What Pierce Abernathy Can’t Cook Without

These are really similar to guindilla peppers, so if you’ve had any Basque food at all, those are the ones in a gilda. Also, I’m Armenian and cook a lot of Armenian food, and these are similar to some pickled peppers we have — not as spicy, so a little more tolerable for everyone’s palate. They have a nice punchiness to them. I enjoy making a martini with them. They’re a beautiful garnish. Or you can chop them up and put them in a bean salad or a grain salad. I also like to add them to an herby green sauce because the liquid is not only salted, it’s a bit acidic, too, almost like preserved lemon liquid. So it can be this perfect seasoning element, and you’re kind of getting two products in one.

Mustard is my favorite condiment in the universe. I will eat it by the spoonful. Edmond Fallot has the best mustard, I think. I always have their plain Dijon stocked to make salad dressings, but they also make a few different varieties that are unique and really killer. Tarragon is an herb that is quite hard to find at the grocery store, or even at the farmers’ market, so having something with that flavor infused is great. I also really love thegreen peppercorn. Green peppercorns have this spiciness, but they’re also floral. I use these mustards for so many different sauces, vinaigrettes, and marinades as well.

For a while, it was difficult for me to find good dried gigante beans. A lot of times when you see them, they’re pickled or preserved at the olive bar. I wanted to be able to cook them from scratch. I think their size is just so great. They’re delicate and creamy and a little bit nutty. It’s a very approachable bean. SIMPLi is focused on regenerative farming, which I love. And every time I’ve made these, they really don’t need much — a little soaking and a low and slow cook.

This is a larger pearled couscous. I think it’s so delicious. It has this nuttiness that’s pretty mild. It takes about ten minutes to cook on the stove, so on a hot summer day when I want a grain salad, I always go to this. It’s highly versatile in terms of what you can put in it. Sometimes I treat it like a salad and add a bunch of greens and herbs. Sometimes I’ll slow-roast a tomato sauce and incorporate it in there. If you cook it al dente, it has a really nice bite to it. And then if you want something softer, you can kind of stew it, and that’s really comforting. It can be really ambidextrous.

I love tinned anything, and I love tinned seafood specifically. Some long time ago I read, I think, Anthony Bourdain’s book, and it said don’t eat mussels except the day they’re delivered at restaurants. So I never really cook a lot of mussels myself. These tinned ones are smoked, and they’re just kind of insane. I just made a sauce with them where I blended the entire tin with a little aïoli, served that with some thinly sliced beets, and it was unreal. When I’m feeling lazy and want a quick weeknight meal, I’ll make a pasta and throw these in. I sauté a little shallot, a little garlic, add in a green, and it’s everything I want.

I was just introduced to this yogurt last year because it started popping up at my local grocery store. It’s Armenian yogurt, a small family business based in Pennsylvania. Their branding is amazing. It says all their cows have names. It’s not Greek yogurt; it’s a little thinner. The texture is just exactly what I want. I eat yogurt for breakfast most days, but it also works in so many savory applications. I make yogurt sauces, and I like adding a spoonful at the end of a soup.

This is kind of like a cousin of pomegranate molasses. I love dates, and when I first started using this a couple of years ago, I wasn’t sure how it was going to taste in comparison. It’s not really tangy or acidic at all. It’s more like a date caramel. It’s fantastic in banana bread. It works as a sugar replacement in a lot of baking recipes. A little date molasses mixed into a compound butter on toast is unreal. I’ll make a simple olive-oil cake and just drizzle this on top. It’s also very, very good in a coffee drink. I’ve put it in some salad dressings, which I really like too. A marinade would crush.

Dashi Okumeopened in Greenpoint a few years ago. Their dashi is super high quality. The sachet packets it comes in are just so nice and make it really simple to use. It’s such a foundational broth to me, as someone who cooks a lot of veggies and makes a lot of veggie soups. I don’t really use chicken stock. So to build this rich base of things like seaweed and mushrooms is just so nice. You can alsobuild your own dashi, like a choose-your-own adventure, and they have some pretty specialty stuff.

The founder of SOS Chefs is the sweetest lady ever. If you walk in there, she will immediately treat you like a son or daughter and tell you to try different things. You can tell how excited she is about the products she works with and how she sources everything. I’ve been on an especially big coriander kick lately. For so long, I never really let it shine on its own. Anytime I would use cumin, I would use coriander, and they would kind of meld together. Don’t get me wrong — I love that base. But coriander seeds are insane. They almost pop in your mouth. They seem really hard and firm, but you don’t actually need to grind them if you cook them a bit. They soften, and I love biting into them. They have such a distinct punchiness. You can also use a mortar and pestle and crack them just a bit.

I love this olive-oil company. I’ve worked with them in the past. I met them through the stuff I do on social media, so they sent me some bottles, and they were kind of the people that initially got me thinking more critically about olive oil. I think it can be a very passive thing for people who cook a lot. But this one is so fresh and so floral. Olive oils can be super spicy, but this one is not. I’ll garnish any dish with it. As someone who makes a lot of dips, it’s the perfect olive oil to top dips with.