Barbara Curless, age 10, of Creve Coeur, Illinois, for her question:

Where do cardamon seeds come from?

The true cardamon is a spice herb of the East Indies. The seeds have a pleasant smell and taste. They are often used in cooking to add a special flavor of their own and a good cook knows how to add them to enhance the delicate flavor of other herbs and spices.

In olden times, a few cardamon seeds were added to a pot of tea or coffee. They improve the flavor of the brew and more besides. Cardamon is a medicine herb and once in a while it is very good for the tummy.

Many of the early settlers were accustomed to cardamon in the Old World. When they could no longer get the real stuff from the East Indies, they looked around and found native herbs that yielded seeds nearly as good. Nowadays, several native seeds are called cardamon because they somewhat resemble the true cardamon of the Fast Indies,