Hmmnn.. It varies from season to season and year to year. What could I not live without? Salt, pepper, garlic, chilli and good olive oil. But they're just everyday.
Garlic is a must-have, it keeps the vampires away, though it's a pain to get rid of the smell, especially when I have unexpected contact with people. Generally I'm awful with cooking; I just add random herbs my mother keeps in unlabelled jars in the cupboard (she doesn't anticipate that anyone else might want to cook so she doesn't bother to label them). Usually I add some green ones, and some orange/ yellow powders to make the food more spicy (possibly some chilli?). Can't go wrong with some old fashioned salt and pepper as well.
Ever since starting T, I've had ridiculous cravings for super peppery and spicy foods; so now I drown my food in pepper. Garlic, onions, bell peppers, and hot sauce are others I utilize a lot.
I don't really cook, but adding cheese to anything instantly makes it better. Other than that, garlic.
Cumin. It makes everything taste better! The thing I eat most often though is chicken. I add cumin to it often which is really good or I have this dry rub I made with a bunch of other spices which has a more warm flavour rather than spicy.
I love to cook with chickpeas, butter beans and black beans. Very tasty and good protein sources. Anything spicy suits me as well, so I like to use cayenne pepper, or hotter stuff more sparingly.
Fruits of all sorts. Soy products (soy sauce, tofu, soymilk). Rice. Teas and coffees. Flour, butter, yeast, eggs, and sugar, because baking. Nice olive oil and a garden variety of vegetables are also essential. And let us not forget peanut butter, honey, and cocoa. As for spices: garlic, onion, pepper, salt, nutmeg, vanilla, cinnamon, rosemary, basil. Those are probably my favourite.
Spice. Lots of spice. Start with just salt, go to stuff like pepper flakes, hot pepper slices, hot sauce, that stuff.
