Recipes and Cooking Tips

Smoked Paprika.

Almost always some acid. White wine, vinegar, lemon juice.

Fish sauce

The soap gene people are going to hate me, but cilantro.

MSG

Ethiopian Berbere seasoning. A lot of places make a blend with too much cayenne, but if you can find one that isn’t especially spicy, it’s an incredible earthy umami flavor you can put in almost anything.

For the umami thing, black garlic is really good. Kinda like fermented roasted garlic, really nice in soups and stews

Fat and vinegar.

Rice? Generous splash of white vinegar into the rice cooker, then a pat of butter at the end to melt in the residual heat. If you want something to pair with stir fry, try drizzling with sesame oil instead.

French fries? Toss 'em with a splash of malt vinegar (they already have oil from the frying).

Salad? Toss it with a splash of a good quality balsamic vinegar and extra virgin olive oil. Bonus points for tahini.

Stir fry? Splash some rice vinegar into the pan and drizzle sesame oil over the top at the end.

Pasta? Drizzle of a good quality balsamic vinegar and extra virgin olive oil on the plate.

Pizza? Pat of butter right after you take it out of the oven to melt from the residual heat, then a drizzle of good quality balsamic vinegar.

Cinnamon

Cocaine /s

Fennel seeds and a bit of oil in tomato sauce. First had it at a popular Italian place and I've loved it ever since

The perfect 5 spices:

Salt, pepper, onion powder, garlic powder, and MSG.

Almost everything you cook will benefit from these.

Salt, acid, fat, heat. In everything.

Acid: vinegar, hot sauce, or some type of citrus. Fat: butter or oil. Heat: Paprika if you only want to pretend but a actually spicy note goes well in almost everything, at least some black pepper.

Oyster sauce

Sesame oil

Kimchi/ferments/pickles

Gochujang

Chinese 5 spice

Balsamic, Chinese vinegar

Seasoned rice wine

Furikake

Chili oil

Hot sauce - especially a smoked habanero/chipotle

Better than bouillon but used like a flavor concentrate rather than stock

Some of my other favorites like berbere were already mentioned, periperi is in a similar vein

Splash of beer in a stew or bread recipe, also diastatic malt.

Ginger paste. It's kind of cheating, but I hate how much time it takes to finely mince ginger to the point where it just disappears into a recipe.

Tony Chachere's (pronounced sash-er-ee) Creole Seasoning. It was my go to meat seasoning when I was younger before I started branching out. Being from Louisiana, we put Tony's on everything. It's especially good on fries and eggs. You can basically just substitute the salt in any dish as it's pretty salty on it's own.

I buy a block of hot pot seasoning, keep it in the freezer, and shave some off whenever I need some spicy, salty, mouth numbing goodness. I found one that is made with beef tallow, too, which is nicer than the palm oil kind.

Sichuan peppercorns are great to use to boost many dishes too

Salt

Anchovies

Worcestershire Sauce

Anchovy paste. When I make tomato sauce I like to fry all my aromatics together with some minced calabrese salami and then I push everything to the side and sautee about a teaspoon of anchovy paste in the reserve oil until it gets fragrant and then incorporate it in with everything else and finish the sauce and oh hell it is amazing. It's not for every dish but when you want to drop a killer umami bomb into something like a broth or a stew it is unreal.

Citric Acid and real Liquid Smoke make most things pop.

Not very special at all, but I like adding finely chopped flat leaf parsley on top of savory dishes. Looks nice and I really like the taste of parsley.

Shallots and butter. Most things I make including cakes, I’ll reduce down some shallots, butter, and roasted peppercorns. Really adds to any dish

I'm a fan of fruit syrups - adding a nice dash of sweet along with other interesting flavors & can also add a splash of color to the plate/dish. apple syrup can have notes of caramel, pomegranate molasses has a bright yet sour taste, and (while not actually fruit) rose syrup has a rich floral aroma. in many cases, fruit syrup/molases is just simmering down juice with perhaps a little sugar.

infused oil is another favorite - I've got a bottle spanish olive oil infused with korean red pepper flakes in the kitchen, I always use that with pork or chicken, but I also have a few herb infused oils as well - rosemary, lemon thyme, and savory (sort of a earthy marjoram/mint flavor), each have their uses but it's usually in salad dressings.

I have a couple of infused vinegars as well, but those are for salads only (serrano pepper balsamic and tarragon peach vinegar)

in tomato based sauces, I try to include a tomato leaf if it's that time of the year (not many though, they're sort of toxic).

in soups I try to add celery leaves - the celery flavor is very concentrated in the leaves (more than in celeriac - the roots)

Ajvar.

It's good to use instead of tomato paste or ketchup in any recipe that calls for it. My favorite is using it as a glaze for meatloaf.

You also shouldn't underestimate something as simple as smoked salt.

mustard seeds in any tomato sauce based dish. the taste is negligible but they just make it look more tomatoey