Favorite mix of spices in cooking

[Which Doctor]

It's filth and has no place in society.

Just allow it.

 

[BisexualMMA]

Hating paprika is like hating a flower pot on someone else's porch.

 

[Madmick]

After salt & pepper, everything revolves around garlic. It makes everything taste better. It works with everything. IMO, the first step to mastering spices in cooking is to be able to prepare delicious food without garlic. Why do I say this? Because everything I try to season without a recipe minus garlic ends up tasting like shit.

BBQ and meat rubs are one thing, but it seems to me when I watch cooking shows that the great chefs don't rely too much on seasoning, and more on creating a balance of flavors from their food ingredients.

Example: Carrots, Celery, and Onions (Scallions) are the holy trinity of vegetables for a soup base. I learned that watching Pepin, not from one of my books. It's fantastic. Roux --> Holy Trinity --> Chicken Stock + 1 Bay Leaf is such an easy start to make cheap, filling-but-volumetrically-low-calorie, low-labor, slow-cooked soups that you can store in the fridge, and eat for several days with easy reheats. You can improvise a million things on top of that. It's pretty hard to screw up.

 

[JoeyJoeJoeJr]

Sea salt pepper and garlic powder are my go to spices.