/ck/ - Food & Cooking

[Anonymous No.18826025]

what is your litmus test for a good cook

[Anonymous No.18826052]

>>18826025
Someone that washes their hands

[Anonymous No.18826060]

>cook
Can make a pasta sauce, soup, and meat and veg dish I guess. More important to me than form (perfect sear, omelette) is grouping together food that goes well. I'm not a huge judge though.

[Anonymous No.18826076]

Making broth

[Anonymous No.18826104]

I don't feel the need to add salt to their food

[Anonymous No.18826225]

>>18826025
Variety.
Making a perfect french omelet doesn't mean shit when it's one of the only 5 things you can make.

[Anonymous No.18826298]

>>18826025
Fat levels. Too skinny and he doesn't know how to feed himself. Too fat and he doesn't know how to make a balanced meal.

[Anonymous No.18826359]

>eating food other people cooked
lmao why would you do this
people are disgusting, i could never trust somoene who isnt an immediate family member to cook me food

[Anonymous No.18826385]

>>18826225
Variety is a red flag for a restaurant. If a restaurant has a menu that's pages long, it means they don't specialize in anything.

[Anonymous No.18826390]

>>18826385
Yes, but those cooks can probably do other things passably.

[Anonymous No.18826394]

>>18826025
For me, it's whether they prepare things themselves, or tend to use pre-prepared processed ingredients.

[Anonymous No.18826400]

>>18826394
Are you supposed to make salt yourself by evaporating ocean water?

[Anonymous No.18826407]

>>18826400
I regularly have about 4 types of salt around. But I'm not sure what's wrong with regular old Morton's iodized.

[Anonymous No.18826410]

>>18826400
The salt is the only one in that picture I disagree with, but it's not like I made the picture myself. The other 3 are valid.

[Anonymous No.18826413]

>>18826394
There's nothing wrong with anything in your pic especially for basic weeknight meals. I have roasted garlic I prepared in my freezer and a garlic press but I'll still reach for the jarred stuff. Also iodized salt has nutrients and sometimes you don't want big chunks of salt. If anything that's better. Also the lemon juice in the container is basically the same as fresh lemon juice especially when it's mixed into a recipe. Especially if I have fucked up nails then I don't have to deal with stinging. Finally the parmesan is fine and actually works better for certain dishes. Plus grating parmesan is fucking annoying and takes forever

[Anonymous No.18826415]

>>18826385
What would be a good menu for a pizza and wing restaurant? Just pizza and wings?

[Anonymous No.18826417]

>>18826413
Based goyslop enjoyer

[Anonymous No.18826445]

>>18826390
I mean, sometimes it's the same ingredients whipped up in different ways, like traditional Chinese restaurants, they get a pass for large menus but most places it's a red flag for me
>>18826415
Pizza, wings, and supporting foods that balance the pizza and/or wings. For a wing place, things like cole slaw, fried corn on the cob, roasted potatoes and carrots, etc. Not sure about supporting foods for a pizza place but they keep to always have wings and garlic breadsticks on the menu.

[Anonymous No.18826461]

>>18826025
I guess if the food has the right texture, like in a soup nothing is mushy unless its like tomatoes that are supposed to be. I was going to say it's if the food tastes good but anypony can make box mix taste good given 6000 calories of butter salt and sugar.

[Anonymous No.18826478]

>>18826025
I don't know about a universal litmus test but a few things I look for in an inexperienced cook that tell me they still have basics to know
>adding oil to a cold pan, THEN heating the pan, scorching the oil
>adding garlic too early or even first when sautéing vegetables or searing meats
>Not knowing how to properly cut/peel/dice an onion
>doesn't use different oils for different tasks
There are plenty more, but these are my most common telltale signs of inexperienced cooks imo

[Anonymous No.18826483]

>>18826413
I have always wondered who is behind all these fastfood threads thank you

[Anonymous No.18826486]

>>18826060
You don't care about seafood?
>>18826359
>i'm an autist, why aren't normies like me

[Anonymous No.18826490]

>>18826478
Caring about teh oil thing is a major eye roll imo. Maybe you do all those high heat pan sears more than me but most of the time... Bruh who cares.

[Anonymous No.18826528]

>>18826394
What's wrong with iodized salt?

[Anonymous No.18826546]

>>18826025
uses lower power settings on the microwave

[Anonymous No.18826566]

>>18826546
I'm curious to hear why you would say this. Personally, the only time I ever use the microwave is when reheating foods with lots of liquid, so there's no reason to use a lower setting.

The only time I'd use a lower setting is if I was defrosting something (which I don't use the microwave for) or using the microwave to do the actual cooking, although cooking in a microwave seems like something only a shitty cook would do?

[Anonymous No.18826574]

>>18826025
is this professional or home cooking? My answer is still "washes their hands"
Can't enjoy anything if you know the cooks hands are disgusting.
I went to a pho restaurant, ate the ,eal and was happy. As I was leaving, I saw the cook come out and blow a snotball from his nose. I was instantly disgusted and never at there again.

[Anonymous No.18826590]

>>18826445
This winter I’m going to open a pizza and wing place for three months. There’s this restaurant that closes down for three months every year in my town, and they said I could rent it since otherwise it’s just vacant. I’m going to make my own hot sauces from peppers I’ll be growing this summer. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to sell my own beer by then though but I intend to. For side items I was gonna do garlic knots and salads.

Sounds like a fun thing to do every winter. My plan is to use it to promote a hot sauce or beer business, or maybe bootstrap for a food cart (but I’d prefer the former).

[Anonymous No.18826614]

>>18826445
Cooking effectively in a restaurant is a lot more demanding than cooking effectively in a home kitchen on your own time. Provided with sufficient instruction a good cook should be able to do most things decently if they are allowed to work at a relaxed pace.

[Anonymous No.18826620]

>>18826025
when no one here witnessed the picrel

[Anonymous No.18826629]

>every steak must come out perfectly
>must be able to cook over-easy eggs in a stainless steel pan
>bacon must be crispy but never burnt
>6/7 meals you cook must not have an 'excuse' as to why they didn't come out perfectly

[Anonymous No.18826631]

>>18826614
>sufficient instructions
average instructions will be completely insufficient for someone that has no idea of how to cook

[Anonymous No.18826635]

>>18826025
a GOOD cook? me eat their food and it good so they good. if not they good then food will bad.

[Anonymous No.18826636]

>>18826631
Yes, that’s because they’re not in fact a good cook.

[Anonymous No.18826662]

>>18826486
Personally I don't like seafood, I'll get around to it

[Anonymous No.18826668]

>>18826025
knows local seasonal ingredients

[Anonymous No.18826678]

>>18826025
Litmus paper

[I have gum cutters and you don't. No.18826686]

>>18826025
i never liked eggs and i've been vegan since nine (9) years old

[Anonymous No.18826689]

>>18826052
so most straight guys are disqualified eh

[Anonymous No.18826694]

>>18826528
tastes bad and you should be getting your iodine from seaweed instead of added salt

most normies get most of theirs from dairy tank sanitizer

[Anonymous No.18826696]

>>18826668
that's fucking retarded, you really think some god-tier cook from texas would be complete dogshit if he was placed in the UK or whatever?

[Anonymous No.18826704]

>>18826025
it's easier to have a litmus test for a BAD cook
>if they use cheap aerosol oil like PAM
>nonstick pan instead of stainless, ceramic, or cast iron
>using pre-prepped "convenience" ingredients like >>18826394 and non-homemade stocks

[Anonymous No.18826710]

>>18826696
>Them: A good cook should know about and select from their local seasonal produce
>You: Oh yeah? Well what if we sent a cook to the MOON?! WHAT THEN HUH?!

Calm down you fucking sperg.

[Anonymous No.18826718]

>>18826394
Who in the heck shops at Meijer? They ought to change their name to "Uneven Floors That We Refuse To Repair + Weird In-House Brands That No One Likes."

[Anonymous No.18826726]

>>18826710
Maybe we started off on the wrong foot because I feel what you posted in le meme arrows is genuinely a valid argument.
If we talk about the absolute value of a cook, then they should be able to thrive in most locations. Taking someone and placing them somewhere else and discovering they don't understand the local ingredients doesn't mean that they are a bad cook and didn't know it, I don't think that it is a good way to measure someone's cooking ability. I do understand your argument though, and i agree to the extent that learning to cook local ingredients is a decent test of a local cook. Especially when the ingredients are harder to come by when discussing national, or even regional cooks.

[Anonymous No.18826741]

>>18826726
nigga u gay

[Anonymous No.18826777]

>>18826686
you still have time
adopt a healthy diet with meat and seafood

[Anonymous No.18826791]

>>18826025
I like to give them something that’s simple yet so often fucked up by the average person: Cook a steak to medium rare.

[Anonymous No.18826819]

>>18826726
>looks in book about Japanese cuisine
>see they like fresh bamboo
>fly to Japan in October to show off your awesome understanding of world cuisine
>people look at you like you're retarded
>d'oh

[Anonymous No.18826894]

>>18826025
how well washed they chicken is

[Anonymous No.18826958]

To me a good cook is someone who can improvise, whether or not they're following a recipe as a guide. Assuming of course it comes out well.
To me that shows a fundamental understanding of what they're doing and how to make thing taste good

[Anonymous No.18827013]

>>18826413
>lemon juice in the container is basically the same as fresh
boyohboyohboyohboy... just how can one nuke their taste buds that badly?

[Anonymous No.18827026]

>>18826686
>t. Female

[Anonymous No.18827157]

>>18826025
not being a pussy
you cant be a good cook if you're afraid to touch and eat raw meat, raw eggs

[Anonymous No.18827178]

>>18827013
Did you read what I said? IN RECIPES where the lemon juice isn't one of the main components. It's fine for marinades and salad dressings. But I wouldn't make lemonade with it or use it where real lemon juice should shine

[Anonymous No.18827208]

>>18826025
An almost autistic passion for produce, in season.
Paired with an almost complete disregard for fads, fashion and hypes.

Just add [current fad] to ["forgotten" veg or fruit, aka what you always did in school] and you'll be a Michelin wiz in no time.

[Anonymous No.18827228]

>>18827178
Salad dressing are a place where real lemon would definitely shine if you don't think so then just sub out all the lemon for vinegar and don't bother with the bottle

[Anonymous No.18827230]

>>18826689
indians aren't straight

[Anonymous No.18827241]

>>18826025
Two conditions
>They can fog a mirror
>They're not under some delusion that cooking is anything more than a necessary life skill

Sorry OP, looks like you fail.

[Anonymous No.18827852]

>>18826400
I believe the argument is that you could grind the salt yourself in a grinder.

[Anonymous No.18827909]

>>18826394
oops

[Anonymous No.18827958]

>>18826394
Whoever made that hasn't actually seen a shitty cook before

[Anonymous No.18827984]

Amount of garlic used. The more garlic used, the better cook you are.

[Anonymous No.18828140]

>>18826025
>>18826478
This is basically what I came here to say. If someone has taken the time to pay even minimal attention to how things in a kitchen are done "correctly", then they will very likely also care about how their food turns out. Over the course of a number of years, their dishes should casually turn out at least decent even when they aren't particularly trying.
People that don't know shit about cooking only have good meals when they get super lucky or they are relying entirely on the couple recipes they learned from a parent or friend that they do over and over and are fucked if something goes wrong during the preparation.
It's also why I appreciate women who are proud bakers, because while I'm not particularly crazy about baked good desserts, I know that it means they pay attention to what they're doing and have the patience to iterate. Successful and reliable baking requires a lot of tweaking of individual recipe components, and someone who doesn't care about cooking won't know where to start (or where to look to get started) on making adustments to a recipe that underperformed on the first pass.

[Anonymous No.18828404]

>>18826025
they understand temperature and how their pans react to their stovetop, they don't scorch oil and aren't afraid of a smoky kitchen, have good varieties of spice around their cooking area they clearly use frequently, and aren't afraid of using lots of fat in their cooking. Even if they use shitty store bought premade things a bit of care and technique can make a mediocre home chef produce food better than a mediocre linecook with ease

but the biggest tells are:
1.do they have a decent variety of meals they can cook that all cover major food groups and are well seasoned?
2. do they actually know how to cook the meat they're working with or just use it as a filler protein? (example: people who cook chicken thighs on the stove and wonder why they're chewy and unpleasant tasting, showing they don't know that the interconnective tissue needs to be cooked slowly first)
3. do they understand how to get a good sear? or, if they're using shitty glass stovetops and can't, do they know about using flour dredges and temperature management to get a good enough one?
4. do they own a dutch oven that they use? do they brown their slow cooked meat before letting it simmer, or are they one of those faggot morons that just lets massive chunks of fatty meat simmer in a crockpot making the kitchen smell awful
5. are they afraid of smoke in the kitchen? this is the biggest tell if someone isn't a good cook, if they panic when a nonstick pan starts to smoke then theyre not a good cook nor do they have any experience

[Anonymous No.18828434]

>>18826710
>Well what if we sent a cook to the MOON?! WHAT THEN HUH?!
What's wrong with that scenario? Plenty of local cheeses to work with.

[Anonymous No.18828663]

>>18826025
well now everybody's worried 'bout a good look
but they should be tryin' harder to be a good cook
Instead of skippin' straight to the last page
In that ol' rationalization book

[Anonymous No.18828686]

just ask what the 4 mother sauces are. they dont even have to make good ones, just vaguely know what they are

either this or how they chop onions. if they cut them retardedly theyre almost never any good at cooking

[Anonymous No.18828708]

>>18828686
The 4 mother sauces are basically irrelevant for ordinary home cooks. In fact they're irrelevant for everyone who isn't planning on working in a French restaurant.

How often is a home cook gonna spend a whole day making veal stock and reducing it into a demi-glace?

[Anonymous No.18828744]

>>18826400
You're not supposed to use iodized table salt, you retard.

>>18826225
Fucking idiot. Variety is trash.

>>18826025
>>18826052
These are really the only two answers in this thread.

Someone who can cook eggs, and someone who cooks clean and cares about hygiene. Everything else is totally secondary.

[Anonymous No.18828894]

>>18826025
I'm a sea food diet. I sea food and I eat it.

[Anonymous No.18828918]

>>18828708
like i said they just have to know what they are. i figure someone who doesnt know what they are probably doesnt know much about cooking, and therefore probably isnt any good at making anything besides a couple recipes they googled, which isnt really being a good chef just knowing how to put shit in a pan

[Anonymous No.18828928]

>>18826025
they can list off the last few recipes they've made, describe the process, and it had varied ingredients and techniques while the people who ate it confirm they were good.

[Anonymous No.18829102]

>>18828140
Based. Baker gfs are the best. I got one about 6 months ago, and she's currently in and out of the kitchen checking on her various starters and whatever bread she's got in the oven while we play Raft together. She's a gym rat, too, so we get to eat great food to meet macros.

[Anonymous No.18829108]

>>18826694
It tastes like salt you fag

[Anonymous No.18829117]

>>18826052
fpbp. Also, if they have cats, I won't eat there.

>>18826689
not quite faggot.

[Anonymous No.18829126]

>>18826385
For a restaurant not for a cook.

[Anonymous No.18829186]

>>18827852
>grind the salt yourself
Why would you do that? There's no aromatics sealed in the salt crystals that are released on grinding. It's fucking salt. Plus, by grinding them you'll get nonuniform grain sizes. The whole point of using (iodized or not, it doesn't matter) table salt (aka baking salt) is that the grains are roughly a consistent average size across manufacturers for a good century, making it usable by volume in baking recipes.

Kosher salt (or large-grained salt -- it literally doesn't matter whether it's kosher, iodized, or comes out of my asshole, as long as it's all salts of which 95+% or so are NaCl) is ubiquitous outside of baking because you can control it much more easily by hand, and it generally has a wider margin of error.

[Anonymous No.18829200]

>>18829186
It's so weird that you would type such a breathless, exasperated post and then get some basic facts wrong.

Salt granule size and density is not consistent between brands. Diamond crystal kosher salt s nearly twice the size of Morton's kosher salt because they're made with totally different methods.

https://archive.nytimes.com/dinersjournal.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04/28/warning-measure-your-salt/

[Anonymous No.18829238]

>>18829200
So you can't read, didn't read, or didn't read carefully?

[Anonymous No.18829283]

a good cook should know how to make a tray of lasagna

[Anonymous No.18829308]

>>18829238
You used gay-ass wiggle words and didn't mention what I said at all, fuckwit.

Just admit you didn't know that DC and Morton's were so different and we can both move on.

[Anonymous No.18829372]

>>18829308
I get it if you're esl. I didn't say kosher salt brands were consistent. I explicitly said table (aka baking) salt brands were consistent. Then in a separate paragraph I described kosher salt, a different thing.

It might have been confusing that I was talking about two different things in two different paragraphs. Maybe in future I can give more indication when I change topics. For example, I am currently discussing cranberries.

ATTENTION: THE TOPIC IS CHANGING

ATTENTION: A NEW PARAGRAPH IS ABOUT TO BEGIN

PREPARE FOR THE TOPIC TO CHANGE:

Now I will discuss apples. End of example. Is that easier for you to follow?

[Anonymous No.18829387]

>>18826590
>I’m not sure if I’ll be able to sell my own beer by then though but I intend to
are you in the US? I think the license to sell beer here is 10s of thousands of dollars. and a license to produce beer for sale is probably an additional 10s of thousands. though for the first one you might be able to reasonably piggyback off the license of the business you;re renting the space from, assuming they have one

[Anonymous No.18829390]

>>18828744
>Variety is trash.
so you only know how to cook less than 10 items?

[Anonymous No.18829947]

>>18829283
bitch lasagna

[Anonymous No.18829950]

>>18826076
You literally do nothing!?

[Anonymous No.18829974]

>>18826696
>god-tier cook
>from texas

[Anonymous No.18829986]

the ability to adjust a recipe for their personal taste/to make it better
you'd be shocked how many normies who cook will just follow a recipe to a t without ever changing things.
>>18826413
the garlic really depends on the brand, I've gotten lucky with my local store's generic brand but I've tried others that are almost all dogshit. So I do understand the hate. if it weren't for my local brand I'd stick with fresh
the lemon juice is absolutely a step down from the real. it's an okayish cheap substitute but it definitely never equals fresh.
>>18828918
unless the cook is specifically studying french cuisine or fine dining there's no real necessity for them to know the mother sauces - at least their formal categorization. it would be like knowing what dashi is as a requirement which is only necessary if you plan to dabble in Japanese cuisine.

[Anonymous No.18829995]

>>18826025
just a nice broth †bh

[Anonymous No.18830007]

>>18828686
>4
Hon hon hon hon

[Anonymous No.18830190]

>>18827228
I'm not talking about on salad I mean in "salads" like broccoli salad with craisins and nuts in it, or italian pasta salad

[Anonymous No.18830338]

>>18826025
Is able to make rice without a rice cooker and can make a soft or medium boiled egg.

This disqualifies like 80% of /ck/

[Anonymous No.18830534]

>>18830338
>Is able to make rice without a rice cooker

[Anonymous No.18830540]

>>18830338
>can make a soft or medium boiled egg

[Anonymous No.18830547]

>>18826400
Iodized is disgusting
Buy sea salt or kosher salt

[Anonymous No.18830659]

>>18827984
based

[Anonymous No.18830750]

>>18830338
The fucking rice thing kills me. No matter how many methods I try, no matter how high quality the fucking rice is, no matter how precisely I measure, or use the "first knuckle" trick, or how many times I wash the rice, etc etc it never fucking comes out perfect. I swear I'm going to be chasing the rice dragon. How the fuck can I make a perfect puff pastry, cook a perfect egg 69,000 different ways, make just about any sauce you can think of, break down a chicken in under a minute, make a damn near perfect chicken Cordon Bleu, beef wellington, fish piccatta, etc. but I can't make a proper goddamn pot of rice?
Perfect rice is fucking hard without a rice cooker and I'm tired of pretending it's not. Have at me, /ck/. I don't care anymore. /TedTalk

[Anonymous No.18830763]

>>18829372
I bet you didn't know that Morton's Kosher salt is actually table salt.

[Anonymous No.18830845]

>>18826413
Get a rotary style parmesean grater. I generally don't like uni tasker things in my kitchen but I keep one around because I hate grating more than a bit of parmesean on a box grater.

[Anonymous No.18830851]

>>18826025
ability to abstract, improvise, understand alternative ingredients/replacements, and ultimately not be beholden to recipes. People that follow random online recipes with no agency or ability to react are the worst cooks. "my dish turned out too watery" like ok how about you actually pay attention to moisture levels when cooking and frequently taste what you're making to be sure you're correct.

I've been chastised for tasting and caring about my food as I prep it. Like yeah I'm prepping $200+ worth of meat for a big grill out. I'm going to make sure the seasoning is evenly distributed and cook a small amount to make sure I got the salt levels correct before I put it away to rest.

[Anonymous No.18830855]

>>18826478
With ceramics and non stick you shouldn't heat them dry anyways. Stainless sure but I like putting oil in first so I can gauge temperature based on the oil developing legs. For highly processed oils that you're likely using for high heat I'm not sure how much scorching matters anyways.

[Anonymous No.18830879]

>>18830845
This is good advice especially since parmesan lasts so long in the fridge I didn't know this device existed

[Anonymous No.18830901]

>>18826052
This. First and foremost.

Personally, I'm impressed when someone has garden fresh herbs and veg. Doesn't have to be a huge acreage but even potted basil, fresh eggs from a chicken, freshly made pasta from scratch, or advanced knowledge of cheese making even in a home kitchen without fanciful amenities

[Anonymous No.18830947]

>>18826445
>yes I'll have a side of roasted potatoes and carrots with my wings and pizza please

[Anonymous No.18831207]

>>18829947
>bitch, lasagna

[Anonymous No.18831373]

>>18826025
Can follow a recipe, and also adjust it to make something that suits them.

[Anonymous No.18831419]

>>18826478
>doesn't use different oils for different tasks
just use olive oil for everything, there is literally no difference in the final product

[Anonymous No.18831520]

>>18830763
When people who /ck/ refer to "table salt" they mean the same thing as "baking salt", i.e. the fine-grained salt that comes in shakers and little salt packets at diners. Coarse-grained salts never fall under that definition. Just because your dinner table may use a coarse-grained salt does not make it useful or appropriate to refer to that with anyone outside your immediate family as "table salt".

It's like how my pre-dementia mother refers to every any new movie by the name of some famous vaguely similar one from 50 years ago. We all understand what we mean, but that doesn't mean that I should go around talking about "UHF" to movie buffs when I'm actually referring to film "Weird".

[Anonymous No.18831530]

I don't get why people think it's good cooking to have no sear or crisp on the eggs, if you're hungover and keen for a greasy feed, semisoft egg would make you puke.

[Anonymous No.18831534]

>>18829950
Not at all.
Making a good broth is a real skill.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7l8tXyzul8

[Anonymous No.18831539]

>>18830845
Second this. Also just swap out cheeses with just a wipe-down. Box graters can mince so fine some very aromatic ingredients that they have to be frequently thoroughly washed, even if barely used -- and they're of course an absolute pain to hand-wash.

I double-up several types of cooking ware for different types of meals after all. If I'm making super-spicy Indian food one night it's virtually impossible to clean the pan well enough to make pancakes the next morning without sacrificing the first 3 or so.

[Anonymous No.18831550]

>>18828744
There is literally nothing wrong with iodized salt.
Even for fermenting its fine in >90% of cases.

[Anonymous No.18831564]

>>18830750
My big breakthru for rice was not salting the water.

[Anonymous No.18831591]

>>18828434
>mfw this post

[Anonymous No.18831715]

>>18826410
I'm sorry you're either not intelligent enough or technologically literate enough to remove salt from the picture before posting it.


Maybe you should study up a bit. In a decade or two, if you really show improvement, we might let you post here again.In the mean time, you should just delete your post. But I understand that might be too advanced for someone like you.

[Anonymous No.18831905]

>>18826025
Whether they can apply heat to an arbitrary bunch of ingredients and make something edible.

[Anonymous No.18831924]

>>18826025
For a home cook?

1. Someone that follows the recipes exactly.

That's it. I'm so goddamn sick of Food Network watching homechefs feeding me a plate of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese with truffle oil and garlic cloves in it. Or finding olives and capers in the spaghetti sauce. The instructions on the box for just about every food exist to competently prepare a dish to a minimum standard of satisfaction. Experimenting with food comes after you understand flavor profiles, not just whipping random bullshit together.

[Anonymous No.18831948]

>>18831564
People salt their rice water?

[Anonymous No.18831959]

>>18831948
I salt my ass before cramming.

[Anonymous No.18832300]

>>18831948
I thought it was like pasta and did so.
Didn't understand why it always stayed hard in the middle.

[Anonymous No.18832555]

>>18826490
>Bruh who cares.
Bruh... Anyone with tastebuds.