Cardamom Tea Bread

Each slice of this breakfast bread is flecked throughout with bits of cardamom, often an underused sweet spice. Native to the Malabar Coast of India, cardamom is the favorite spice of the chilly Scandinavian countries. The papery pod holds a few hard black seeds that can be crushed with a rolling pin or with a mortar and pestle, although cardamom is available already ground. This is another bread that is good toasted the day after baking and spread with raspberry jam.