You know that feeling, even though your spice rack has numerous flavors, there is always at least one ingredient missing when you want to try something new? Just Spices has taken on this cooking misery and developed a solution: ready-made spice mixtures. 24 of them are hidden in this year’s advent calendar. Of the star opened all the doors.
Classic advent calendars filled with chocolate are among the top sellers in the pre-Christmas period. In spite of this, or precisely because of this, alternative delicacies – hidden behind 24 little doors – have been enjoying increasing popularity for years: From salty snacks to alcoholic beverages and grainy muesli mixtures, those interested can choose from a large number of “edible” gift ideas. Our author, for example, is a passionate hobby cook who is less happy about chocolate than about new spices or recipe ideas. For this reason, she took a closer look at the Just Spices advent calendar.
Background: This is how the idea for Just Spices came about
It all started in a shared student flat: When Ole, Bela and Florian want to cook Indian food, they realize that they don’t have most of the spices for an authentic dish at home. Of course, there was the option of buying all the ingredients separately – but instead the cooking trio decided to travel the world together in search of new taste experiences for their new project: Just Spices. The start-up was founded in 2012, and just two years later the first spice mixtures came onto the market. The successful company now includes a colorful potpourri of products that are intended to spice up any dish without artificial additives: whether breakfast or snack, bread or cake, lunch or dinner – Just Spices has the right spice for (almost) every dish. 24 of them are hidden in the 2022 advent calendar.
Spoiler: This is in the Just Spices advent calendar
The advent calendar was sent by post and arrived at our author in a box specially designed by Just Spices. After opening the package, he first had to be unwrapped from his cardboard coat, which was also decorated for the occasion. Our tester immediately noticed that several postcards with Christmas motifs were punched into the outer cover, which simply had to be pressed out of the paper. A nice idea. But back to the content: Behind each of the 24 little doors is a full-size spice mixture (i.e. a tin) from Just Spices. Behind one of the doors there was even a voucher for the online shop with a value of 5 euros, which – from calendar to calendar – can be individually high: the highest value is 50 euros. As a further gimmick, there is a recipe idea on the back of each of the 24 little doors, which can be viewed using a scannable QR code. On top of that, the Just Spices advent calendar comes with a cookbook with over 100 pasta dishes, which alone costs 24.99 euros. Nevertheless, the spices are of course the highlight.
Spoiler alert: These 24 different spice mixtures are hidden in the Just Spices advent calendar.
© star
Can the spice advent calendar convince?
All spice mixtures are free from animal products and therefore purely vegetable. So far so good. But what probably interests our readers much more is the question of whether the Advent calendar from Just Spices its worth just over 100 euros? Our author says yes. Because the fact is that a tin costs between 4.99 and 5.99 euros in retail, which results in a product value of at least 120 euros with 24 doors – on top of that there is the cookbook with 100 pasta recipes, which alone is scarce costs 25 euros. Apart from that, the various spice mixtures not only include well-known classics from Just Spices, but also two brand new spices and an exclusive special edition of the popular avocado topping. So much has already been revealed. It is also particularly important to mention that there are a total of 24 different spice mixtures, so that there are no duplicates. Our author particularly liked the balanced mix of flavors for fish and meat, sauces and dips, salads or simple vegetables.
Her five highlights include these spice blends:
- “Coffee Kiss” (contents: almonds, cocoa powder, cinnamon)
- “Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal Spice” (contents: cinnamon, apple, almonds, hemp seeds, sea salt, vanilla, anise)
- “Garlic Pepper” (contents: pepper, garlic, cane sugar, sea salt, onion, allspice, paprika, thyme)
- “Asia Bowl Topping” (contents: fleur de sel, paprika, ginger, onions, garlic, chili, carrot, coriander, leek, cumin, lemon myrtle)
- “Bolognese spice” (contents: paprika, tomato, onion, garlic, carrot, oregano, pepper, savory, thyme, chili, mace blossom, chives, bay leaf)
Our conclusion
The calendar is not only worth its price, but also convinces with its content – provided that the person to be given the gift likes to cook and cooks often. All in all, our author finds the entire implementation very appealing: from the creative packaging made of paper and cardboard to the small and large gimmicks to the loving designs and details. Only the fact that the cans show little variation in color and are therefore visually very similar (which can lead to a risk of confusion) was negative for our tester. So Christmas can come, she now has enough spices for cooking.
Source: Just Spices
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