28
votes
What's on your spice rack?
Very basic question, what are the herbs/spices/seasonings that are the staples of your cooking?
Are there any that you use that are under-the-radar that you recommend?
I ask because I have gotten into cooking a lot more in the last six months or so and am looking to restock a spice rack I have had for years with things I will use. So nothing is too simple (salt/pepper) I'm just looking for ideas and looking to see what flavors the rest of Tildes enjoys!
As an Asian American, I'll scream it from the rooftops, GET MSG!
MSG is so good and easy for umami, and you can use it to make fried rice and other things like that. Chicken powder and mushroom powder could also be substituted, but I just like good ol' MSG.
My ex girlfriend's initials were MSG and I loved taking her to Chinese restaurants and joking that she couldn't eat there what pointing to the sign saying MSG with a circle and a line through it.
Unfortunately, a lot of stigma and slight racism comes with MSG, (a paper about it: https://www.jandonline.org/article/S2212-2672(21)00068-X/pdf). It's so ingrained that even my parents who are Taiwanese immigrants think MSG is bad for you. I do feel like as a community, Asian Americans have been taking it back recently and it's been really nice to see.
Just wanted to put another comment in here, not quite a spice, but if you feel like your dish is "missing something" but you don't know what it is, you might want to try adding some kind of acid to it. I remember reading that somewhere and it adds a lot.
This used to be a big problem in my meals! I've since realized that I probably like my food even more acidic than the average person. I didn't realize I was such a ho for acid until I started doing this, my dishes all just felt kinda boring. Highly recommend trying this out to see if it works for you!
MSG is awesome. I discovered it ages ago because I always buy all sorts of Asian foods and ingredients at the local toko and I've used it ever since. I used it in many dishes, not just Asian food.
I use mine in a BBQ rub (shoutout Rodney Scott!) and it’s super good there too.
I finally bought some the other day. How much should I use? Is it just a 1 for 1 replacement for salt?
Don't use it 1 to 1. It's much savorier, if that makes sense.
I think it's just mostly to taste honestly! Too much might make your mouth a little dry, but honestly when I cook I don't measure salt or msg either, just kinda go by how you feel.
Any ideas on where to get msg in resealable packaging? I've tried to repackage it myself and made a huge mess, but I also am the person who uses bottles in the spice rack so I can grab and go, and refill as needed.
You can find msg in spice-rack sized bottles from a brand called Accent (the flavor enhancer) in most stores. Additionally, if you feel a reason to avoid msg, many asian markets have something called mushroom seasoning that is often msg free and still a great flavor enhancer. I buy a rather larger container of it with a lid and it lasts quite a while.
I have no qualms with msg! but I do love mushrooms! I just have to be super careful what I buy/store because my best friend (who I cook with a lot) has a deathly mushroom allergy so we try to keep mushrooms away from her at all costs.
My condolences go out to your friend. As a fun guy who loves fungi, not being able to eat mushrooms would be a noticeably devastating blow to my palate. MSG is clearly the superior option here.
It gets better as she's also vegetarian bordering on vegan because her digestive system can't process meat of any kind (like an allergy). so her protein choices when we were kids were limited and she and I had a fun time of comparing our relative iron deficiencies for a long time. I'd rather be safe than sorry and collect a new spice for the rack in MSG!
Personally I just have basically a "salt cellar" of MSG, though it has a little scooping spoon for it.
Dodging the basics, I'll put out some less-common ones that i use a ton:
I keep sumac around too. In addition to chicken, l'll just put some in greek yogurt. A quick dip with olive oil, salt, a little lemon juice, and sumac. Good with naan or other flatbread. And maybe a cucumber tomato salad. (Cilantro is optional. Mint or parsley are good substitutes.)
Cinnamon: Just wanted to add that true cinnamon is nice if you can get it. It's milder, more complex, and crumblier than cassia, which is what you often get when you buy cinnamon powder or sticks in the U.S. You can find it if you search for "Ceylon cinnamon."
Outside of the ones already mentioned here, here's a few that I haven't seen others post yet:
Tajin bangs. Due to where I live Tajin is in wide availability and, if you’re an alcohol consumer, it goes great with a lot of drinks. Margaritas, Mexican lagers, pickle beers, etc.
I’ve always got a bottle of Tajin and it gets probably the most varied use.
I love Tajin and it's really hard to get in my country. Not obtainable in the shops, only online via Mexican food importers.
And I don't know why - it's delicious! It goes with everything, even traditional British stuff - a favourite in our household is on cauliflower cheese.
I haven't tried it in drinks though so maybe I will have to!
I haven't personally tried it in a drink, but I have heard great things about mangonadas! While it does require a few additional niche ingredients, they could be easily appended to your next online order.
It's blended mango, sugar, lime, tequila, chamoy (A saucy tajin compliment that is more fruit forward), tajin, and a tamarind candy straw (tamarind with chili powder wrapped) to drink through. It just sounds good!
Tajin is awesome. I highly recommend trying it on ice cream and sorbet - especially tropical fruit flavors. Goes great with mango.
I feel like these two are "cheating" because they're more so condiments, but I do use them to season things and no one else has mentioned them
Otherwise:
chili flakes, cayenne, salt (get multiple, i have sea salt grinder but also kosher salt and flur de sel), black pepper, tarragon, rosemary, thyme, basil, cumin, nutmeg, cinnamon, tumeric, cardamon, star anise
For those of you who are Canadian I highly recommend finding a good Bulk Barn, and if you need spice jars Ikea has some great options. For those of you who are not Canadian, Bulk Barn is a bulk food store where you pay by weight. It is substantially cheaper for things such as this (as well as oats, rice, protein powders etc.)
Seconding the Bulk Barn shout-out here, some of their prepared seasoning mixes are just phenomenal. In particular, their rib rub and sriracha rub are awesome for BBQing/smoking, and their souvlaki seasoning is out of this world.
I don't know how many spices we have - a lot - an entire cupboard shelf, with many stacked two-high. Most of these are used regularly, some only occasionally, but I do have a few items that I bought on sale with no idea how to use them and they're still mostly unused. So I'd recommend taking a look at recipes for the types of food that you want to be cooking and build off what's in those. That will get you what you need for now. And if you enjoy cooking and keep it up, plan for where you're going to put those additional spices.
Also, keep in mind when you're trying new dishes that you're not sure if you'll like, you don't necessarily have to go buy the new spices right away. A few years ago I had a recipe that called for Aleppo pepper. I had no idea where I would ever find this, so I googled substitutes and found a suggestion to mix cayenne and paprika to get something similar. That dish turned out to be a regular in our household and when I found myself in a specialty spice store last winter, I bought a jar of Aleppo. It's definitely different, but the suggested substitute didn't do a bad job!
Also, if you're in the US, I'm a big fan of Target's store brand spices. They have a decent selection and are often much cheaper than the national brand you'll find in most grocery stores and I don't notice much of a quality difference. If you want to go high quality, I'm a big fan of Penzey's, which ships throughout the country if you don't have a store available in your area.
You can also get the stuff you probably don't need a whole bottle of from bulk bins, and just buy whatever amount you need. My local co-op has them, and I'll just pick up a tablespoon or two of the stuff I'm only gonna use for one recipe.
A good kosher salt is nice for salting during cooking.
After salt and pepper, I’d go with garlic powder, onion powder, paprika, cumin, and cayenne as your next good ones.
I think that dried herbs are pretty dang valuable, I have and use a good amount of basil, oregano, even rosemary occasionally. I have ground thyme but I think I want to switch to dried.
That should cover a lot of your bases. Don’t be afraid to experiment!
I’d second this list and add fresh pepper from a pepper grinder. There’s just no comparison between the preground stuff and crushed up peppercorns.
Along the same lines as grinding fresh pepper, instead of just shaking dried herbs onto whatever you're cooking, pour a little pile into your hand and use your other hand to break up the herbs onto the food with your fingers. It releases all the flavors and aromas of the herbs just like a pepper grinder does with pepper. Also you don't get dried herb bits in the final product, they kind of blend into the dish more. Usually as soon as I buy any new herb the first thing I do is rip the plastic shaker lid off.
Even better: buy fresh herbs and dry them. Basic food dehydrators are cheap and easy to find used. Otherwise you can hang them in a dry place or use an oven.
Then just toss them in a coffee grinder and transfer to an old spice jar. Way more flavorful than buying spices in a store that are already 2 years old.
A lot of great answers already. A couple other ingredients/blends:
-Dried chile (ancho, guajillo, etc) to have more control vs. premixed chili powder
-Preserved lemons (and limes!)
-Advieh (persian 'allspice' mix) for persian cuisine
-Limoo amani (dried lime) for certain persian dishes
-Hawaij, a yemeni spice mix delicious in soups
-Sichuan chili oil is easy to make and adjust flavours as you like
A few notes on storage:
-Whole nutmeg lasts much longer than powdered; it shaves easily with a knife or microplane
-I store leftover orange/lemon peels in the freezer to grate for zest on demand
-I store fresh ginger in the freezer and grate/microplane it frozen (turmeric, too)
-'hardy' fresh herbs freeze very well and have a lot more flavour; think bay leaf, thyme, rosemary
Cumin. A basic now for meats, stews, pickles, root vegetables. Delicious.
Salt and Pepper. Other most frequently used (in order of my recollection):
Then we have an assortment of spice and/or herb blends.
Edit to add:
Nutritional Yeast. Vegans know. Whenever I do tofu scrambles I go to town with some nooch.
Bay leaves are good fresh too, if you can get them. I put them in everything, fresh or dried. Sauteeing onions and garlic? Throw in a bay leaf. Frying ground beef? Same thing. Or toss a couple in the cavity of a roast chicken.
Mustard powder is another one I use a lot. Salt, freshly ground pepper, and a little mustard powder is good on steak or pork, in salad dressing, or mac and cheese.
Bay leaves are great! Can’t be overstated.
I’ve recently taken to making my own vegetable broths, throwing a couple bay leaves in just elevated them in my opinion.
Scrolling all the way to the bottom to post: Tony Chachere's Creole Seasoning.
It's just a blend of salt, black pepper, chili powder, garlic powder, red pepper, and MSG, but man do those flavors come together and make every dish pop.
A few outliers I've not seem but often use
*Kaffir lime leaves
*Dried bitter orange peel
*Fenugreek
*Nigella
*A number of anise flavours - aniseed, chervil, star anise and ajowan.
*Long pepper
I shop regularly at the spicery, a Bristol based online spice traders who have an amazing range, letterbox friendly packaging and useful freebies.
One I have not noticed posted, but always keep a bottle of in the cubbard is Shichimi Togarashi. It's a Japanese pepper blend with orange Peel and sesame seeds. Its amazing on rice, meats, soups, anything that needs a touch of heat and a bit of zest.
Had some leftover smoked pulled pork, and made rice bowls with it. Slathered on some Shichimi Togarashi and damn was I wanting seconds.
I have a few, mostly curry related:
As many others have already said, salt (I prefer sea salt or kosher salt) and freshly ground pepper (I have a peppercorn blend of black, white, and pink). I use garlic and onion powder in almost everything I cook. One thing that I have recently switched to is smoked paprika instead of just plain paprika, it adds much more depth to anything I'm cooking, and white pepper, when I want a more mild pepper flavor.
My spice rack is actually two large racks magnetized to either side of my fridge. I have a lot of spices and I use them all the time. I won't go into all of them, but my main go-to's are:
Cavender's Greek seasoning! I originally bought it for a steak recipe but I've started putting it in more and more foods. It's great on a fried egg!
A local place tosses their homemade curly fries in this stuff and they are dangerously addictive! I grew up mixing it in tuna salad salad too and would recommend.
I'll go with something I haven't seen mentioned yet-- I have a bunch of different hot pepper flake blends (from flatironpepper.com right now) that I add to almost anything. They go in eggs, in any Asian food, in pastas, soups, chilis... I like hot :)
I also have several pepper flake blends from Flatiron Pepper! I personally really enjoy the sweet heat, Asian reds, and their roasted garlic/onion/jalapeño mix. That last one is very tasty on veggies and in sourcream as a dip.
Most everything else I use has been posted already, so I’m just gonna add tonka beans. I believe they’re technically illegal in the US so you’re not gonna find them at your local Walmart or Target, but you can buy some pretty cheap on Amazon. They have a delicious scent that I can only describe as “dessert”, it’s chocolatey and vanilla-y with some hints of cinnamon or allspice, and all you need is half of one grated on a microplaner to add something extra to your hot chocolate. Or grate a little and throw it in with your coffee grounds before brewing to add a very appreciable layer to how your cup of coffee smells without affecting taste much
Let me second the smoked paprika (one of my favorites) and the liquid smoke, which I put in almost every savory soup, stew, sauce. I don’t think I saw cardamom, though. It is lovely in a homemade chai and great with cooked fruit like a pear tart or apple pie (use much less cinnamon).
Liquid smoke is a great secret ingredient if you don’t have a grill or the time for a proper smoke. A little goes a long way. I’ve added a tiny bit to the sous vide pouch with pork tenderloin and it blew my guests away.
For anyone looking to buy liquid smoke, check that the ingredients are just smoke and water. It’s not uncommon for there to be other flavor additives and enhancers that, particularly the cheaper stuff, and it ends up with an off-putting artificial taste.
What's liquid smoke exactly? 'Smoke and water'? That doesn't sound edible
Short version is it’s what would have been deposited on/in your meat and eaten had you traditionally smoked it, dissolved in water.
Salt, pepper, maybe some sort of leaf on top if i'm feeling fancy.
Oh, man. A few years back my household swapped to using test tubes (with natural cork corks) and test tube racks for spices, to save on counter space. We've got a selection of 48 spices close at hand, with bulk and backup spices in a cabinet. I'll write up a list when I get home, but for the moment let me sing the praises of test tubes for the purpose. It lets you keep a lot of different spices at hand in small portions, and a test tube is easy to uncap and easy to put away in the racks.
Its probably also super easy to get the spices out of
Yeah, with a cautionary note for things like powdered garlic/onion or any other spices that have a higher oil content. If they're prone to gumminess, it's extra important to keep them dry or it'll gum up in the tube, and then they're a pain to extract.
Chopsticks are good for this sort of thing. Get a pack of the cheapest metal ones you can find, grab one and start poking.
We also use them for stirring sugar or honey into tea.
Salt, pepper (specifically Tellicherry peppercorn), Sumac, Trader Joe's seasoning blend, and Paprika.
I have a very large selection of spices and seasonings because I love to cook and I cook a variety of cuisines.
But to answer your question directly, the ones I find myself using the most often are (in no order of preference) salt, pepper, bay, oregano, garlic, onion, thyme, cayenne and parsley.
Secret ingredients? Juniper berries and whole cloves. Adding a few to a stew or sauce gives it a roundness and complexity that is hard to identify.
It's not a fashionable seasoning, but I keep dried tarragon around. It's a great complement to fresher, lighter dishes - I mostly use it in omelettes with chives, and salads. I also grow it fresh - both French and Russian varieties. French tarragon tastes better, but it grows slower and is more prone to fall over and die.
No one has mentioned dried lavender yet, either. The flavor profile makes it a good substitute for rosemary in anything where rosemary would be too strong. Lavender is super easy to get hold of, and a useful ingredient for the classic fines herbes or Herbes de Provence mixtures. It pairs well with citrus flavors in baked goods, can be used as a tea ingredient, and can accentuate poultry (lavender-honey glazed grilled chicken is great) or light fish dishes.
Tarragon and lavender are really old school French provincial cooking ingredients, but I wouldn't mind seeing a culinary revival of some of the old European standards. I love to cook globally, but the local, fresh ingredients available to me lean more towards cold climates than warm.
Also, Ethiopian berbere spice mix - great mixed with oil and brushed on grilled corn, in braises/stews, or on popcorn.
One of my most used spices is actually a mix by Fiesta seasonings - their Fajita Seasoning (the version with tenderizer). I put it on chicken mostly, but also put it on the occasional cut of beef that we are using in a Mexican style dish. Even though it’s for fajitas, it has a very well-rounded taste profile and I’ve put it on chicken going in pasta and Asian dishes as well.
You can probably get more flavor out of your own mix and by grinding your own spices of course, but for us, with kids and a crazy life, this fajita seasoning is a quick route to a tasty dinner. Hope your grocery store carries the Fiesta brand!
A few specific things:
Kampot red peppercorns
These peppercorns have a really fruity scent and terrific flavor.
Tahitian vanilla extract
This vanilla is wonderfully sweet and floral. It's perfect for things like custards.
China Tung Hing cinnamon
Not as hot and spicy as regular cinnamon. This has a sweet, almost honey-like scent. Goes great with the aforementioned vanilla!
True Lemon and True Lime
This stuff is so handy for adding good lemon or lime flavor to your cooking. No need to keep bottles of stale tasting juice in the fridge or water down recipes to get extra citrus flavor. It's made from real juice and oil, so tastes infinitely better than the bottled stuff. It also has a more consistent flavor than fruit you'd get at a grocery store.
Trader Joe's Everything But The Bagel seasoning
Pretty much what it says on the tin. Great mixed into some cream cheese and spread on crackers.
I've been using oregano and black pepper lately. The oregano and a bunch of other bottled herbs are rescued and past best by though, so their flavour isn't very strong anymore.
I'm hoping to turn part of my garden into my spice rack too. I have two varieties of basil, and one of them (the lady who gave me the cuttings told me they're Thai basil) has been growing very well. I also have some mint varieties that are all called Indian borage. They make nice tea, though I haven't tried them in meals yet.
Skipping the basics but here are some other I always have:
Celery salt
Old bay
Lawry's season salt
Mrs dash
Black Garlic
Tajin
Lots of good seasonings here. A couple I always keep in stock:
-Celery salt
-Celery seed
-Cumin seed (really good toasted and cooked in rice)
-Curry powder
-Garam masala
-Turmeric
-Tajin
And this is all ontop of the basics: cumin, onion/garlic powder, salt, pepper, chili powder, paprika, msg, etc. I love mixing spices all the time for things like premade/condensed soups, ramen packs, nacos, and homemade soups and chili's. We also cook a decent amount of Indian dishes so we keep those stocked.
Mine is a weird mix of juniper berries and close (corned beef, anyone?) to garam masala for that good good. I love cooking different styles of food, and my spice rack shows it. I had started my own hot sauce company but ended it before I could make an Indian inspired flavor. Still trying to figure out the recipe to make a beauty.