Is there a spice/herb/ingredient that you zealously use in all of your meals? Which is it?

Not after Labor Day, I hope.

Veeky Forums detected! but on a serious note, I just like garlic. A lot. On everything.

fresh grated one is great but a such powerful colourant... even the blades and cutting boards I use are yellow now

I take tumeric every day in pill form because it is supposed to help with my back pain.

Doesn't do shit but I still take it anyways.

I use Saffaron. Here in UAE or anywhere in the middle east, Saffaron is cheap. I love putting Saffaron on rice. Also I made my own spices, into 1. I mixed a few spices. Saffaron gives it a good color and taste.

About the only thing I use in most of my cooking is freshly ground tellicherry black pepper.

I cook so many different ethnenticities of food that there isn't much crossover between ingredients.

Fresh ground turmeric is awesome, OP. I just started being able to get the roots from a local market about 2 years ago. It's so much better than the ground stuff that it's not even funny. I use it when I'm cooking Indian or Thai food, but otherwise not so much.

I demand this on my food. Last time mommy put something else on I held her face onto the burners.

Maybe it's different in UAE, but for Egypt, Algeria and Lebanon, it seems safflower is often labeled as saffron and no one seems to really care.
I don't like real saffron myself and greatly prefer safflower, but I've family who do like the stuff and on a trip to Egypt (not technically ME, but still the Arab World, so close enough) a few years back, I was determined to pick some up for people.
I was surprised at how difficult it was to find the real stuff, even in supposedly upmarket stores. But then, Cairo still has dirt "streets" with donkeys and shit wandering about, so I don't know what I expected.

>ethnenticities

I use MSG too but usually just a pinch between my thumb and index finger. Healthier and tastier than just alone.

Wherever I can sneak it in, I use turmeric. The most sensational spice in health circles.

Sounds shit. I bet it features herbs that are shit tier in dried form.

I often include a little bit with any cinnamon meal.

An Indian I spoke to said the dried powder is just as good. I've seen whole in the shops, is it really worth it?
You've sold it to me. So you just buy the root then chop some and grind it for your jar?

I've got this but I'm afraid to use it. I guess boiled rice would make a good test.

Shit.

maybe spend a little less time looking for spices and a little more time encouraging your governments to actually fight terrorism rather than depending on the US to do everything for you.

I hope trump gets in so we stop protecting you fucks.

How does the tellicherry compare to the regular black pepper?

Well, grated orange penis isn't one of them.

Why would you think that I'm an Arab? Because I've been to Lebanon, Algeria and Egypt? You know that tourism exists, right? You know that's a thing, yeah? You do, don't you?

If you have been to any of those places, then you should be under surveillance. There is literally no reason to travel to those places unless you are a terrorist and/or supporting a terrorist funding business

Foodwishes has made me put cayenne pepper in a lot of things lately.

You just can't go wrong with it.

>Wherever I can sneak it in, I use turmeric. The most sensational spice in health circles.
tumerics health benefits are bullshit but go ahead and use it for a spice.

you have to be 18 to post on Veeky Forums, user.

nice strawman, akmed.

Yet again, /pol/ fucks a thread up where there was no reason to. Why don't you go back to your containment board/hug box where you belong?

On topic, I tend to use Herbs de Provence on nearly everything.

>So you just buy the root then chop some and grind it for your jar?

I buy the roots and keep them in my freezer. Then when I want some I grab a root and either grate it fresh, or just toss it in the food processor or blender if I'm making a curry paste.

Turmeric loses its flavor rapidly once it's ground up. So the idea is to grind it fresh when you need it.

USA loudmouths over foreign policy usually don't know shit about the places they have an opinion over. Otherwise he would know that terrorism is a bigger priority there than it is in the West. Muslims have killed something like 100 Americans since 2001, that's absolutely nothing compared to what terrorism does over there. And for that reason the USA often prefers not to give full cooperation to weaker intelligence agencies, nevermind actually betraying its allies who are in power over there (and who are often incompetent or dissenting on issues like this).

Trump is the most pathetic phenomenon, a politician who feeds primarily off the weakest portion of society, those who (despite having the best, dominating genetics and culture - WASP males) are being left behind in the tertiary-educated, cosmopolitan, technological world of the 21st century.

Maybe turmeric specifically, but spices in general seem amazing nutritional value per calorie.

It's still black pepper, it's just one of the most highly prized versions of it. It's more aromatic and the flavor is a bit stronger than normal black pepper.

Interestingly, a lot of premium spices (that included) are cheaper than supermarket stuff when you shop from a dedicated spice merchant. I buy a 1-lb bag at a time. The cost per unit weight is lower than the normal pre-ground shit at my local supermarket.

Garlic powder

>nutritional value

That's a funny way to say

>unverified herbal remedies and crockpot wives tales

But maximising your plant food intake agrees with all the science.

Americunt here. Well said. Any way, back on topic: zealously for every meal? fresh ground pepper. And crushed red pepper, garlic & basil as I regularly make pasta dishes for dinner (quick & easy for a single guy).

I tend to overuse bay leafs. Not even only in every single stew or soup I make, but I also put that stuff in marinades.

>Garlic powder
never understand the need of garlic and onion powder when you can have the fresh stuff around the Year in every supermarket...

Completely different flavour dried v fresh, kinda like how paprika doesn't taste of bell peppers and dried tomato, even if reconstituted, won't taste like its fresh counterpart.

Herbs and spices have by far the highest antioxidant ratio per weight of anything you can eat and virtually all of them have been scientifically proven to have a wide range of health promoting compounds.

sure... but fresh garlic is 100% more tasteful

>antioxidant

Pure distilled memejuice. Utterly meaningless.

A lot of those studies are bullshit.

Even if you're dumb enough to actually believe that, there are still a wide range of health promoting effects from herbs and spices. Turmeric and garlic are both potent anti-carcinogens, basil has been shown to protect cell structures from radiation and oxygen-based damage, clinical trials have shown ginger to have significant anti-inflammatory effects, etc etc. You can pick nearly any herb or spice and find a list like this.

Not sure why you're angry at the thought of spices being healthy.

Yeah man, the oregano lobby is huge. They fund all kinds of biased studies.

You might say one is tastier than the other to your preferences, but in nowise are the two interchangeable. There is nothing stopping you from using both fresh onion and onion powder in a given dish and, in fact, many recipes that utilise onion powder or dried minced onion do call for both dry and fresh.
Similarly, you'd be hard-pressed to find a recipe for lecsó that doesn't use both fresh bell pepper and dried paprika because lecsó, by simple virtue of being lecsó, is made with both.

Again, dried garlic != fresh garlic, the two do not taste alike and they're used in different manners to create different flavours.

cinnamon
i fucking love cinnamon

The "anti-oxidant" movement is nothing but another buzzword that all kinds of companies scramble to get so they can slap it on their labels. It has no more meaning than "All Natural". Then fat diebetic fucks buy chocolate coated fruit flavored jellies because it says "a good source of anti-oxidants!" on the bag.

>what is co-opting?

This. Garlic powder permeates the food more then fresh mince. It creates a more even flavor. It also does not taste much like fresh garlic. I find its useful in reducing the need for salt as well.

>basil has been shown to protect cell structures from radiation and oxygen-based damage

so why don't they make radiation suits out of basil leaves?

>Then fat diebetic fucks buy chocolate coated fruit flavored jellies because it says "a good source of anti-oxidants!" on the bag.

but those are acai blueberries. my diabetes is a completely separate issue and it's not worth the risk to my health to stop eating those.

>It also does not taste much like fresh garlic. I find its useful in reducing the need for salt as well.

That might be because so many garlic powders include salt, especially if it says "garlic salt".

Ever had fresh garlic powder? I know it sounds like a contradiction in terms, but hear me out.

Find dried minced garlic or dried garlic bits or dry some yourself, yeah? Then powder it.
That's what I mean by "fresh garlic powder." It's like garlic powder × 50. Garlic powder on steroids. The garlic powder to end all garlic powders.

I got the idea from watching a friend of mine making chutney. She used dried ginger chips, which she then powdered, and fresh ginger both (because 'they don't taste the same and bring different things to the chutney'). I asked her why she powders ginger chips herself instead of buying powdered ginger and she said something that makes a lot of sense: the flavour compounds in spices are very volatile so powdering them and exposing more surface area to air will result in loss of flavour much more quickly than were they kept whole.
Using a chip of dried ginger she gave me, I powdered it at home and compared it with the ready-powdered ginger I had on hand already. Huge fucking difference!
And since ginger chips are cheaper by weight than ready-powdered, I haven't looked back.
I've applied the same idea to garlic, as mentioned, as well as to onion and turmeric (which I have to dry myself because I've never seen chips of the stuff sold anywhere).
Give it a go.

I've used dried herbs for such a long time, and they're just easier to store in the pantry. Lately, I've been using fresh herbs and OMG it makes everything so much better.

Other than that, I love mixing my own garam masala, toasting then grinding that and throwing that into anything with a savoury base.

Decorticated cardamom is also god-tier.

Cayenne pepper because I like capsaicin.

anytime I make chili or mexican food I'll throw this in, or even just beans and wieners

recently ive been putting a little pile of chopped curly parsley on everything.

got a big thing of mccormick cardamom recently. used like, 1/10 tsp and havent touched it in months.

wtf do i do with cardamom. shit has the most intoxicating smell

After salt and pepper, cumin is my most used spice.

It's great for some sweet pastries, oddly enough. I threw it into a blueberry pie and that was interesting.

I use it in dry rub a lot, or whenever I cook anything Indian.

this burger place near me had blueberry cardamom milkshakes for a while

You sound like an angry old man. What are you doing on Veeky Forums?

I put salt on everything

I really like cumin. I don't put in everything, but I overuse it a lot.

>I often include a little bit with any cinnamon meal.
OP, what in fuck is a cinnamon meal?

It's just /pol/ leaking from its containment board again

Underrated post

Ketchup on everything.

Is it a bad idea to use a pinch of MSG instead of salt for boiling water?

M I N T
I
N
T

I really like using sage as of late. I never hear anyone mention it in recipes or on here and I don't know why. Its got great flavor.

I put a little shaka shaka of this in my recipes.

This.

Paprika goes good on most everything too

Coriander

mustard

Sage certainly int for everything, but sage & gnocchi, or sage & Italian assuage & orecchiette is God-tier. Might make that for dins tonight.

Is that coriander seeds or actual dried cilantro?

It's the seeds.

One or Multiple of these:
Garlic
Steak Sauce
Soy Sauce
Mustard

...btw the best steak sauce ive had besides A1 is this cheap 99 cent stuff at Walmart with a black and blue label on it (Price First generic brand?). For the cost it is the best.

Salt, pepper, garlic

ground

So as I sometimes do when I look through these threads I decided to go get some of this and try making a burger with it. It was maybe the best burger I've ever had. I mean it was cooked perfectly and there were some good ingredients so it wasn't just the spice but it definitely contributed. Nice recommendation.

throw onions + chicken thighs in a pan and let them simmer with cardamon, cinnamon, nutmeg, cumin, and tumeric. its my go-to meal lately its so good

I use a lot of parsley. Plays well with all meats.

cute

...

god tier in milk tea

One of the best meals I've had while my wife was away featured these. Put a handful of them in a bowl, combined them with some Tom Collins mix and then topped it off with a frozen pie crust. Tasted great!

Chef John plz go

What's the root thing behind the ash-tray of sulfur?

i can justify putting cilantro on just about anything

Turmeric. It's a root. You get the powder after grinding it.

Cayenne and I did it before it was cool.

Also not a herb but lemon zest/juice wherever I can get away with it. And finally when a recipe calls for garlic I always put 1 or 2 cloves more than needed, most of the time unless it totally fucks up the flavor.

Most of my fallback meals have a basis of onion, garlic, bell pepper, tomatoes (pieces, paste or peeled and from a can), salt, pepper, paprika, chili, rosemary, thyme, oregano, and basil.
Frequently used spices that are in rotation depending on the meal I'm making are cumin, coriander, ras el hanout, curry powder, ginger, dill and nutmeg.

I've been using cumin more and more, and it's slowly finding its place in the starting lineup.

>ras el hanout
Is that the badguy from batman?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ras_el_hanout
It's the good guy from North African cuisine.

Big fat penis because I'm OP