I used to do all my spice blending with a "magic bullet" coffee grinder (dry stuff) and a food processor (wet) - and to be fair, both seemed to be doing a good job. That said, rumours circulated of coffee grinders "burning" whole spices and ruining the flavour. in fact, if anyone watched Rick Stein's latest foray into the Eastern World he was also told the same thing.
Coinicdentally rather recently, having ground electronically a fair amount of Coriander and Cumin seeds, I was vaguely disturbed to see smoke rising from either the motor or spices or both!
Henceforth therefore, I am now a convert to the good 'ol Pestle and Mortar. In fact, I now have three - and there is good reason for this:
Firstly a nice small ceramic one for small jobs - (many recipes call for a later infusion of ground coriander, cumin, asafoetida (hing) and so on) - and as the majority of my spices are all whole, I need to often get hold of 2tsp type quantities of spice.
Next - some granite. Big, heavy and invaluable for both wet and dry grinding. This should be your first purchase as it is capable of fulfilling all requirements.
Finally - and in no small part due to watching TV, a recent addition to the armoury of crucibles - a deep clay pot with a big wooden pestle. Still getting to grips with it but absolutely fantastic for pulping ingredients containing moisture without getting chilli juice in your eye!
Above is the current stable of mortars - but you might also notice a blue plastic item.....This little beauty I believe to be one of the best kitchen gadgets I have ever purchased, and has been with me since the Good Food Show about a decade ago......its called the GarlicTwist and is made by those clever people at Nextrend again.
Trust me - this will do garlic, chilli, ginger, galangal, horseradish and much more (see the link below) - and I recommend everyone has one or two in their kitchen. Even if you just use it for garlic, you will be happy with your investment the first time you DON'T have to start digging around in the traditional UK garlic press for all the dry bits you didn't get out last time!
3rd Gen Garlic Twist by Nextrend
BTW, the best way to purchase the Garlic Twist is via Amazon - beware of imitations!
Back to the granite Mortar.....once purchased you need to "season" them. Not as hard as it sounds and you should only need do it once, but you do need to get rid of the microscopic granules of stone (although its unlikely to kill you!)
Current methodology, and what I did, is to use raw rice. Put a little in, grind it up (no bashing, use a high pressure circular grinding motion with the pestle in one spot - once you have started breaking up the ingredients you can always go to a circular motion around the crucible) - tip onto some white paper, and you will notice that the gound ingredients are grey.
Rinse out the Mortar, dry, and start again, tipping each set of ground rice onto the same paper. Keep doing this until the rice turns out white. You are now ready for use.
As for maintenance, I tend to rinse and wipe out the mortar immediately I have ground anything as stone will take on flavours and so on. Try not to use detergent or minimal amounts only and rinse well.
NEVER put ground turmeric in your mortar - this should be added to the nice stainless steel bowl you have for your mise en place and mixed then with the contents of the mortar! (I'd recommend a similar strategy for anything else with high staining propensities such as Paprika - in fact anything you have purchased which is pre-ground!)
Enjoy grinding - and remember - patience is the key - don't scrimp because your arms are tired - you will end up with a less than enjoyable whole spice stuck in your teeth later on.
PS: Masala pastes (generally green chilli, Garlic, Salt and sometimes ginger) are ideally suited to the granite mortar. Chop particularly the chilli and ginger into small pieces to cut down on time grinding. Now that I have the bigger clay mortar, if making a Masala without ginger, then I will be using this.
PPS: The heavy granite pestle is absolutely ideal for "popping" cardamom pods on the chopping board with no effort.
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