/ck/ - Food & Cooking

[Anonymous No.4518112]

evening /ck/, i came seeking some truly beginner advice and guidance.
in a few weeks time, ill be looking after someones house for a week or so alone, only a brief walk from the supermarket and with plenty of free time on my hands.
now the issue i have with this is that i do not know how to cook. i havnt ever cooked anything more advanced than putting it on a tray and sticking it in the oven or picking up a phone, and for this i feel terrible.

i want to use this week away as an opportunity to get into cooking, without risking poisoning my family/being harrowed by their jeering when i announce im cooking. i also dont want to live off takeaways and cheap shit all week.
i was wondering what sort of resources you guys have for recipes and the like, and if you had any advice or super-basic do's and donts that could help in any way. ive taken to watching various cooking shows on tv, and one that particularly struck me was nigel slaters simple suppers, and toyed with the idea of grabbing the DVDs, but i assume thats being WAY too ambitious?

im also mildly surprised you guys dont have a sticky of some sort on the matter.

pic related is what my family automatically assume their reaction to any of my cooking would be.

[Anonymous No.4518398]

Alton Brown's show "Good Eats" is a pretty good way to learn the basics. I'm fond of Nigel Slater too, but his shows tend to assume a fairly large amount of kitchen experience.

I'd say some good foods to begin with are pasta, potatoes and eggs.
Pasta can be cooked by placing it in a pan of salted boiling water and simmering it for about 10 minutes if it's dry or 3 if it's fresh. Pull a piece out (with a utensil to avoid scalding yourself) and taste it to see if it's too chewy and needs to be cooked for longer. A serving is somewhere around 70-90g but you'll get a feel for how much you like to eat and be able to eyeball it soon enough.
Once cooked, you can simply grate some cheese on top and add a spot of salad for your first easy and successful meal.

[Anonymous No.4518421]

>>4518398
Potatoes can be cooked in a great variety of ways but the 3 methods I use most are boiling, mashing and baking.

To boil potatoes, you might want to peel and/or chop them depending on what type you have. New potatoes are nice with the skin and often small enough to boil whole. Larger potatoes may have tough skin and old ones might need peeling to help you remove all the blemishes. Aim for chunks of uniform size so they all cook in about the same amount of time. You'll want to rinse them too. Place your potatoes in a pot of cold salted water and bring it to a boil. Reduce the heat to a simmer (gentle boil) and after somewhere between about 10-15 minutes they should be done. Test them for doneness with a sharp knife which should slide nicely into them. You'll get a feel for testing like this with a little practice.

To mash potatoes, boil them as above, drain them and let them sit for a little while to dry off a bit. You should be able to see the steam coming off them. Use a masher (or a fork, as I do) to mash them. I'd recommend adding some butter and a little milk for a more luxurious texture and flavour. Chives and cheddar cheese are both good additions.

I share a somewhat crappy oven with several people so tend to bake my potatoes in the microwave. I wash them, prick them on all sides with a fork and nuke them on high (800W) for about 5 minutes. You'll get much better results including a crunchy skin by baking them for an hour or so but I don't have instructions for that to hand. I think AB does it in an episode of Good Eats and I'm sure some anons can weigh in here.

[Anonymous No.4518423]

Can you read recipes, OP? That might seem like a weird question, but there people out there who can't follow one. The obvious answer is to google recipes for easy shit you can make in batches and then freeze (ie spaghetti sauce, chili, soup, stews, etc) or just easy dishes like stir fry or eggs. DVDs aren't a bad idea if you're going to commit to it. I'd recommend Julia Child's "How to Cook" series.

I have a handful of infographic images which I can dump, but I have to know if your cooking skill is as bad as you're telling me? Can you brown meat or sautee veggies? Do you know what spices you like? Can you cook pasta? Do you know how to cut vegetables?

[Anonymous No.4518431]

>>4518398
Eggs can be boiled, fried, scrambled, made into omelettes, etc. and can teach you a great many cooking methods. I've just reread your post and feel like i'm going too far with my instructions so I'll point you to the famous Ramsey eggs video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dU_B3QNu_Ks.. Alton Brown has done several egg episodes with beginner level walkthroughs. Combine eggs with potato and some salad or a vegetable (boiled as you've learned to do, or sauted by tossing around in a frying pan) to make a tasty meal.

Good luck and have fun, OP.

[Anonymous No.4518432]

>>4518423
Guides like these can be a little overwhelming at first, since they list a shitton of ingredients you may or may not know how to work with. Use your discretion and pick what you're most likely to eat.

[Anonymous No.4518433]

>>4518423
Not OP but i'd like to see a veg cutting infographic please.

[Anonymous No.4518439]

>>4518423
>Can you brown meat or sautee veggies?
Not OP but I have no clue what you just said.

[Anonymous No.4518443]

>>4518439
What the fuck are you doing in /ck/?

[Anonymous No.4518446]

>>4518432
I also recommend investing in a rice cooker if you like to eat rice. I have an inexpensive one (cost me about $30, thank you Chinatown), and they're easy enough to use that even a noob can use them. All you have to do is put in the rice, fill up the water to the proper line (depending on how much rice you put in), and cover it up and flip the switch. Make sure you don't open the lid until it's completely finished, and that's it. You can even cook things in there, google "rice cooker recipes".

[Anonymous No.4518452]

>>4518443
I clicked on the wrong board and this thread looked interesting.

[Anonymous No.4518454]

>>4518433
I'm not sure if I have one, actually. I can quickly look it up, but you guys can also use your google fu, since I have a bunch of other images OP can use.

Anyway, here's some spices. Keep in mind you don't need to rush out and get every single one.

Barest essentials: Salt, black pepper, parsley, basil, bay leaf, powdered ginger, chili powder, cayenne pepper, garlic

Other things I personally use: Oregano, thyme, cilantro (at the risk of making every supertaster on the board buttmad), dill, curry powder, sesame seeds, fresh ginger, red pepper flakes, paprika

Again, this is up to you and your personal tastes. Don't be afraid to experiment. A little spices make a dish go a long way.

[Anonymous No.4518460]

>>4518454
I think this is the last pic I have on hand. I can post simple recipe verticals if you're interested.

[Anonymous No.4518534]

Found some knife shit.

[Anonymous No.4518536]

>>4518534

[Anonymous No.4518537]

>>4518534
>white on light teal or turqouise
Can't read shit captain!

[Anonymous No.4518544]

>>4518542

[Anonymous No.4518542]

>>4518536

[Anonymous No.4518548]

>>4518544
And some more spice shit. OP I don't even know if you're still around, but I'm going to post simple recipes.

[Anonymous No.4518560]

>>4518544
Wow, that's horrible advice.

For the slicing, you'll get more even and less curved cuts going from top to root by simply slicing the top and bottom off, halving, peeling excess or bad layers, and cutting formerly sprout to root.

For dicing, cut in a radial pattern instead of straight down. Nature made one set of cuts for you, use them. You can also angle cuts inwards top and bottom but slowly progress and regress from a straight cut as you go for extremely even pieces.

[Anonymous No.4518567]

[Anonymous No.4518570]

[Anonymous No.4518572]

[Anonymous No.4518576]

[Anonymous No.4518577]

[Anonymous No.4518584]

[Anonymous No.4518585]

[Anonymous No.4518751]

Some simple advice on stir-frying vegetables:
For things like peppers and onions, you literally just need to pour a little oil in a clean frying pan and head up the vegetables for a few minutes or until they're a little soft, then add the sauce of your choice, turn off the heat, and mix. That's it.

For things like broccoli or leafy greens like rabe >>4518584 and spinach, you should blanch the vegetables first before stirfrying. Also very easy. You basically heat a pot of water to boiling (salt it some, since it boils faster that way and also prevents leaching of nutrients). Put the vegetables in their and let them boil quickly for a minute or so until bright green and slightly tender. Then drain them in a collander and run them under cold water to stop the cooking process.

Once you've done that you can stirfry them whenever. You can actually eat them right away if you don't feel like doing anything anything fancy with them, or you can store them in the fridge for future use.

[Anonymous No.4518791]

Ignore anyone who talks about salt making water boil faster.google can confirm that it's bullshit.
Don't be afraid of getting your pan hot. If you pussy out your ability to brown/sear things will be impaired and your technique will be stuck at a low student level for a long time.
Be aware if other myths like ' you must leave food to cool to room temperature or it will spoil faster in the fridge'

[Anonymous No.4518813]

For a beginner I'd learn how to cook a steak, basic stir frying and stews. All simple first steps.

[Anonymous No.4518992]

>>4518446
You don't need a rice cooker. I just simmer rice in chicken broth in a pot over low heat. Works every time.

[Anonymous No.4519435]

Can a slow cooker be used as a rice cooker?
I'm soon to inherit a Crock-Pot and to be honest I've heard they have pretty limited use but it's free.

[Anonymous No.4519458]

>>4518534
>>4518537
Edit.

[Anonymous No.4519464]

>>4518534
>>4518536
>>4518542
>>4518544
Thanks.