/ck/ - Food & Cooking

>>13039935
TLDR

>>13040020
Can't cook.
Want to cook.
Where and how should I learn how to cook?

I am a fan of Alton Brown but he can go a bit overboard, Chef John at FoodWishes does a lot of straight forward recipes with minimal bullshit.

Many people here first learned from Alton Brown. I don't think Good Eats is still available on YT, but it's worth torrenting. His first book - I'm just here for the food - would be my honest recommendation for a basic starting point. It explains the fundamentals of basic cooking techniques and then has a handful of really accessible recipes using each technique, and the recipes are all on point. But seriously, just put the show on in the background and it will make cooking seem so simple yet appealing you'll be going out the next day to buy tools and ingredients to make something. Once you have some basic shit down you can google recipes for foods you're interested in and try things out - but don't start with that if you're completely clueless; recipes assume you already know what to do with them without spelling out every little step. Also, thank you for not posting in the cat blog.

>>13040194
Sorry to disappoint but I already posted in the cat blog before making this thread because I assumed it to be a QTDDTOT, they were somewhat helpful and told me to make this thread in the first place.
Thank you for the suggestions, that's a pretty large chunk of media, I added it to my big list of stuff to look up tomorrow.

>>13039935
Check out the vids of that guy who has had a couple strokes and can only use 1 arm now. Also the parkinsons disease lady who violently flails around. That's basically /ck/.

>>13040222
Jack isn't /ck/ and CP grill is my wife so back the fuck off.
>>13040215
I told you to make your own thread because the cat blog is a cancerous circle jerk that parades itself as the "real cooking thread".

>convinces OP to make his own thread
>half the thread is bitching about the cat blog
Jesus fucking Christ you are cancerous

>>13040295
>ahem
Two posts.
Please don't derail.

>>13039935
>>13040024
cook
start with simple dishes
eat your food unless it's complete shit
remember what was bad/you didnt like and improve next time you cook
once you get a hang od simple recipes try minor experimenting, mix in additional spices or/and ingredients
you can move to more complicated shit once you're comfortable with your skills

>>13040295
>half the thread

I literally don't even know what a cat blog is

oh look its that catblogger necrobumping a thread

/ck/ doesn't cook. They eat fast food or make fast food. If you want mediocre pizza, Burger's, tacos and fries you've come to the right place.

>>13042064
>necrobumping
>>13042087
I do

why are catfags so disgusting?

>>13040024
>where and how
In the kitchen, by cooking

>>13039935
here's one mega tip, slice and dice onions (this is VERY important), fry them, prefferably with olive oil, some chefs argue that it's even better to fry them without oil at all, you can try that. Very important to NOT burn them, when they burn they become black and give a very shitty taste to your food. So that right there, just fried onions is the base for plenty of the dishes, just add boiled rice (dried first, off course), and some garlic (before you add the rice), and you got a very basic but still good dish, you can add just ham, dicec black olives, carrot, etc. Tomato sauce is done with canned tomato sauce with some rice and beef if you want. Most food tastes much better if you just fry some onions first. They should look like pic related. To achieve this you just have to shake it now and then to avoid it sticking to the frying pan and burning.

>>13039935
Look into a book called the Food Lab by someone with Kenji the name.

just think of the food you like and work on it until you perfect it
use unprocessed ingredients and lots of salt
if you like eggs they're a good, cheap versatile food to practice on

>>13042245
That book is very narrow and mostly useless.

This might sound stupid, but I'd say for the first few times by some canned or frozen items. For example, make enchiladas. Depending how you'll want to go, you'll need the meat, sauce, probably some sort of cheese, and tortillas. Usually the most you have to do is cook the meat, or burn it in the oven, and if you screw that part up it will be easy to figure out. If it goes well, try to spice it up. Maybe dice some onions and throw them in their. Maybe try your own spices. Then try to make your own sauce. This will also help show the difference in food quality and tastes with what you use.
Could also try making a simple soup. I'd say it's hard to screw up chicken noodle soup unless you forget about it.

https://youtu.be/CGSyzk-HRm4


This was made for you.

>>13039935

>>13040239
>Jack isn't /ck/
the fuck did you just say?

>>13039935
Pepin's complete techniques

>>13039935
from what you're saying you're still living with your mother
I don't see any reason you can't spend some time with her and learn the basics a bit better, even if she's not a particularly good cook she still has more than 10 years experience

basics for general cookery are
>you don't need to learn complicated processes to make good food
>10 on the burner is for boiling only
>6 or 7 on the burner if you don't want to burn things
>400+ in the oven dries things out and only really cooks the surface
>325-375 is for baking most things slow
>don't even attempt bread until you've mastered the potato
>grilling or cooking meat is not impressive no matter what your dad says but just let him believe in himself
>nearly anything that tastes bland is missing salt
>if you're trying something new and don't have full confidence, google recipes and make comparisons to what you're doing

>>13039935
cooking is mostly trial and error.

follow some simple recipes and swap out ingredients/seasoning as you get more comfortable

its mostly learning about what works and what doesnt.

having the necessary hardware helps but you dont need fancy stuff to make a good meal.

>>13040239
You just can’t help but post constantly about the thread you don’t like, huh?

Good for you anon. This explains the different cooking methods: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=l2Om8L3diTQC&lpg=PP1&pg=PA8#v=onepage
The absolute core is applying enough heat for long enough that food cooks through to the middle, usually getting it extra hot at some point to brown it, and balancing that with making sure it's not overcooked. As they start out, most people overshoot and underbrown out of caution, so the first hurdle is getting used to your stove and how fast different heats work. Remember that food can't brown if there's water in the pan, but on the flip side you can throw a splash of water in to pause something that's browning too fast.

Salt Fat Acid Heat for explaining the basics that you'd eventually get by intuition if you don't mind slogging through a bunch of waxing nostalgic about childhood. The clue is in the title though, most people don't put enough of those things into their food.
On Food and Cooking if you want to get excessively into the actual chemistry behind the processes. It's not a "learning to cook" book at all, but you might be interested in the science.
For actual food prep techniques, youtube is honestly the best, just search for "how to prep x" and pick a short one.
These recipes are usually from reliable chefs: bbc.co.uk/food
Generally avoid recipe gathering sites where they let any moron submit stuff though, search for the particular cuisine to find someone's site that's concentrating on what they actually know.
Preheating is usually important, caramelised onion timings are usually bullshit.

>>13042548
cope

>>13039935
Maybe try basics with babish. He also has a book

This college put a bunch of videos from their culinary course up online if you want to watch a severely depressed instructor explain food prep: https://www.youtube.com/user/UCCCulinaryArts/videos?disable_polymer=1

OP here, I just cooked an omelette for the first time, no image because I was too focused on eating it to take a picture.
I put too much oil in the pan, overcooked it hardcore and put too much ham and too little cheese on it.
But it tasted alright and I didn't horribly disfigure myself so now I know what to do better next time.
Thanks to everyone who posted all the good advice and links to various media overnight, I'm cataloging it right now to check out down the line.

Practice your knife skills

>>13039935
It's all about the four T's:
>temperature (How hot?)
>timing (When do I add what?)
>time (How long?)
>taste (What do I add?)

rules of thumb:
>"Hard" vegetables need more heat for longer than "soft" vegetables.
>Meat usually goes in first (apart from fat/oil)
>spices/herbs usually go in last
>Start with high temperatures, end with low ones
>Too much liquid? Just wait. Too little liquid? Add water. (unless the recipe requires some other liquid)
>The thicker the sauce, the more stirring is required to prevent burning.
>Mastering browning is half the sauce.
>Play with spices. Read up on spice combinations of different cuisines.
>Fat softens spices.
>Overcooked is better than undercooked.
>Keep it simple.

>>13042978
omelette is a good dish, try making it with nothing next time, plain omelette, next try fried eggs, first you fry the bacon with no oil, it will let off some grease and oil, you'll use that grease and oil to cook the eggs, maybe add a bit more oil to it if it isn't enough. You need enough oil to cover at least part of the egg and enough so you can grabb it with a spoon or even fork and drop it over the yellow thingy to cook it till it's pink (or not so much if you like it less done). That's a good second dish, make sure to watch some tutorial first so you get the general idea. Also yeah, you can retire the bacon once it's cooked to make more room for the egg.

>>13042990
>Overcooked is better than undercooked.
But you can fix an undercooked thing?

>>13039935
>>13040024
just cook
look up a recipe and follow it
look up youtube videos (food wishes is good) and follow them
1 year ago i was scared of cooking a chicken breast in a pan because i wouldnt know if/when it was cooked right
last week i made chicken parmigiana with a side of confit byaldi

>>13043003
Yeah, but eating something undercooked is a pain in the ass (and sometimes even dangerous), overcooked usually just means it's somewhat too soft (vegetables) or dry (meat).

>>13042990
Real good post, I had to learn all this on my own, would have been a good thing to read years ago.

>>13043013
>chicken parmigiana with a side of confit byaldi
sounds delizioso anon

>>13042990
Few more rules of thumb I forgot:
>Too little salt is a nuisance, too much is a catastrophe.
>The higher the temperature, the more attention must be on the pot.
>The less liquid, the more attention must be on the pot.
>If you have to leave the kitchen: 1. Lower the temperature 2.Put the lid on the pot. 3. If there is no/little liquid in the pot, remove the pot from the hot plate alltogether.
>A recipe is not a law, but if you deviate,you suffer the consequences.
>Add one spice, stir, taste.
>Always think one step ahead. Prepare your ingredients.

>>13043087
Another, if you let it cook for long time it generally tastes better, that's at least how it goes with my sauces, just dice onions, fry them, add brick tomato sauce, cook it, the longer you coock it the sweeter it tastes

>>13042990
Clarification:
The rule "Spices go in last" only applies to spices that stay IN the food. Spices that get removed (bay leaves etc.) go in with the liquid.

>>13043114
True. Letting a meal sit overnight is sometimes the difference between a good and a great meal.

>>13043127
I once was eating at the house of my exgf's parents, the meal was raging delicious, I asked for the ingredients "pepper, onions, and garlic", literally what I always use almost for everything, but the thing is she let that sit there making bubbles for literal hours, in a crock pot, now that makes the meal

Bump

>>13040024
Life of Boris is good for simple and cheap cooking. James Townsend is good for simple to fancy afairs with all levels of cooking.

>>13042464
>10 on the burner is for boiling only
[rages in chinese]

>>13044566
sorry chang but tossing and stirring around on max heat is not the same as leaving it on max heat