ingredients

An ingredient is something that's used in a recipe or formula to create something else.

When we talk about food, cooking, or even science experiments, the word "ingredient" comes up often. Think about baking a cake - you need sugar, flour, eggs, and milk to make it happen. Those are all ingredients. Similarly, if you're making a favorite soup, those veggies, broth, and spices are your ingredients too. Even in chemistry class, when you mix different substances together to create something new, like a colorful slime, each of the individual parts is an ingredient that's being combined.