The main issue with C is incorrect comparison. Cooking with spices seems to be compared with taking spices for medicinal use. This is incorrect. There are many other things also that are wrong, but this would be my POE to rule this option out in under 5 secs.
When you see like/unlike, first check if there are comparison issues. In under 10 seconds you could eliminate A, B , C. Only D and E remain. E goes our for 2 reasons –
 1 -> ‘D’ conveys the correct meaning in fewer words
 2 -> ‘Usage of spices’ is incorrectly compared to ‘spices’. This also falls in line with the primary line of elimination.
There is no need to go into gerunds here. To answer your question, I dont think ‘cooking with spices’ is a gerund. Hence, use of like/unlike is incorrect.

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Aah! Here ‘attending’ is the noun (gerund). Guests is not part of the subject.

I very much doubt ‘attending guests’ is singular. Could you share where this information is provided?

A goes out because of ‘that of’. There is nothing that ‘that’ refers to. If we are not sure what ‘that’ refers to, we cannot be sure of what is compared. Pronoun ambiguity should be the reason to eliminate A&B.

This question has been answered multiple times before. Type ‘Marconi’ on the search bar and you should be able to get an answer. If not, update the latest ‘earlier’ thread.

Adding ‘that’ is not necessary. There is no tense change here, hence rules of ellipsis can be applied. If the second part is ‘will provide ideal conditions over the next year’, I think a ‘that’ may be necessary. Sai any pointers?

@Deepak – I dont think that is completely true. I think rules of ellipsis needs to be applied. If the tense across and changes, the subject (or a pronoun) may have to be repeated.

Could you add an example where the subject is repeated. Will help explain better.

Request – Please post complete question here. Do not add in urls. If the content at the linked location changes, this question becomes useless for anyone else who would like to know more.

The question talks about comparing economic concerns of women with those of men. Option A does not comparison whats over. It states something that is obviously decipherable from the passage, but does not answer the question at hand. Option C on the other hand does both. It introduces a comparison and can also be inferred from the passage.
“en’s commercial
interests and credit networks (30) became increasingly far-flung,
owing in part to the ability of creditors to buy and sell promissory
notes (legal promises to pay debts). At the same time,
(35) women’s networks of credit and debt remained primarily local and
personal. Dayton contends that, although still performing crucial
economic services in their (40) communities—services that
contributed to the commercialization of the colonial economy—women
remained for the most part outside the new economic and legal culture
of the eighteenth century.” These lines help in inferring the information.