Dec 9, 20249 min read

Asian Pantry Essentials

Oftentimes I find myself sharing recipes with friends and family only to find that nobody can make my recipes, because not everyone has a pantry stocked with every ingredient you could ever need to cook food from around the world. Maybe that is a bit of an exaggeration, but I am definitely proud of the collection of spices, sauces, and pastes I have built up over the past couple of years! You do not need every ingredient under the sun to make good food though... with just a few key ingredients I find that I can at least somewhat replicate many of the most popular dishes from specific regions in the world. In this post, I will go over how I would stock up my pantry from scratch with essential Asian ingredients.

South Asian Ingredients

This is my area of expertise as somebody who grew up in a South Asian household and spent half of my life in South Asia. I previously did a post on South Asian spices that you can refer to here if you want to go more into depth on this topic.

South Asian Aromatics / Herbs

Aromatics are a key basis for many savory dishes and something that you should always try to keep stocked up in your refrigerator. In South Asian cooking, the key aromatics are garlic, ginger, and chilies. Typically, garlic and ginger are crushed together in a mortar and pestle to form a ginger garlic paste, while chilies may be sliced and/or added whole. My family adds this as a base to any dishes that contain meat because it is thought that this removes the "meaty" aroma. On the other hand, this base of aromatics is not necessarily added to vegetarian dishes in my family. The most frequently used herb is undoubtedly cilantro / coriander, which is used to top many dishes and while cooking. When using cilantro, make sure to use the stalks too because they have the best flavor! Fresh mint is also very common, in fact it is an essential ingredient in my family's biryani recipe!

South Asian Spices

You can find more information on this topic here, but to summarize the following are some key spices you are going to want to have in your spice cabinet:

Black pepper powder
Black peppercorns
Spicy red chili powder
Mild / Kashmiri red chili power
Turmeric
Cumin powder
Cumin seeds
Coriander powder
Coriander seeds
Curry leaves
Cardamom
Garam masala
Cloves
Cinnamon bark

There are of course many other spices you may need when cooking South Asian food, as we are known for our spices, but I would say these are the key spices you should always try to have on hand. Additionally, if you want to prepare a specific dish and are missing some key spices, you can purchase Shan or National spice mixes for common dishes. These are quite common in the South Asian community and are generally pretty good in a pinch.

South Asian Sauces, Vinegars, Pastes and Oils

While these aren't necessarily sauces, two key canned ingredients you are going to want to have is crushed tomato and coconut milk. Crushed tomato is used in many South Asian dishes, including most Pakistani / North Indian dishes that are in the form of a "curry" or stew. This is largely what creates the thick liquid base of such dishes. Coconut milk is used in a similar way, especially in South India.

For oils, the only ingredient I would really recommend is ghee which is South Asian clarified butter. Since the butter is clarified, it has a high enough smoke point to cook with and also gives great flavor and aroma when added on top of dishes. Otherwise, you may also want mustard oil but this is something that I don't always have because I am not the biggest fan of the aroma. It is also not something my family uses as much because it is more popular in parts of India compared to where I am from in Pakistan.

Something that I would also buy which most people outside of Asia probably do not know about is Rooh Afza (a sort of fruity rose flavored syrup) and cardamom syrup. These are great syrups for making simple but delicious desserts, even just adding these syrups to milk can make for a great dessert drink!

East Asian Ingredients

After South Asian food, East Asian inspired food is probably what I cook the most. It is quite different from South Asian cooking though because there is a much more substantial use of sauces, pastes and oils compared to spices. In fact, I have actually found that less is usually more when it comes to adding spices to a lot of East Asian dishes because the pastes and sauces are already so flavorful!

East Asian Aromatics / Herbs

Two out of the three most common aromatics I see in East Asian cooking are the same as in South Asian cooking and that is ginger and garlic. These are incredibly common and I find that garlic especially is often used in generous quantities in Chinese food. For chilies, I typically have both Chinese dried chilies and fresh chilies (the same ones I use for South Asian cooking) stocked up. Additionally, green onions are an essential aromatic that can be used when adding aromatics to your pan for a dish, in broths, or for topping dishes.

East Asian Spices

East Asian spices has some overlap with South Asian spices, so I will just include spices that I didn't mention in the South Asian section.

Star anise
Sichuan peppercorns
Black cardamom
Sesame seeds
Gochugaru
MSG
Chinese 5 spice
Japanese 7 spice

For those of you reading this that may have unfavorable opinions on MSG I definitely recommend that you reconsider, this is an excellent ingredient for adding umami to dishes with no scientifically determined adverse side effects. The last two additions to this list can also be considered optional, especially Japanese 7 spice, but I think that they are nice to have.

East Asian Sauces, Vinegars, Pastes and Oils

This is where East Asian cuisine really shines. Starting off with sauces, soy sauce is incredibly common in East Asian cooking. There are many different types of soy sauce but I would say the most essential are light/regular soy sauce and dark soy sauce. This is what I have using in all of my East Asian cooking but I really want to try ganjang (Korean soy sauce) as well because I hear it is quite different from light/regular soy sauce so that is on my bucket list. An additional sauce that is nice to have is oyster sauce, which can be used while cooking or to top food.

Rice vinegar is a nice vinegar to have on hand and has a much more pleasant aroma than regular white vinegar. Shaoxing wine and mirin are other liquids (alcohol-based) that are essential ingredients to have in Chinese and Japanese cooking. For those that don't consume alcohol, you don't have to worry because the alcohol is boiled off in the cooking process when preparing dishes that use these ingredients, resulting in an alcohol content that would be similar to vinegar.

Pastes were probably the most influential discovery I had when starting to cook East Asian food and can easily add an incredible depth of flavor. The four main pastes you need to have are black bean paste, red chili paste, miso paste, and sesame paste. Different countries have slightly different versions of these pastes so I usually buy what is most available to me which is generally the following.

Chunjang or Lee Kum Kee brand Black Bean Garlic Sauce for black bean paste
Gochujang for red chili paste
White miso for miso paste
Tahini for sesame paste

Red miso would also be nice to have but I don't usually have it at home because I find I don't use it nearly as much as white miso.

For oil, I always have some roasted sesame oil and I usually try to make my own chili oil. Both of these are great for adding on top of dishes, especially broth based dishes, for extra flavor and aroma. They can also be used for cooking if you are preparing something at a low temperature. I also want to try peanut oil and perilla oil because they seem to be quite popular in East Asian cooking as well.

Southeast Asian Ingredients

I recently visited four countries in Southeast Asian and was shocked at how much the food in these countries exceeded my expectations. This has inspired me to try and cook Southeast Asian food more so while I don't usually have all of these ingredients on hand these are ingredients that I seek out when I do plan on preparing Southeast Asian food.

Southeast Asian Aromatics / Herbs

While South Asia is known for its spices, and East Asia is known for its sauces/pastes/oils, Southeast Asia is undoubtedly known for their aromatics and herbs! Just like South and East Asian cuisine, using garlic and ginger as aromatics seems to be a common theme throughout Asia. Green onions may also be used similarly to their use in East Asian cuisine and fresh chilies may be used as they are in South Asian cuisine. Additionally, Southeast Asian cuisine has some other interesting aromatics that can be a bit hard to find here in Canada like galangal. Galangal is similar to ginger and turmeric root but with a unique flavor that is hard for me to describe having only tried it raw once. Speaking of turmeric root, it is also used in lots of Southeast Asian recipes and is definitely easier to find in Canada compared to galangal. There is also quite a heavy use of herbs in Southeast Asian cooking, among the most prevalent being Thai basil and perilla. These are often added raw on top of dishes but another herb, lemongrass, is uses during cooking to add a light lemony flavor to dishes. I would also definitely recommend trying kaffir lime leaves and kaffir limes for a more intense citus flavour, both of which are commonly used in Southeast Asians cuisines. Additionally, an influential herb in Southeast Asian desserts is pandan, which has a flavor most similar to vanilla and is also used similarly in Southeast Asia. I recently purchased pandan essence and have successfully used it in desserts, but I am not sure what the best substitute for real pandan is.

Southeast Asian Spices

After going over the South Asian and East Asian spices, I think that it pretty much covers most of the spices you would find in the average Southeast Asian dish! Hopefully a major spice isn't slipping my mind!

Southeast Asian Sauces, Vinegars, Pastes and Oils

There's lots of overlap between this section and the corresponding East Asian section but there were a couple of things that I wanted to mention here that I see more often in Southeast Asian cooking. One is definitely fish sauce, which is used both in cooking and for adding on top of food. Shrimp paste is another seafood product that is often used and and ingredient I highly recommend as I personally prefer the rich umami flavor that shrimp paste adds to stews compared to fish sauce. Another sauce that I must mention is sriracha which originates in Thailad but is massively popular in Canada and the USA. For those who haven't tried sriracha, it is a mildly spicy, slightly sweet and savory sauce that is a great sauce that feels like it can be added to pretty much everything!

Additionally, there are premade pastes for specific Southeast Asian dishes that you can but in stores, usually for "curries" or sometimes soups/stews. I have tried these a couple of times before and generally really enjoy them when I add some of my own spices as well! You can also find spice packets for other dishes but I cannot really give an opinion on these because I have never personally tried them.

Central Asian and Middle Eastern Ingredients

Sadly, I do not have much experience preparing Central Asian food at home. I do make Middle Eastern dishes occasionally, but I think I will save this for another post. Perhaps I will combine the two in a future post, so subscribe to my mailing list and check back on the future for a Central Asian and Middle Eastern ingredients post!