Cooking

Paprika

• Paprika
• Powdered/granulated Garlic
• Powdered/granulated Onion
• Cayenne

Basically almost everything I cook has these in there with salt & pepper. Even if I'm using onion and garlic in the recipe.

Garlic by far. Salt, Pepper, Garlic.

After that I use quite a bit of cumin

My local Asian market sells powdered sriracha sauce. If you get this in your kitchen, everything you cook will be sweet, sour, spicy, and red for about a week before it's gone. It's fucking good.

Probably paprika

Capsaicin

Some top ones for me: MSG, Chicken Bouillon, Smoked Paprika, Thyme, Garlic powder, and finally, controversially, bay leaves.

MSG goes in basically anything. If it gets salt and pepper it's probably also getting MSG for me. I do a lot of chicken, and whenever I do I'm almost always adding some chicken bouillon to add some flavor to it. I really love Thyme, and find myself just adding it somewhat randomly to things. Smoked Paprika is a perfect flavor that's so unique, I add it to anything I want to have a bit of a kick, like chili, ect. Not that it's like spicy or anything, just it adds a little something to those dishes that you can't really get elsewhere. Garlic powder is an all around great utility, and I tend to "dump" this stuff on things.

Last but not least, Bay leaves. I swear, I'm like the #1 consumer of these things. I throw them in anything. Anything savory with a decent sauce/soupy base is PERFECT to add a bay leaf to. If you use em often you can really taste the difference, since fresh bay leaves really pack a punch in flavor.

Smoked paprika

Onion/garlic powder. In roughly equal quantities.

Melange of course. Really gives you that baked in sand worm flavor without having to catch one.

Fun fact: before it became mass produced sugar was originally considered a spice

I planted herbs all around my house, so I always have fresh herbs available. But I almost always end up using thyme, occasionally rosemary.

People here keep saying garlic, which I also use extensively but I don't think of it as a spice.

Is garlic a spice or an ingredient? I use a lot of fucking garlic.

For spice i love paprika

Hondashi

Gochujang, laoganma

Ginger, soy sauce, roasted sesame, white pepper

I think you know what kinds of food I really like

Garlic or Onion. Both are universally used in recipes going back hundreds of years.

I love using turmeric. You'd be srprised how well it pairs with so many things, plus it's very healthy. It goes naturally with a lot of middle eastern and south asian food, but you can also add it to sauces and soups for warm and earthy notes (if that's your thing like me).

As for spice mixes, I love Cadaver's greek seasoning. It's pretty simple (salt, pepper, organo, with a few others) and you can enhance pretty much anything with it

Sage. Always from Penzey's.

I once accidentally dumped too much sage into a sauce. It tasted so good that I kept doing it.

Mustard

Does bouillon count? I tend to use that in place of salt (I think salt is boring) so it goes in almost everything. Other than that, it’s a tie between black pepper, garlic, and onion powder. I don’t use that much in spices actually lol rather use the whole ingredient.

Cumin, coriander, and especially sumac. Sumac is SO good.

I have four that I use for everything equally so I’m going to consider them as a single seasoning, like Mrs. Dash. Onion powder, garlic powder, paprika, and cayenne. I put that mix in anything I cook.

Thyme. Not that often, but whenever I use it, I use loads.

Freeze dried garlic, by far.
Propably even tops pepper and occassionally also salt.

Cumin here too, followed by Berebere mix which is the one I buy in bulk, keep the bag in the freezer. I don't buy the cumin in bulk because it's cheap in stores here.

Unless you are counting onion & garlic, but those almost always fresh and I'd call them veg more than spice.

Garlic, sumac, coriander, paprika, rosemary, chaat, turmeric.

Tarragon. My favorite. Notable runners up cardamom, oregano, basil, herbs de Provence. Curry definitely, but technically that's a mixture of spices.

I'm not including salt or garlic salt, which would absolutely dwarf all others.

Garlic (usually the refrigerated kind from a jar) and cumin. Dried onion can be acceptable if you don't have time to chop an onion. Coarse ground black pepper has a distinctly different flavor than the kind that goes on the table. Crushed red pepper flakes really help revive leftover Italian, Mexican, and Thai food. And it's situational, but I am really starting to like Aleppo pepper quite a bit.

My favorites are crushed dried chilis, smoked parika, cumin and nutmeg. I often use vegetable bouillon as a spice as well.

Probably garlic

im not the cook of the family and failing at flavoring is my main failing so I asked my wife and she says onion powder or minced onion with garlic not far behind.

Coriander, is my favorite, though I like cumin too. Paprika (Against what seems to be popular I don't care for the smoked stuff just plain), and I also love cardamom! I add a bit to every sweet I make just about. I really like getting a nice good quality chocolate bar and chopping it for chocolate chip cookies. Cardamom goes really well in these cookies imo. Love it

I also have hatch green chili pepper, aleppo pepper, oregano I grow myself and I use it a lot.

Cayenne pepper, and a lot of it. Curry is next

I don't know exactly what counts as spice ? I use a bit of shoyu (japanese name of fermented soy sauce) for broths and the like. Beer yeast for salads. A selection of chilis from Mada or Sénégal for some pleasant hotness. Curcuma grows everywhere around here so it's also a staple. Same for ginger, and the wild variant "tsingiziou masera" -although I have been buying east african ginger recently because it's cheaper.
Green pepper seeds from northern Mada, they're not hot at all, just pleasantly crunchy and savoury.
When I get nostalgic of Provence I cook with garlic, olive oil and parsley (for seafood) or I use the wild basel that grows here during kashikazi (rainy season) : small leaves, strong taste, a little different from the mediterranean species.

Coriander in every dish along with salt and pepper. People just don't realize how much it adds to food. Garlic and onion powder in 95% of the dishes

Smoked paprika, I have both spicy and sweet. Spicy goes so well with hash browns and baked potatoes

Not counting sugar? garlic powder or Cinnamon and vanilla. I use garlic powder to go with salt and pepper in a 7:2:1 ratio as like a base for everything from tuna salad to bean burritos. Thrice a week I make overnight oats with Vanilla extract and cinnamon.

Note my favorite is smoked paprika, I just know fewer recipes and synergistic flavors.

Cumin, thyme and garlic powder for me.

I find myself using more bullion lately. I also have been using a dry smoke seasoning for when I want a more grilled flavor without the grill.

Khmeli Suneli (Georgian spice mix, perfect for meat seasoning)

Chili powder because larger amounts are used at a time. Then smoked paprika, cumin, oregano, cayenne are my goto spices. I buy them in bulk.