Things My Kitchen Is Never Without

Ok, maybe not never. But some basic things I attempt to always have on hand:

• olive oil
• butter
• salt/pepper/some kind of spice
• hot sauce
• wine (even, or especially, cheap-o cooking wine) 
• canned tomatoes
• rice, lentils, pasta, etc-- whatever your favorite starches happen to be
• onion
• green pepper (my favorite veggie. I put it in almost everything. Substitute other stuff at will) 
• milk
• chicken broth, or boullion 

With just this stuff, or not even all of it, I can feed myself (not that well, but still) for almost a week. See, for example, finals week. 

I also love to keep these "luxuries" on hand:

• frozen dumplings
• jars of pasta sauce
• frozen stir-fry veggies
• jiffy mix-- both cornbread and blueberry. great for impressing someone with 'homemade' muffins or cornbread in under 30 minutes. 
• cheese, tortillas and salsa-- the perfect microwave quesadilla lunch in 30 seconds
• frozen meat, meatballs, etc
• different kinds of hot sauce (at last count, i had 4 or 5 kinds of bottled hot sauce...)