Questions about spices? I need Help.

[jmhandy]

Hello,

My name name is Joseph, a graphic design student at UW-Milwaukee. I am working on a package design project and could really use your input. Below is list of questions I have created to find out a bit more about you. (My intended audience) Please feel free to add any additional information that may help me get a feel for your lifestyle, likes, or dislikes. Also, if you have any questions for me please list at the bottom of your response.

If your are at all interested, I will post my designs at the end of the project.

Best Wishes,

Joseph


Questions for high quality spice packaging design:

1. How many meals a week do you cook? What spices do you like to use?


2. Are you more likely to prepare food for family, or friends?


3. What type of food do you most like to prepare? Why?


4. Which age range best describes you? A. 16-29 B. 30-45 C. 45-56 D. 57+


5. Describe the most unexpected delight you have had with a dish. Where did this surprise root from? Did it change your opinion for that certain dish?


6. Explain a good, and bad food experience you have had at a dinner party.


7. Where do you keep your spices? Does this space allow for many sizes of spice containers?


8. What colors do you associate with an appetizing dish?


9. How do you expect high quality dried spices to be packaged?


10. What is your favorite spice brand? How would you change it to approve the overall experience you have with it?

 

[jkath]

I started answering these questions and realized I don't have that much time, as I'm supposed to be readying my house for it's open house this afternoon....
but I will say that cooking is my love, I really enjoy cooking for any and all, and aside from cumin, all spices are my friends. I have three shelves in my kitchen devoted solely to spices. They are housed in different ways: I have some of those lazy-susan racks designed to hold baby food bottles, I have a shallow shelf for all my little spices, and did I mention that all my spices/extracts are alphabetized?

(PS - a while ago I started a topic called "that one spice you just don't like". You may want to do a search on it, as it may answer a lot of your questions!. Also, good luck in this, and I know we'd love to see your designs)

 

[Background Noise]

J M Handy,

As a fellow design student (doing grad work in Landscape Architecture) I understand the importance of user-end research and the perils of surveys. The questions you ask are more suited to in interview format. Try to interview local professional chefs and gourmet food store owners, it has been my experience most people will give you 20 minutes. Call parents of your fellow students, talk to who ever does the cooking. When doing a survey, go with a dozen “yes/no” questions or Likert Scale questions. Then end with no more than three open ended questions. Most people don’t have the time type survey of the scope you presented.

That said I will answer some of your questions because that’s all time, or inclination I have.

I am 33 and I cook good food 4 days a week for myself and my wife. I usually cook Italian or French and my favorite spices are salt, black pepper, red pepper, basil, parsley, nutmeg, and dill. Why do I prefer Italian and French cooking? Got me, it is what I like to eat. My spices go in a cabinet next to my stove, I would assume that they are packed somehow, I don’t want to carry them in my hand. Colors I associate with appetizing, I agree with the psychological studies on the subject. Warm colors such as red, yellow and orange stimulate appetite, while cool colors suppress it. I fell an exception is green in very appetizing. Finally, I am not sure if you are doing logo or packing design, but I would like small spice containers to be square in shape with labels on the cap. This way they could be stacked and more containers would be visible when looked at from the side.

If you know anyone on the design college to make digital 3D models, see if they will help you with your presentation graphics. Labels are easy to apply to 3D models and spice jars will be easy to model. Good luck.

 

[auntdot]

Hi Joseph,

I fear your questions may be a bit too open ended to obtain the information you desire.

I am not sure if my drunk Aunt Sofie going face down in the soup course was the best or worst experience I had at a dinner party, but it sure was memorable.

I guess you are trying to find out something about spice packaging.

And the tale of reviving Aunt Sofie is not going to help you, I think.

My guess is that if you go back and restructure the questions so they can be easily answered and will give you the information you need, I think you will find the very kind people at this website more than happy to lend a hand.

 

[foodaholic]

High quality spices and high quality packaging are two different things.The best spices are whole and brought into countries in large quantity,vacuum packed with moisture and volitile oil percentages.Good suppliers and quality assurance procedure is the most important,not packaging.But if you're looking for different design templates or ideas
regarding what might appear to be a highend design for packaged supermarket spices
then probably design related websites might get you better results.IMO

 

[jennyema]

I spend a lot of money on spices and herbs.

Packaging means nothing to me. It doesn't influence my decision at all.

Quality and price. That's it.

 

[GB]

I totally agree with Jenny, but would add one thing. The packaging should be airtight. Other than that I could care less about the packaging as long as the spices are fresh and great quality.

My favorite spice brand is Penzys because of their quality. I usually buy their stuff which comes in a plastic pouch with a plain sticker saying the name of the spice. Nothing fancy at all, but boy are their spices great!

 

[Robo410]

in all honesty, many spices and herbs are put in bottles that are way too big for the average family. While someone baking an apple pie a week might need a big bottle of ground cinnamon, another family might use it once every two months. Some common herbs and spices do come in small bottles and that's great, but many of the fancier and thus less used ones only come in the big size...should be the other way around.

 

[Claire]

It's hard to go back and forth to get the questions in order, but here goes. I'm down a bit in the number of meals I prepare per week (hubby was diagnosed with diabetes and has taken more control of his own diet) but I'd say about 10 meals a week. When I entertain these days it is for friends, but when I lived closer to them I cooked for my extended family at least weekly. In the winter lots of soups, stocks, and stews, in the summer anything that doesn't need a lot of heat. Why? I don't have central A/C. Light fare just tastes better after a hot day anyway. I'm 50, hubby's 58. I suppose curries and other Indian foods would be the answer to that one. I tried making a curry when I was 20 or so, and hated it. Didn't try Indian food again at all until I was 30-something and had it in Hong Kong. Now I make up large batches of various flavored curries (Indian, Thai, etc) and constantly have a serving in the freezer. I love everything about it, and we cannot get that kind of food around here. I once had a freind bite into a beef rib, hit a vein, and splash blood all over herself and her husband. Luckily she is a good freind. They wiped up and kept on eating. I use a couple of rubbermaid turntables on the lowest "upper" shelf in my cupboards. I buy my spices all over the place, sometimes in jars, sometimes bulk, sometimes in bags, so always have a lot of different size and shape jars. If I lived in Madison I'd probably only shop for spices at Penzey's, but here I have a spice guy who buys in bulk and repackages into small ziplock bags. I save jars of the appropriate sizes to store them in. Mom taught me that a nutritionally balanced meal has as many colors as possible. She was right.

 

[Constance]

I do major cooking about twice a week, making enough so that I will have left-overs to utilize in other dishes. My husband is a good cook, and he usually cooks something on Sundays. The spices I use most, other than S&P, are garlic, basil, Italian parsley, thyme. My husband uses a lot of Bayou Blast (Emeril's Bam) and Tony Chacheries Cajun seasoning. We also use a lot of Tone's garlic/herb seasoning (it's a great mix), Lipton's onion soup mix, and Good Seasons Italian Dressing mix.

We cook for both family and friends. My motto is "feed'em up and love'em up"!

I am 58, and HB is 60.

I tried a recipe for Szechwan Peanut Chicken that combined peanut butter and Pace Piquante Sauce. It sounded strange, but was delicious!

I think the worst food experience was one Thanksgiving. We'd had an early frost, then a long mild spell, and I had a bunch of nice broccoli in my garden to serve with my meal.
I always keep spring broccoli dusted, but one doesn't think about needing to do that in the fall. I also usually soak fresh broccoli in salt water before cooking, but again, I didn't see any need for that since it had been cool.
The whole dinner was just about ready when I put the broccoli in the pot. Everyone was hanging out in the kitchen, so I didn't say anything when a little green worm floated to the top of the boiling water. I just scooped it out. But then came another, and another, and suddenly there were more little green worms than I could scoop out. I casually asked my guests if they preferred green beans or peas. HB wanted to know what was wrong with the broccoli. My father, a strong man with a weak stomach, spotted the worms, and just about lost it.

I've had a lot of good experiences at dinner parties, but I guess one of the best was after we'd lost several members of our immediate family, while at the same time our kids had been having babies, and I looked at my loved ones around the Thanksgiving table and realized that my house was filling back up.

I keep my spices in the pantry where it's cool and dark.

I like to see lots of colors on the plate. I use paprika on cheese and potato dishes for color. I use lots of sweet red and green peppers, and lots of fresh parsley and basil. When I make chicken soup or chicken and dumplings, I use a few drops of yellow food coloring in my broth to make it look really rich and buttery.

I like the big rectangular see-through jars best for my spices. They fit well on my shelves, and I use them up fast enough that they don't get old.

I like Tone's spices, Frontier Herbs, and have recently been dealing with Marshall's Creek Spices, a small company with a great product. I also grow a lot of my own herbs...sage, thyme, chives, basil and parsley...and use the empty Tone's jars to store them in.

 

[Yakuta]

1. How many meals a week do you cook? What spices do you like to use?

I cook 8-9 meals a week. My favorite spices are cinnamon, cardamom, black pepper, corrainder seeds, cumin seeds and brown mustard seeds.


2. Are you more likely to prepare food for family, or friends?

I love to cook for everyone. Normally I cook for my family but I also love to cook for friends or help them cook for their family and friends.

3. What type of food do you most like to prepare? Why?

I like to cook Chinese, Thai, Indian, Mexican and Italian food. I like food that is bursting with flavors that round up your taste buds (sweet, spicy, creamy) and these cuisines do it better than the others that I have tried.

4. Which age range best describes you? A. 16-29 B. 30-45 C. 45-56 D. 57+

B. Early Thirties

5. Describe the most unexpected delight you have had with a dish. Where did this surprise root from? Did it change your opinion for that certain dish?

I was not big into crab and lobster. I just could not handle looking at them in it's entirety (just the entire crawly part got to me). When I first tried crab claws (steamed) I was a bit intimated but now it's one of my favorite meats. It's sweet and succulent and I am glad I tried it.

6. Explain a good, and bad food experience you have had at a dinner party.

Good experience: An appetizer only party. I have a small appetite and I like variety so these sort of parties suit me very well.

Bad experience: Food that was not all the way cooked. I saw the pink chicken and politely refused.

7. Where do you keep your spices? Does this space allow for many sizes of spice containers?

I have a laundry list of spices. Luckily I have a large walk in pantry and several spice jars where I store it. I buy whole spices for the most part and freshly roast and grind my spices.

8. What colors do you associate with an appetizing dish?

Curries - Red. Looks professionally made.
Pasta - I love whites and pale greens. I like lighter sauces on my pasta
Desserts - Soft yellow added by saffron or white added by whipped cream and white chocolate. I also love bright greens, reds and browns (fruits, nuts and a drizzle of caramel).



9. How do you expect high quality dried spices to be packaged?

I buy my spices from ethnic stores and am pretty familiar with quality regardless of it's packaging

10. What is your favorite spice brand? How would you change it to approve the overall experience you have with it?

No brand preference. Most of the spices I buy are shipped directly from asia and other countries. They are labeled as such. I like the ethnic shops because you can get the real deal for a much lower price if you know what to look for.

 

[Jikoni]

1. How many meals a week do you cook? What spices do you like to use? Everyday of the week. Cumin, tumeric, cinammon, cardamoms, dhana jeera and lots more I use lots of spices.
2. Are you more likely to prepare food for family, or friends?Both. I cook for my family daily(proper food ...well we do frozen Pizzas, but I prepare my our pasta sauces)When friend visit, then even more reason to cook!
3. What type of food do you most like to prepare? Why?
I make sure that during the week, we eat potatoes of some sort with something like roast meal(fish or red meat or chicken) and veggies, pasta with some sauce and salad, rice with stew or pilau a kiddie meal during the week like homemade burgers and frozen oven chips. In short I vary the meals weekly. If I am in a hurry,I always have frozen pizza on standby.
4. Which age range best describes you? A. 16-29 B. 30-45 C. 45-56 D. 57+ B. 30-45
6. Explain a good, and bad food experience you have had at a dinner party.Good-my sister-in-law and family were visiting, I had prepared an aubergine sauce for the rigatoni, as they sat down I could tell they were not impressed, but as soon as they had the first taste, they started asking for the recipe.and every time they visit, they request the same meal. bad experience? burnt rice, I had to cook the rice all over.

7. Where do you keep your spices? Does this space allow for many sizes of spice containers?I I keep all my spices in one place, and buy the same shape containers so they all look the same even though they would still fit in different containers
8. What colors do you associate with an appetizing dish?I don't, I taste the food, colours can be deceiving.
9. How do you expect high quality dried spices to be packaged?Air tight containers to conserve the aroma.
10. What is your favorite spice brand? How would you change it to approve the overall experience you have with it?'Tropical Heat' from Kenya and 'Living colours of India' in Switzerland. airtight would be a good way to improve both.

Hope that helps.

 

[Von Glassoff]

How many meals a week I cook always varies. Sometimes I cook something that we have left over and of course heat up the next night. I also might cook breakfast 3 to 4 times a week. If you only count night time then 5 to 6 meals a week. I also do a lot of inbetween meal cooking. Like making deserts and breads that I might give away because I love to cook.
My favorite food to cook would be chicken. I find it more ways to make a meal with chicken than anything. From roasting a large chicken with garlic and rosemary to making an Italian chicken dish with angel hair pasta and a sauce of olive oil and herbs. Give me chicken and I can make more versatile dishes than anything.
I would think that most people cook for family more than friends. Family live with you and friends do not. I guess I invite family over to eat more than friends if that is what you mean.
We are in the C. age range.
The most unexpected delight with a dish was James Peterson's eggplant parmesan recipe. Everyone that hates eggplant loves this recipe. Most eggplant parmesan recipes you fry the eggplant before assembling the dish. In his you bake the sliced eggplant on a cookie sheet 20 minutes before assembling the dish and baking it. I hated eggplant before eating it this way. We have 8 family members that hate eggplant but love this recipe.
Are these experiences (good & bad) at my home or someone else's: On two occassions at someone else's home the chicken that was served to me was still somewhat raw. I just did like I was too full to finish. I cannot think of a good experience except most of the time I have people over to eat they love my cooking and that makes me want to cook more. One of my best friends husband says that my cooking has 'an elegant flair'.
I keep my spices in a smaller cabinet (but not too small) near my stove. I feel that I have sufficient room for them. I love so many spices but if I had to narrow it down to a few it would be garlic, rosemary, basil and thyme.
Colors I associate with an appetizing dish????? Hmmm? Yellow, green & red. That is a hard one. If you are getting at a spice container packaging causing me to want to buy it because of it's looks being appealing then you are asking the wrong person. I want the best quality spice for the best price. I don't care if it comes in a plastic bag and I go home and funnel it into a bottle that I have saved. (Which I have done by the way) I want something that I can stack in the cabinet and see what it is. Not too small and not too big. I only like large sizes of something I use a lot of.
I just went and looked in the spice cabinet. I seem to have more McCormick than any other brand but I have a lot of different brands too. I cannot say that I have a favorite brand. I like stackable spices. Square would be my choice but most are round. Something you can fit all sizes of measuring spoons into the top and a way to level it off but also with shaker holes. I would love some kind of gadget that fit in the cabinet that held like five rows of spices and each row could pull out like a drawer does and the name of the spice be on the side as well as the front for easy identifation. It would be nice if a spice company made their own holder like this to buy for your cabinet that only their brand of spices fit in. The brand would have to be the best quality for the best price.
Ok, now I have devoted enough of my time to this survey. I hope that this survey helps all of us out here who love to cook.