Ubiquitous Must Have Item #4

Garlic!

Before you go off on the vampiririsms, the smell, the robin leach/garlique references, think about how awesome garlic is. It's a mainstay in food & pop culture! It also has the potential to be sweet, pungent and spicy.

Sweet garlic a.k.a. roasted garlic is an excellent flavor bumper-upper and pretty easy to DIY. Just take whole cloves of garlic, unpeeled, wrap in foil, and roast in oven for 45-60minutes. Upon removal, just unwrap and you're good to go. Excellent for spreading and just all around sweet garlicky goodness. You can also cut off the tippy top of of a head of garlic, drizzle in olive oil and roast in a small pan (muffin pan/mini ramekin).

Pungent! Okay, not tasting sounding, but so fun to say.

Pungent!

Raw garlic. I once made an Emeril dish that required 40 cloves. I got to 20 something before I quit. The dish was surprisingly good and not overpowered. Raw garlic is also great when grated. If you want to add a lot of flavor to a raw (uncooked) sauce, raw garlic can be very helpful. Grab a zester/microplane and get all pungent with it.

Oily!

I love infusing oil with garlic. Basically, grate or chop garlic and let it gently simmer in the oil. Once the oil lightly bubbles, you have garlic oil. Very easy, very tasty, very---oily. Also, a good swap for butter.

Spicy!

It's a spice, technically. So, garlic can pair up with many spices. Garlic & chili powder. Garlic & nutmeg. Garlic & peppercorn. Garlic & parsley is a really good one. Garlic gets around.