Spices are the foundation for Indian cooking. They can transform any dish into a tasty meal and give life to even the simplest ingredients. India’s cuisine is characterized by the heavy use of a wide variety of spices. Spices are combined and used differently in various recipes; a subtle shift in cooking technique can make the same spice taste entirely different. Vasco da Gama landed in Calicut on 20 May 1498. Unopposed access to the Indian spice routes boosted the economy of the Portuguese Empire, which was previously based along northern and coastal West Africa. The main spices at first obtained from Southeast Asia were pepper and cinnamon, but soon included other products, all new to Europe. Portugal maintained a commercial monopoly of these commodities for several decades.