All Ingredients

Triticale is a wheat-rye cross that's higher in protein than either of its parents. It has a pleasant enough wheat-like flavor, but it's prized mostly for its hardiness and ability to grow in poor soils.

Triticale berries are similar to wheat berries, though they also have a subtle rye flavor.

You can use these like rolled oats to make a hot breakfast cereal. They cook up in about 15 minutes.

A Ligurian specialty, these are small, twisted bits of pasta. They're often served with pesto.

These firm, white-fleshed yams are widely used in tropical countries. They're somewhat bland and dry, so they're often served with spicy sauces.

This German heirloom bean is relatively sweet. It's especially good in soups and casseroles

These are great for making hors d'oeuvres.

This is a secret ingredient of many chefs, who use it to impart the earthy taste and aroma of truffles to their dishes. There are two varieties: the mild white truffle oil and the more pungent black truffle oil. Both are delicious sprinkled on pasta, but the black truffle oil is better suited to meats and heavy sauces while the white is the best choice for fish dishes, cream sauces, and vinaigrettes. If you're cooking with it, add it at the very end to prevent the flavor from dissipating. Truffle oil is expensive, but a little goes a long way.

This is an egg pasta that's flavored with truffles. It's normally served with a cheese sauce.

Truffles are one of the most expensive of the fungi (technically, they're not mushrooms), but they're packed with flavor. You can grate raw truffles into salads, or chop and sauté them and use them to flavor sauces. Their flavor is complex, so truffles work best in delicately flavored dishes like cream sauces. Truffles are highly perishable, so you should plan to use them within a few days after buying them. To preserve them, add slices of them to bourbon, then use the bourbon and truffle pieces to flavor sauces. Fresh truffles are often sold in containers filled with rice. Don't throw out the rice--it was put there to absorb some of the truffle's exquisite flavor.

This is a tasty, meaty mushroom.

This liqueur is flavored with vanilla and citrus.

These small pasta tubes work well in minestrone and other Italian soups. It's also one of the shapes used to make Spaghetti-Os.

This is a tiny version of tubetti ("little tubes"), a short, tubular Italian pasta shape. It's usually served in broths and light soups. It's also one of the shapes used to make Spaghetti-Os.

Tucapi is a yellow sauce extracted from manioc roots. It is used with rice and various meats like duck, fish and shrimp.

This large, tubular pasta is often stuffed and baked. It also goes well with hearty sauces.

Unopened canned tuna can be stored for up to a year in a dry, cool place. Once opened, it will keep for up to two days if you wrap it well and refrigerate it. Varieties include albacore, bluefin, blackfin, bonito, skipjack = aku, kawakawa, and the leaner yellowfin = bigeye = ahi.

This is a salty bean paste used in Vietnamese cuisine.

This squash has a gorgeous rind, but ho-hum flavor. It makes a good centerpiece, or you can hollow it out and use it as a spectacular soup tureen.

Turbot is an outstanding fish, but somewhat expensive.

Markets often sell whole turkeys at bargain prices during the holidays, using them as loss leaders. It's a good idea to stock up on them then, since you can keep them in the freezer for up to a year and serve your family this cheap, lean meat year-round. If you're planning to roast a whole turkey, choose a young turkey. Older birds (including yearlings) aren't as tender and are best cooked in a stew or soup. When selecting your turkey, make sure that the plastic wrapping isn't torn. There's no big difference between males (toms) and females (hens). Experienced cooks like fresh birds (since they're moister) that are between ten and twelve pounds. Bigger ones are tricky to cook without drying them out. Frozen turkeys should be thawed in the refrigerator, allowing one day of thawing per five pounds of bird. If you're short of time, you can thaw a turkey by leaving it in its original plastic wrapper and covering it completely with cold water, changing the water every 30 minutes. Allow 30 minutes of thawing time per pound of bird if you use this method. Fresh turkeys should be used within two days of purchase. Cut-up turkeys are also available. The major cuts are the turkey breast, tenderloin, cutlet, drumstick, and thigh.

Different brands of turkey bacon have wildly different amounts of fat, but most have much less fat than ordinary bacon. The flavor suffers a bit, though.

This has less fat and sodium than beef jerky.

These are long, green, and hot chili peppers. Turks like to grill them and serve them with meat. Don't confuse this fresh pepper with the spice called Turkish pepper.

Turmeric has a pungent flavor, but it's more widely known for it's brilliant yellow color. You can find fresh roots in Southeast Asian and Indian markets, but dried ground turmeric is far more commonly used. Be careful when handling fresh turmeric--it can stain your hands and clothes.

These are used in Indian and Southeast Asian dishes. There are no acceptable substitutes, just omit this from the recipe

Turmeric has a pleasant enough flavor, but it's prized more for the brilliant yellow color it imparts to whatever it's cooked with. It's a standard ingredient in curry powders, pickles, and prepared mustards. Be careful--turmeric can stain your clothes.

Turnips can be roasted, boiled, steamed, or stir-fried. Select small turnips that feel heavy for their size.

A staple of Southern cuisine, turnips greens are traditionally served with salt pork or ham hocks. The leaves are pungent and slightly bitter, especially older ones, but they become milder when cooked. Don't prepare them with aluminum cookware, as it will affect their flavor and appearance.

Turtle meat is very flavorful though it's somewhat chewy. It often goes into soups.

Tvorog is a Russian version of cottage cheese. It is a cow's milk curd product.

This mild Danish cow's milk cheese is great on sandwiches.

This milk Israeli cheese was produced originally from sheep's milk. But now may also be made from cow's milk, goat's milk or water buffalo milk.

Look for these in African markets.

These slippery Japanese wheat noodles are popular in southern Japan, where they're often served in soups or stews. They're roughly as thick as spaghetti, but they come in different widths. Dried udon noodles are available in Asian markets and health food stores. Cook them for about 11 minutes. Fresh udon noodles are called nama udon, and should be cooked for about 2 to 3 minutes.

This grapefruit-mandarin cross looks like a grapefruit in an ill-fitting suit. It's sweet and juicy, though, and simple to eat since the peel comes off easily and the fruit pulls apart into tidy segments that are virtually seedless. Americans pronounce the name "ugly," but in Jamaica, where it's grown, it's pronounced "HOO-glee." Some marketers have tried calling it "Uniq fruit®," but the name hasn't caught on much. Ugli fruit are available from December through April. Most specimens are much uglier than the one pictured here, but don't let that deter you. Select fruits that are heavy for their size, and that give a little when you press them.

This Japanese vinegar is quite salty, and it has a distinctive, slightly fruity flavor. It's typically used in dips and salad dressings.

These are used for making sprouts.