For inhabitants of Indian subcontinent or East Asia, 'exotic spices' was something they could cultivate on their own or buy directly from the farmer. For Europeans, it was a commodity that had to be brought from afar and thus its price included costs of long transport and markup of many middlemen, especially when the multi-stage Silk Road trade is considered, as caravans were not operating on the entire length of the South Asia-Mediterranean Sea route, but rather on short 'stages' between major Asian, Middle Eastern and Ottoman trading centres. This facilitated trade and increased the quantity of goods in circulation, but also increased markup as at each subsequent stage. One important reason for the establishment of maritime routes linking Europe with East Asia was the opportunity to circumnavigate all the intermediaries. From late 16th century onward, the spice trade increased in Europe after its decline in late 15th century due to Ottoman dominance in Eastern Mediterranean region, but spices were still quite expensive and hardly available to anyone.

It should be noted that the European 'traditional dishes' are usually nothing of the sort, at least from the historian's perspective. A lot of them hail back only one or two centuries back, what is often evident by the common usage of the plants introduced to Europe only via Columbian Exchange, especially tomatoes and potatoes that were accepted as edible in some areas only in late 18th or even early 19th century. Second important thing is that the 'common' cuisine is more often than not based on literally common or popular dishes i.e. those eaten by majority that was hardly affluent enough to import rare ingredients. Dishes common among peasants and workers were usually hearty and well-seasoned, as their recipes often included various fragrant ingredients and seasonings like garlic, mint, coriader, fennel, basil, parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme (although this refrain of Scarborough Fair only emerged in 19th century, the 'herb refrains' including or simply enumerating various herbs are a tradition hailing back to at least 15th century). It should be noted, however, that pepper (usually in black form) is nowadays almost as ubiquitous as salt in Europe and thus is rarely considered 'exotic', unlike cloves or cinnamon. On a side note, this most likely hails back to 14th-15th century, when most of the spices were rather expensive, but pepper was generally common to the point that fines for the transgressions against the local guild charters were sometimes expressed in the amount of pepper to be provided or its monetary equivalent. The same applied to other transactions, as e.g. a deed written in 1236 for the church of the Holy Trinity in Norwich states that certain Thomas, son of Herlewyn is to pay to 5 shillings and 1 penny for arable land held and 'one pound of pepper for the common pasture in the whole village of Gateley', while the family of William the la Pole in 1347 was also obliged to pay a pound of pepper for their holdings in Preston consisting of 'one messuage, three tofts, twenty oxgangs of land [e.g. four homesteads and 300 acres] and five acres of meadow'.

Furthermore, the limited supply of the spices meant that majority of people in Europe could not use it too often and thus limited it to occasional dishes (this also applied to sugar before the development of the usage of sugar beets), most notably in various baked goods. This is also alleged cause of the popularity of Lebkuchen, a softer variant of gingerbread, very common in the areas previously belonging to or maintaining contacts with Hanzeatic League. Widespread production of gingerbread was a sign of economic prosperity of the cities able to import much sought-after spices in large amounts. Incidentally, in many languages, the name of this baked goods is related to pepper (ger. Pfefferkuchen, ned. pepperkoek, pol. piernik, rus. пряник, swe. pepparkaka), suggesting its liberal use, although medieval recipes indicate that ginger and cinnamon were also commonly used. Another popular application of various spices was spiced wine, very popular across Europe, often associated with colder season in the south but usually drunk all year round in the north. Contemporary recipes suggest that they were prepared immediately before serving, but were also made in bulk, with large amounts of spices being added to wine barrels and left to macerate. This drink was, of course, limited to people able to drink wine regularly, i.e. upper strata of society, although this still mandated rather substantial supply of spices.

People enjoying more wealth could have been able to afford many spices and their usage was also considered an evidence of wealth. In many cookbooks from the late Middle Ages, usually written by the chefs working for the nobility or even royalty, one can easily find mentions of common Oriental spices. For example, Llibre de Sent Soví, a Catalan cookbook written in or around 1324 by an anonymous author, most likely a Catalan chef who is sometimes said to be the chef to Edward II mentions frequent use of citrus fruits, pepper, ginger and saffron, what is quite understandable, given that it has been written in the region, where Iberian, Jewish, Arab and Berber influences intertwined, leading to eclectic recipes. This book most likely influenced many other books as the same recipes can be found in Libro di arte coquinaria by Martino da Como, published around 1465 and De honesta voluptate et valetudine by Batolomeo Platina, published for the first time in Rome around 1470 (on a side note, this was also the first European cookbook to be printed rather than written). The Forme of Cury, compiled in the last decade of 14th century by the chefs of King Richard II also makes common use of 'clowys, macys and quibibz' (cloves, mace and tailed pepper) being used in many meat-based recipes, along with ginger and less common saffron. We can also find similar suggestions in Le Ménagier de Paris from 1393 that, although it was a general guide to homemaking rather than a simple cookbook, it still contains many detailed recipes that allow an insight into the cuisine enjoyed by the upper-class French in the late 14th century. A much younger specimen, Compendium ferculorum, first published in 1682 by Stanisław Czerniecki, a chef to Voivode of Krakow, is unusual due to the fact that large number of the 333 recipes contained therein, especially dishes made of red meat mention liberal uses of various foreign ingredients and spices, most notably almonds, raisins, dates, figs, lemons, black pepper, ginger, nutmeg, mace, saffron and cumin. This was quite typical for the 16th and 17th century Polish cuisine enjoyed by the richer strata of society, mainly due to the proximity to Ottoman Empire that facilitated access to these particular ingredients and also caused a substantial Ottoman influence on the customs of the Polish-Lithuanian nobility, such as fashion and warfare.

So the rich of the era could afford substantial amounts of rare spices. The records of the famous Landshut Wedding in 1475 between George, Duke of Bavaria and princess Jadwiga of Poland note that the preparation for the immense feast for thousands of people required '207 lbs of saffron, 386 lbs of pepper, 286 lbs of ginger, 205 lbs of cinnamon, 105 lbs of cloves, 85 lbs of nutmeg and 500 lbs of sugar'.

Essential oils derived from spices were also commonly used in medicine from antiquity to late 19th century and to a small extent still find application in specific fields, as is the case of eugenol obtained from cloves and commonly used in dentistry thanks to its antibacterial and anesthetic properties, usually as the mixture with zinc oxide for the root canal filling paste. But modern applications aside, spices were common ingredients used by classically-trained doctors who derived their knowledge from the Hellennic and later also Arabic texts that described various medicinal properties of exotic condiments, usually associating them with 'hot' and 'dry' humour. This caused them to be quite commonly used for various stomach ailments as well as general invigoration what, with the pro-digestive and antibacterial properties of typical for many the spices might have stemmed from practical observation and have been actually efficient in some benign problems. Many sources discussing spices often state that the use of spices is beneficial for one's health when they are either ingested or worn as perfume, what strongly suggests that perfumes were also worn not only for aesthetic, but also alleged medicinal purposes. Such remarks are quite prominent in e.g. Kitab al-Wuslah ila l-Habib fi Wasf al-Tayyibat wal-Tib of uncertain origin, dated mid-13th century and compiled possibly by Jamal al-Jazzar or Ibn al-Adim.