HOW TO TEACH YOURSELF TO COOK AT HOME: 07 SKILLS EVERY COOK SHOULD KNOW

Whether you are interested in learning a useful skill or trying to impress your partner or are just tired of eating meals outside your home, all the time, Please, be happy for now is the time to learn how to cook on your own at home. Besides being less expensive than dining out, cooking for yourself allows you to customize each of your dishes while having some fun in the kitchen, Read through as we take you step by step…

07 TIPS ON HOW TO TEACH YOURSELF TO COOK

If you get overwhelmed at the mere thought of turning the oven on, we are here to help. This article gives beginner cooks 07 practical tips for learning to cook at home, along with a few easy recipes to get started. So tie on your apron and get ready to become a master chef. Even top chefs once had to learn the basics of cookery. Good Food brings you the must-know skills that will take you from a nervous novice to a confident cook.

1. Start With the Basics: In the midst of your newfound passion for cooking, you might be tempted to tackle impressive dishes like Fruit and vegetables or baked Alaska. But these dishes are only so impressive because they are quite challenging recipes that you should wait to attempt until you have developed your cooking skills a bit more. Instead, the best way to learn to cook is, to begin with, the basics, such as pasta or tacos.
   
2. Get Into a Routine: Like anything, learning to cook well requires regular practice. If you really want to become a good cook, you have to commit to doing it regularly. Try to prepare all of your dinners on your own for one week to get yourself fully immersed in the kitchen. Simply approaching cooking with a positive mindset and a “can-do” attitude will make the process seem easier. You might even have some fun.
   
3. Grow Your Spice Collection: To make flavorful dishes, you will need a sizable spice collection. Most notably, you will need to make sure always to have these essentials on hand:
   
   a. Sea Salt
   b.Black pepper
   c.Onion powder
   d.Garlic powder
   e.Paprika
   f.Parsley
   g.Basil
   
   These base spices will help you create delicious, well-seasoned dishes. As you continue cooking, you will naturally acquire more spices for a wider range of cuisines.
   
   Read Also: How To Maintain A Clean Home:11 Efficient House Cleaning Tips
   
4. Invest in a Set of Pans: Regardless of what you plan on cooking, a high-quality set of pans is a necessity. Purchasing pans from a reliable brand will prevent you from finding pieces of coating from cheap pans in your food. Typically, pans with a ceramic coating provide a dependable non-stick surface and are less susceptible to chips and scratches than other kinds of pans.
   
5. Plan Ahead: Before you start cooking, get out all the supplies you’ll need and measure all of your ingredients. Doing this will make the entire cooking process go smoother by saving you from continually washing your hands to retrieve, measure and add in a new ingredient. You will also want to make sure you preheat the oven whenever necessary before diving into prepping a recipe.
   
   
6. Be Patient With Yourself: Note that even for an experienced chef, unexpected things can still pop up out of nowhere and ruin a meal. Although it can be frustrating to see all that time and energy go down the drain, keep in mind that cooking is a learning process and do not give up. Instead, focus on learning something each time you cook by figuring out what worked and what did not, which will make you into a better chef in the future.
   
   
7. Stay On-Recipe: Honestly, it is best to wait to go off-recipe until you’ve become more confident in the kitchen. As you keep following recipe ingredients, measurements and instructions exactly, you’ll start to learn how different components work together and what can be substituted for certain ingredients. Eventually, you’ll be able to modify recipes on your own to create custom variations.
   
8. Keep Your Knives Sharp: Not only will keeping your knives sharp keep you safer in the kitchen but it will also help you cook better. Sharp knives mean that food can be cut more easily and require you to apply less pressure, preventing accidents. One of the essential skills in learning how to cook like a chef is proper care of cutlery. Likewise, watch chef learning videos to discover how to use whetstones and how to safely clean and sharpen cutlery
   
   
9. Create a Cooking Notebook: If you want to learn how to learn to cook like a chef, then a smart move is planning out meals in advance. In cooking school, students are usually required to plan out the day’s meal, including appetizers, entrée, and desserts. Put this practice into place in your own kitchen! Using a notebook to plan out the week’s meals not only saves time; it creates a personal cookbook that you can refer to again and again.
   

Read About: How To Plant A Vegetable Garden In 5 Good Steps: A Beginner’s Guide

SIMPLE RECIPES TO TRY WHILE LEARNING TO COOK AT HOME

How To Cook Rice

An everyday staple that deserves to be prepared properly. You don’t need to buy a rice cooker to get fluffy grains; the absorption method, shown in our how-to-cook rice video, simply uses a lidded pan of boiling water.

How To Separate An Egg

Lots of recipes call for only egg whites or yolks, so how do you separate them out? One of the easiest methods is to crack the egg with the blunt side of a knife, open the shell into two halves, and pass the yolk several times between the halves, letting the white drop down into the bowl underneath before popping the yolk into a separate vessel. Watch our video on how to make meringues to see this technique in action.

How To Knead The Dough

Bread is a staple, but if you have never tasted a fresh loaf when it is hot from the oven, you are missing out. Mixing flour with water and gentle pummelling activates gluten, which needs to be developed through kneading to make the dough stretchy and elastic. Prepare a flat, clean surface by sprinkling over a little flour, and take your bowl of risen dough. Using your fists, ‘knock back’ the dough until it forms a smaller ball, then tip this out onto your kneading surface.

Using the heel of one hand, push the dough down and forwards, stretching and squashing it. Give the dough a quarter turn and fold it in half, then repeat, kneading and turning in a rhythmic manner for as long as the recipe states. See this technique in action in our how to make bread video and improve your bread skills.

How To Make A Batter

The technique varies depending on what you are making, but you always need to whisk your batter properly to combine the flour, milk or water so that there are no lumps. Get a smooth finish video guide for making thin crepe pancakes, fluffy American pancakes, classic Yorkshire puddings and homemade battered fish on YouTube and online training Channels.

How to rub flour and butter

Some find it the most satisfying part of a bake, while others hate this time-consuming task. However, if you are making shortcrust pastry, scones or a crumble, you will need to use a technique called rubbing in. This means taking flour and fat and rubbing it between your fingertips until it looks like breadcrumbs.

Check Out: How To Handle A Child With ADHD: 5 Tips To Handle ADHD In Children

How To Cook Egusi Soup

• Add ground melon to a bowl, add about a cup of water and mix to form a paste then set aside. Wash and chop the spinach, drain in a colander and set aside.
• Place a big pan on medium heat, add palm oil and heat for about 3 minutes (Do not bleach oil) add the reserved chopped onions and Sautee till translucent
• Add pepper mix, and locust beans and stir to combine. Bring to a boil for 5 minutes.
• Add the egusi paste in bits to pepper, reduce the heat, do not stir and cover the pot with a lid. Cook for another 10 minutes.
• Remove the lid, and gently stir the soup. The egusi would be lumpy at this point, use the back of a ladle to break the lumps into desired size/texture
• Add smoked turkey, ground crayfish and crayfish, and beef stock (if using) and stir to combine. Add bouillon cubes, taste and adjust accordingly. I didn’t add salt to this soup as the smoked turkey and mackerel already contained salt. Continue to cook for another 10 minutes, check at intervals and stir to avoid burning if need be
• Add shredded smoked mackerel and gently stir into the soup. Add chopped spinach, stir to combine and cook for another 3 to 5 minutes. Take it off the heat, and allow it to cool for about 10 minutes before serving

Read About: How To Maintain A Clean Home:11 Efficient House Cleaning Tips

How To Use Ingredients While Cooking

The fun of cooking (and learning to cook) is that it’s a choose-your-own-adventure. I dedicated each week to a different ingredient I never handled before—one-week shrimp, one-week chicken thighs, another week rice noodles, another Chinese five spice, then turmeric—to see if I could figure out how to use it. I wanted a mixture of proteins, vegetables, and spices—anything that would give me more experience and prevent falling into a rut. I started by Googling whether there were ways to align the ingredients I picked up with the methods I had down. But, when searching for turmeric turned up a zillion stew recipes, I needed an easy stew under my belt.

If this information was helpful kindly drop a comment in the comment box below and also share it with your friends and loved ones on your social media platform.