A nutritionist and cookbook author shares the 4 flavor boosters she uses to make healthy dishes shine

A balanced plate of food consists of carbs, healthy fats, protein, and fiber, but to Sophie Gastman, this formula is missing one key nutrient: Vitamin P (pleasure).

"I'm a big advocate of making food taste nice, and then the healthy part follows," Gastman, 28, a registered nutritionist dedicated to debunking nutrition misinformation myths, told Business Insider.

After spending years trapped in cycles of food restriction and following diet "rules" as a teenager, Gastman believes life is too short to eat food you don't enjoy. " Ultimately, if your diet isn't something that you enjoy, then it's not healthy," she said.

She thinks about adding protein, fiber, and a variety of plants to dishes — and doesn't overdo it on ultra-processed foods — but emphasizes that nutrition is just one element of food. "If something doesn't taste good, I don't want to eat it," Gastman, the author of "Find Your Healthy," said.

To make her meals taste good, Gastman leans on the flavor boosters that she always has in her kitchen. "I always have a lot of jars of various things like chili oils and various kind of saucey things," she said.

She shared her four favorite flavor boosters.

Chili oil

"I've got about 15 million different chili oils," Gastman joked.

She has two favorites. The first is Lao Gan Ma Spicy Chili Crisp, an umami Chinese chili oil containing dried chili, crispy fried onions, fermented soybeans, and Sichuan peppercorns. She likes to use it on dumplings, eggs, noodles, fried rice, soups, and avocado toast.

The second is White Mausu Peanut Rayu, a crispy chili oil with peanuts and sesame. "This one's brilliant if you want something a bit nuttier and less spicy," she said. It goes well with spooned over greens, eggs, and noodle dishes, she said.

Pickled anything

Gastman keeps her fridge stocked with different types of pickles to add acidity and saltiness to her food. "They can completely transform a dish," she said.

She likes adding pickled cucumbers to sandwiches, burgers, and potato salad for a bit of crunch, and has a dill pickle hummus recipe in her cookbook, which calls for pickle brine in the hummus itself and chopped pickles on top.

Pickled onions make an "amazing garnish" on salads, tacos, or with avocado and eggs on toast, she said, and olives are delicious stirred through Mediterranean-style dishes like pastas and traybakes.

She also makes good use of capers, often chopping them finely into salad dressings, stirring them through potato salad or pasta dishes, or pairing them with smoked salmon and cream cheese.

Pickled jalapeños and anchar, a type of South Asian pickle, are staples for Gastman too.

Herbs and spices

Gastman loves to add herbs to all sorts of dishes. Not only do they add flavor, she said, but they also help her eat a wider variety of plant foods a week, which is understood to boost gut health.

Her two most-used herbs are cilantro and parsley. "I add them to everything from curries to salads," she said. She also loves Thai basil in a stir-fry or noodle dish as it adds a really fragrant, almost licorice-like flavor.

She also uses spices to zhuzh up a dish in seconds. She "constantly" uses cumin in curries and on roasted vegetables for an earthy, warm flavor.

She thinks smoked paprika is brilliant for adding depth and a smoky flavor to traybakes, beans, stews, or roasted potatoes. And cinnamon is more versatile than people think, she said, "I use it in porridge and baking, but also in savory dishes like tagines, chilis, and slow-cooked stews."

Anchovies

Anchovies, the salty, tiny preserved kind, put a lot of people off because they associate them with a strong fishy flavor, Gastman said, but when cooked, "the flavor melts into the background, leaving your dish with a new level of depth and umami that tastes like it's been cooked for hours."

Gastman uses them mainly in pasta sauces and salad dressings, and thinks people are sleeping on them.