Seasoning with salt and pepper has taken on new meaning in recent years — for professional and home cooks alike. For this we might have a former accountant in California to thank. Traveling the world with a suitcase filled with spices and gadgets, Jing Tio is something of a spice whisperer, introducing chefs, and diners, to new flavors. He turned Wylie Dufresne at New York’s WD-50 on to wild hops, which recently made their debut in a savory pudding, and the pastry chef at Joël Robuchon at the Mansion in Las Vegas now makes ice cream with the herbal coffee substitute teeccino. Hops and teeccino: coming soon to a spice rack near you.

A second-generation Indonesian spice trader and a passionate home cook, Tio, 33, was an accountant and property manager in Southern California until his frustration with the lack of high-end culinary equipment and ingredients led him to sell his cars — all six of them — to open Le Sanctuaire in Santa Monica. The Barneys of cooking stores, it sells everything from Hermès porcelain to Pacojet ice-cream makers, Ferran Adrià’s Texturas-brand agar to $125 cooking chopsticks. Beach-bound Angelenos have been stumped by the boutique’s rarefied offerings since it opened in 2003, but chefs realized that Tio was a kindred spirit, someone who, when asked what he cooks with eucalyptus leaves, shrugs and says, “Usually just a foam.”

Chefs also realized that Tio’s spices were different. His mother supplied him with peppercorns — black, white, red, cubeb, Sichuan, long pepper, four grades of tellicherry — that were still bright and round, not the dusty, desiccated fruits you usually see. “Spices can last maybe two or three years, depending on how well you store them,” Tio says in accented English. “But most of the spice that the consumer gets is already two, three years old.” So he made arrangements with Indonesian spice growers and began selling directly to chefs.

“The spice trade is really tricky,” Tio says with a laugh. “People want the money quick. Sometimes they harvest too fast, and the black pepper’s not dry enough, and mold starts growing. And then they cover it — you know when you cut the battery? The black dust? You don’t wanna know!” Now Tio and his mother have a 50-50 partnership with farmers on Java, Sumatra and Banda islands. Tio also uses sources in India, China and Malaysia, changing suppliers whenever quality dips. He is already on his fourth Sichuan-pepper grower on Sumatra.