Cooking with the Devil's Dung

It Don't Mean a Thing if It Ain't Got that Hing

Anybody who knows Indian cooking will have encountered what the ancient Romans called Parthian laser: it is none other than hing, a spice so pungent it has to be sold in what looks like firmly-sealed pill bottles. The most commonly available version is mixed, sparingly, with gum arabic—the hardened sap from acacia trees harvested in Sudan—and flour, and…