, and there is a solid reason for this. The essential oils of the spices dissolve in it, but hardly at all in water, which is why the same pinch tastes much blander on dry bread. Its place is therefore on a buttered slice, and it is better to use unsalted butter beforehand.

The mixture goes further than its name suggests. It looks great on a baked potato with quark, over tomato slices, stirred into cream cheese, or sprinkled over soup at the very end. It should not, however, go into cooking water, as the lemon peel would boil away and the smoke would dissipate unused.

Two salts, intentionally left coarse

A good butter bread salt lives from its salts, and both here come from small producers mentioned by name in the ingredients list. It is exactly these kinds of raw materials that Altes Gewürzamt looks for.

The grain size was deliberately kept coarse, and you notice this the moment you sprinkle it. You can see the light crystals, the black nigella seeds, and the fine shards of lemon peel lying individually, and you can taste them individually too, because nothing here has been ground to dust. That is exactly what makes a buttered slice of bread, even without any toppings, work so well.

The mixing and bottling take place at Altes Gewürzamt in Klingenberg am Main, with the company deliberately avoiding artificial dyes and flavorings. Those who wish to get to know cumin on its own can find it as whole seeds for the mortar. Butterbrot Spice is part of the Altes Gewürzamt range and sits happily alongside a coarse sea salt.