Learning to cook: Where to start?

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Cooking is about confidence and not being afraid to make a mistake. Cooking is not like baking where you make a mistake or use to much and it'll be ruined, with cooking you can always adjust, too
Land add salt/ seasonings. Too spicy add some Vinegar or sugar.


Most spices herbs can go without proteins, it's always better to use less than more to begin with. A great combo is ginger, curry and cumin.

Most new cooks are scared of heat, when cooking heat control is necessary, but high heat is a good tool for searing/browning. To avoid burning yourself, heat the pan dry add oil right before what your cooking and always place away from yourself that way any splashing will not be towards you.

If your cooking a spicy protein you may want a sauce that is sweet or creamy. In other words don't make the dish to one dimensional.

Use all your senses and have fun with it.
 
Most spices herbs can go without proteins, it's always better to use less than more to begin with. A great combo is ginger, curry and cumin.

When you say curry, what exactly are you referring to?
 
get marco pierre whites books. they are super british and super delicious recipes. I feel that in any cookbook, the author leaves out a little bit of the finesse and techniques as to not give away all of their secrets. eleven madison park has an amazing cookbook.
 
This tread just caused me to go get the French Laundry at the library.
 
Sinc you're in the UK, I'd go for this, Professional Chef: S/NVQ Level 2. It is basically the textbook for the college course, but even if you don't go it's a great book. It goes over a lot of basic things and covers a huge range of ingredients, and also gets pretty complex, I highly recommend it
 
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I have to second brainsausage's rec on the French Laundry Cookbook. I think his chicken dumpling soup has been the most instructive dish I have ever done. You learn how to make a parchment lid and why, how to do quenelles, make dumpling dough, cut vegetables to size, preserve color in veggies, make stock, make a roux etc. etc. BUT it does take time and produces a boat load of dishes -- best done over two days if doing alone.

I love a lot of the suggestions in this thread, and I am going to ask for a couple of these for christmas.

The other thing I would recommend is just being diligent with cooking different things that demand you to learn something new or cook something different -- at least a few times a week. I did that for a few years and learned a lot. I used to go through my cookbooks and write the pages with recipes I wanted to try on the inside cover and would often just randomly choose a number and make it. It forced me out of my box a bit.

k.
 
One of the good things about trying the library first--everyone seems to adore "The French Laundry". I found it too annoying to finish. So if you can check out the books first, it's a great try before you buy way to see which books you really like.
 
One of the good things about trying the library first--everyone seems to adore "The French Laundry". I found it too annoying to finish. So if you can check out the books first, it's a great try before you buy way to see which books you really like.

Just make sure to leave your mark with some good food stains.

k.
 
Or put some plastic wrap on top of the book and avoid the food stains.
 
Sinc you're in the UK, I'd go for this, Professional Chef: S/NVQ Level 2. It is basically the textbook for the college course, but even if you don't go it's a great book. It goes over a lot of basic things and covers a huge range of ingredients, and also gets pretty complex, I highly recommend it

Is this, Professional Chef Level 2 a new edition of the same book? I'm not sure because it says Level 2 Diploma, whereas the one you linked to says Level 2 S/NVQ.
Also, why do you recommend the level 2 book? Is the level 1 book very basic?
The Professional Chef book from the Culinary Institute of America also seems to be highly praised, but I worry that it may be too US centric. Would you also recommend it, or would your suggestion be more suitable for someone from this side of the pond?
I have made a wishlist on Amazon to keep track of all the great suggestions in this thread, and I also picked up a copy Leiths How to Cook from Costco at the weekend.
Thanks for all the suggestions.
Oh, and the cling film over the cookbook is a great idea! Thanks for that one Lucretia.
 
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It could be a newer version I guess yes. I haven't looked at any Level 1 books but to be honest the Level 2 I linked to starts off pretty basic anyways. I don't think it really matters where you get books from. Just things like measurements and that might be a little different and some ingredients have different names
 
Ironically, the two chefs that really influenced the way I cook and taught me about herbs and spices were Nigella Lawson and Antony Worall Thompson. We lived in England for 5 years and although I knew how to cook, I only really knew traditional southern food. They really broadened my culinary outlook and I've just taken it from there.
 
Keller's books are great, and his techniques generally are as well. If I had a complaint, and I do, it would be that he falls deep into the "hokey pokey syndrome." What I mean by that is that in his zeal to differentiate French Laundry techniques from classic techniques, something he seems to have an almost compulsive need to do, he focuses so much on the minor technical changes he has made that the new reader could end up putting the emphasis on what is unimportant rather than what is important. I call it the "hokey pokey syndrome" because I could imagine him giving directions as to how the cut an onion at the French Laundry, and what he would say is something like "unlike at many restaurants, at the French Laundry we believe that to cut an onion, a very important technique in our kitchen, one must make several vertical cuts, then a few horizontal cuts and then cut the onion crosswise into dice. We then do the hokey pokey and spin ourselves about, and we find that, as a kitchen, we prefer to do this with a 3/4 rhythm and to spin clockwise when doing mise en place for lunch but counter clockwise when we are doing mise en place for dinner. When we are cutting onions for family meal, we dispense with the hokey pokey and we do the limbo three times. At the French Laundry, dancing is an integral part of onion cutting."
 
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