Five things about cooking. From a non-cook who's trying to learn...

[annwfyn]

So, one of my huge accomplishments in 2016 was somehow, miraculously, transitioning from 'possibly the worst cook in the world' with a repertoire of exactly two dishes which didn't involve 'put in microwave, press button' to someone who currently cooks from scratch around four times per week, using proper ingredients.

I do not consider myself someone who can cook, exactly, yet, but the process of becoming someone who cooks at all has taught me a number of things about the great divide between those people I know who say such things as 'but cooking is easy' or 'surely everyone can make a basic cottage pie' or 'anyone can cook cheaply and healthily, and there's no excuse for feeding your kids junk food' and those people for whom it all looks like some kind of weird black magic.

And, because I compulsively write these things down, here is the list of the top five things I wish both sides would know.



1) Recipes are good. This, more than anything else, is something that apparently escaped me for years. This is partly because of a number of conversations I had which went as follows:

"Oh, I don't use cook books. I don't really think you need to. It's all very simple. You just [insert whirl of terms I don't understand] and then just add [list of more things] to taste and stir until it looks right and cook until it smells ready. Surely you can do that?"

"..."

The thing that I think those who have been cooking competently for years don't realise is that you need to know the basic rules of cooking, as you do with most things, before you can start to improvise. Most people learn to cook as adolescents, arrive at university with a basic set of recipes and can start improvising from there. Maybe you got given those recipes verbally by a parent or similar, but you started off with the simple set by set instructions. That gives you the foundations on which you build your cooking skills - that you follow while you learn what smells right, what texture looks right, how to stir, how to blend. And without those foundations, it's not very simple to know how to stir and cook and judge by taste and scent.

The thing I think that those who don't know how to cook don't realise is both that cook books are amazing, but also that all cook books are not the same. Find something straightforward, that is precise with amounts and timings. Personally, I fear any recipe that says 'flavour to taste'. And follow those recipes for a while. I found it took about three times of making the same dish before it stuck (I'm probably a slow learner) and getting to know about three similar dishes before any common rules even remotely began to make sense. But in general, I also have learned that there's nothing wrong with not being one of those miraculous instinctive cooks who sniffs at a spoon and says "needs more cardamon". It's OK to say "I don't cook - I just follow instructions". It's where we all start. It's how we all learn. And that learning can take as long as you want. Sometimes just finding a fun recipe is enough in itself.

Oh, and no one is born with the instinctive knowledge of how to make cottage pie. I have a recipe for that too.

2) Some bits of cooking are really boring. And it's OK to not want to do those bits, or at least find a way to ease the tedium. I was raised repeatedly being given veg to peel and slice because I was the least talented cook in my family and all I learned from that was that kitchens were boring and uncomfortable places were my fingers got chipped and sore and I didn't want to be there. A massive revelation for me was that most veg doesn't need to be peeled. You may disagree, but you're wrong. There may be specific meals where it's necessary, but I'm OK with not cooking them.

You may well have other bits of cooking which you find totally tedious. So ditch them. There is no God of Cooking watching over you insisting you have to zest a lemon or chop those onions just so. I wish someone had told me I could just ditch the peeler years ago. Because dear gods, it's changed my life to not start cooking in a grumpy mood with sore hands already.

3) If you don't cook for a long time, and rely too much on ready meals and takeout and the like, it's actually quite hard to re-adjust to the flavours of home cooking.

This is something that I oddly didn't realise until after I'd done it. See, I basically got a very cheap Gousto box one week when I was dead skint and didn't have a lot to do. So I had the time to play with food, and a willingness to trial new flavours. And they did feel very new - tasty and interesting but not originally easy or comfortable. But I did like feeling virtuous and the fact I'd got subscription boxes meant they kept coming unless I remembered to cancel them so I kept pottering along, then skipping one box and just buying the ingredients I wanted from Tesco for a week and remaking old recipes I liked, and then registering which flavours were nice and which weren't...

...and then somewhere along the line I realised that I didn't like the taste of some of the foods I'd been subsisting on before because they tasted too fatty and salty. Too much sugar made my teeth ache. And I'd begun to roam the house glowering into my larder when I felt hungry rather than pondering takeout. Basically, I'd adjusted. But it wasn't really an instant process and it hadn't happened before when I'd tried to shift to cooking more, mostly because many of my early experiments in cooking were pretty foul tasting anyway and even the safe ones didn't exactly have a nice mix of flavours, and either way, my taste buds had adjusted to lots of cheese, lots of fat, and lots of salt so everything tasted a bit bland.

There is, I am told, actual science behind this which is another reason why people raised in low income households and especially households which have serious issues accessing reliable cooking facilities (which happens more often than you might think) often struggle hugely to eat the 'good' and 'virtuous' meals of cheap chickpeas and wholesome wholegrain rice that the well meaning middle classes often think they should do. That shit tastes wrong and nasty and it's very hard to repeatedly subsist on food which you are actively eating as a kind of chore. Basically, our taste buds adjust. Also, food has a really strong effect on our memories and emotions. I note, I was lucky in that one of my early Gousto boxes had goats cheese in it which reminds me of picnics with my family in the French Alps and living on a beach in Chile with Krystyna Joyce. So I instantly decided I liked the thought of these boxes.

I still don't like chickpeas.

But either way, I wish that people who grumble about people who can't understand they'd just be better off batch cooking lentil casserole instead of getting cheap chips in would understand that it's not that simple. And that people who kind of dread lentil casserole would understand that it does involve a bit of a shift. Sometimes it might take a while of just trying something healthier once a week and working in baby steps. It is worth it. But it isn't natural to leap to Jack Munroe vegan delights for 20p per portion straight away and welcome it like mana from heaven. That's not how mouths work.

4) Cooking from scratch takes time. And at first, it feels like it's taking ages because everything requires concentration and panic and it's work and some days that's the last thing you've got the energy for when you're just in from work. It always takes longer than making a call to the Chinese and lying on the sofa, or sticking a pizza in the oven and waiting. And frankly, I'm sure that everyone has evenings where they can't be bothered. But it does get faster.

As a quick interject, I know someone here is about to pipe up and say "well, that's why I batch cook and make 1278 portions of wholesome spag bol that is then stored in tupperware of the exact right size in my huge freezer, for those lazy nights". I haven't got to the batch cooking stage, I don't own tupperware, and that involves a level of planning I'm naturally incredibly bad at. I am sure it's super easy and everyone except me is doing it. It doesn't currently work for me.

Back to the main point. I sometimes feel as if folk who cook don't register how much extra time and concentration it takes for someone who doesn't know how to cook to start cooking properly. It takes longer to do something the first time and a lot more focus and energy, and god knows many of us do not have a massive supply of that to begin with. And what those of us who have never been very good at cooking might realise is that it gets better. The first time I made burritos (with home made lime mayo) it was a focused and slightly panicked experience. Shut up. I know they are dead easy. Now I can make said burritos in 20 minutes while mostly listening to an audio book. But getting to that place took time, and I'm still learning.

5) Food has no moral value. And neither those who cook nor those who don't really are affected by it on a spiritual level at all. Cooking more has done a variety of good things for me - I have been losing 1ib per week on cooking from scratch (with zero other changes), it's done good things for my skin, and it's a lot cheaper than eating a lot of shit - but it hasn't exactly made me a better person. I'm not any more creative, or kind, or intelligent, or responsible.

And in general, I think we really, as a society, need to learn this. People who like the taste of salad more than chocolate aren't essentially better, nicer, wiser, lovelier people. People who like chips aren't bad, greedy, lazy, or horrible. It's just food. And cooking is just a way of preparing food. Whether you can cook or not says nothing about you. What particularly annoys me is the extent to which this moral judgement about cooking largely descends on women, and/or the poor. I have never in my life heard anyone comment on a man who doesn't cook. I am aware of a lot of comments people make about women and their cooking ability. Women who can't cook might be lazy, or slovenly, or incompetent, or bad mothers, or wasteful with money, or busy, or feminists who are too strong and independent to cook, or free spirited, or those who have escaped the chains of the kitchen. And people often assume that the ability to cook is linked to the ability to clean, which, of course, also has moral value. This all is more important if you're poor. An executive who can't cook or clean can hire a cleaner and roll her eyes and say "I just never have the time". If you're a woman living on a council estate, then your character hangs on your ability to cook and clean.

And it shouldn't.

Because food has no moral value. That means that if you can cook, there's no point in judging anyone who can't. And if you can't cook, don't judge yourself. Don't feel intimidated by food, worried about whether you can't, or defensively build an identity around not cooking. Well, maybe you're not doing that. But I did. And I shouldn't have done.

It's just food.

Comments

[borusa.livejournal.com]

Over the years I've gone from someone who really couldn't cook at all to someone who cooks... maybe five days a week. I'm not amazing, still (for example: If it involves pastry, you might end up with something that looks like dough has been thrown at it from about five yards), but I can do quite a number of things.

I agree with what you've written - some random thoughts:

1) Recipes are great. Like music written down is great. Sure, some people learn everything by ear, but they're the odd ones. The rest of us learn tunes from paper, and then later on start improvising.

2) Spice mixes for curry are best got from a book. The relative amounts matter.

3) Chopping, peeling and slicing are dull. Company is not dull. Asking someone "could you come and prep some vegetables with me and then you can go off and do something else while I cook with them" is not cheating.

4) Pretty much nothing is cheating other than ordering takewawy and pretending that you cooked it and then wrote "Lump Tik Poss" on the tubs for that authentic feel.

5) It's OK to have a small repertoire.

6) It's OK if it goes a wrong occasionally. Even with stuff you can do easily. Sometimes you forget to do X, sometimes the cooking gods smite you with inexplicable bad luck.

7) Most meals are more about organisation than skill. This is doubly true for things like "roast dinner", which is more about oven space management than skill.

8) If you like rice (and can afford it), buy a decent rice cooker, and never again have to eat anything more suited to sticking paper to walls.

9) Baked potatoes are cheap and easy and only require time. But you should finish them in the oven, even if you start them in the microwave - they come out nicer.

10) If you have or want to pick one, cook the main, buy the dessert. Gu chocolate puddings are great.

11) Having stuff in your cupboard is useful. Tins are not evil. Frozen is completely not evil.

12) Being able to cook does not make you morally superior, in the same way as pretty much any other skill outside of the Marvel Comics Universe, and maybe within.

13) If in doubt, wash it, chop it, fry it in butter (or oil if vegan). If still in doubt, peel it, chop it, fry it in butter. If that fails, try the above but roast it in the oven. The last resort is to boil it until it's almost soft...

... and then fry it in butter.

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

I agree with all of that. Especially the 'fry it in butter'. There is almost nothing that can't be improved by frying it in butter. It is the ultimate get out of jail free card.

I'd possible add 'and then grate some parmesan over the top'. That and butter covers up a multitude of sins.

Also super agree with the company. One of the huge game changers for me was moving into a house with a kitchen large enough for someone to come and perch on a chair and chat to me as I cook. I don't even need them to help. But conversation makes such a difference. Because, as you said, chopping is very very dull. Audio books are my other support and prop. It turns out everything is better if you have an animated Brian Blessed in your ear.

[pmp.livejournal.com]

As one of those "miraculous" intuative cooks, I learnt that through reading the backs of store bought sauces and spice mixes, plus reading menu descriptions.

For example, realising that both chocolate and coffee work well with tomato based meat dishes is something you can read but it's not until you throw everything into a pan and taste the results can you learn why it works (sweet + bitter basically).

It's actually not an intuative thing is my point, but a learnt skill, a lot of it comes from remembering what things taste or smell like and you can then apply reasoning to whether it works.

One way to practice is to take a favourite recipie, and then decide to make it more X, where X is a basic flavour. So maybe that cottage pie needs to be more sweet, so you can look to try making it with lamb, apricots and harrisa spices instead. Where you get the route to achieve X? You think about other dishes and what they use, the above example is combining a morrorcan (sic) lamb dish usually served with cous cous, with the basic cottage pie recipie (incidentally this is delicious!)

[eniel]

Yes yes yes to the part that food has no moral value. I swear if my colleague tells me once more that avocados are "sinful" I might scream.
I also wonder whether the abundance of celebrity chefs has also created expectations of what home cooking should look like our involve - thereby scaring those of us who don't have the equipment or spices or ingredients mentioned.

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

Yes - I think so. I think there's a lot of cook books out there which also add to this, mostly because they're really written for either advanced cooks, or as glamorous but impractical coffee table books. They have a lot of glossy pictures, a sexy chef on the front cover and instructions that I can barely even follow on the page let alone in practice.

[borusa.livejournal.com]

My mother once got a Robert Carrier cookbook. The first recipe she tried had the following instruction: "Take half a pint of venison stock"

Her reaction:

1) "From where?"
2) "Actually, that sounds like an oxo cube to me."

I have a similar reaction to "julienne the carrots": "That sounds like batons to me."