Trader Joe's Crunchy Chili Onion, 170g

Similar to the jars of chili oil with crunchy garlic you can find on the table of many Chinese restaurants, the genius of Chili Onion Crunch is in its simplicity: with just a handful of simple ingredients, it creates a remarkably deep flavour profile that manages to accentuate the flavours of anything else it’s placed on. The crispy, crunchy, dried garlic and onion creates a delightfully bold, verging-on-umami base, while dried red bell pepper and chili flakes build onto that with complementary smoky, slightly sweet, subtly spicy notes. Most importantly, however, is the olive oil, which not only binds the other ingredients together, but becomes infused with a balanced blend of all the other flavours, combining them all into one superbly savoury seasoning.

Which brings us to its application: we happily contend that Chili Onion Crunch truly does taste great on everything. Pizzas, burgers, burritos, hummus – anything and everything that you’d add hot sauce, steak sauce, or even just salt and pepper to, will benefit greatly from Chili Onion Crunch. Seriously: hot dogs, pasta, omelettes, chow mein – we really could keep going. We haven’t tried it on ice cream yet, but we’re certainly not ruling it out.