The Kitchen of Procrastination

Two things have prompted this blog post: 1. a reader of this blog mentioned to me that they thought my recipe for curried chickpeas and spinach sure had alot of ingredients and 2. moving across the country has forced me to come to terms with my spice cabinet…

My Spice Cabinet, Status Post the "First Clean-Out"

This spice collection has been four years in the making! It includes plenty of extravagance, such as 4 different kinds of salt, all different types of pepper- whole and ground, two or three separate curry blends, and three kinds of paprika (and I don’t even love paprika!). Sometimes I even feel lost in it! Not to mention the spice isles at the grocery stores.
With that, I realized that a post or two about what makes a well-stocked pantry would be a nice addition to the blog repertoire.

First things first: SALT
I suggest getting a big bottle of iodized salt, like Morton’s, for salting pasta water, eggplant slices, etc. Things where the salt is not the key to the flavor, but still necessary.
Then you should also get a general sea salt, like Maldon’s, or a cheaper store brand if you prefer. This will usually be chunkier and nicer for sprinkling on roasted veggies, finished dishes, etc.
If you’re feeling excited about it, then I suggest at least one “fancy” salt. Something like fleur de sel, or Himalayan pink salt, or grey salt. Other options are smoked salt, or truffle salt, where otherwise normal sea salt has been flavored.

Step 2: PEPPER
I highly, highly, HIGHLY recommend investing in some kind of pepper grinder/crusher. The difference between a tin can of “black pepper powder” and fresh ground peppercorns is as if they did not even come from the same little seed.
I have a mortar and pestle in which I grind my peppercorns. I have gone through almost an entire pound (which I purchased in bulk from my local grocery store) of whole black pepper in the past year. You could also get a decent quality pepper grinder specifically for this purpose in the $20-$30 range. This is still significantly cheaper than buying those individual, single-use pepper grinders you can find in the spice isle.

Once you have the black pepper down, I also think crushed red chili pepper flakes are essential. There is hardly a meal where I do not add a dash of them into the olive oil for a bit of extra spice.

Those are the only two peppers that are absolutely necessary, but like salt you can branch out from there: Szechuan peppercorns, white pepper, pink pepper, and whole dried peppers of every shape and size.

Really, it’s amazing what one can do with just good quality salt and pepper. But, to flesh out the spice drawer, I also recommend the following:
- Fresh garlic and onions
- Cumin (preferably both whole and ground)
- Dried thyme leaves
- Cinnamon (ground and sticks)
- real vanilla extract

You can get away with just about anything if you have those basic ingredients on hand. All the rest is frosting on the cake.
I go through so much of all of these spices that I buy them all in bulk. If you really feel like a new spice is crucial to a recipe, I say buy it, try it, add to your collection. But you won’t find a better, more basic starter set than this.

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 23rd, 2010 at 3:20 am and is filed under Other. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.