Copycat seasoning blends from the fast food chains

Dry rubs, spice blends and seasoned salts: the jar in the cupboard that makes five other recipes taste right. These are the highest return on effort on the whole site. Ten minutes of weighing gets you something that keeps for months and replaces a product sold at a considerable markup.

Two things separate a chain blend from a supermarket one, and neither is exotic. The first is the ratio of salt to everything else, which is usually far higher than a home cook expects. The second is that the spices are fresh, and that blooming them in fat wakes up what is left: ground spice loses most of its aroma within a year of grinding, and a supermarket jar is rarely that new.