How to Start in the Kitchen

If you have ever glanced at a cook book, you have probably been able to pick out all the ingredients you have never heard of and all the appliances you don’t have in your kitchen.  Well, I am here to tell you that that doesn’t matter.  Not having an immersion blender should not stop you from trying to cook a delicious and healthy meal.

Sometimes, we get too caught up in being perfect, I’m looking at you Instagram, that we forget it’s okay to try something even if we don’t have all the proper tools.  That’s how you learn.  It took me years (and a great YouTube video) to learn how to properly cut up an onion.  But before then, my soups came out just fine, albeit with chunks of onion thrown in.

But this got me thinking that new home cooks often attempt something difficult that require skills they haven’t quite figured out yet.  The good thing with cooking is that a lot of it is about taste and you develop a balance of flavors over time, whereas baking requires precision and some knowledge of ingredients.

I think this is what deters people from attempting to cook at home.  We think that it requires exceptional skill and fancy appliances, when it’s about liking the flavors you are working with and cooking them properly.  All of which takes time to learn, but it can be learned and it’s not too hard.

The first dish I attempted to make was when I was studying abroad in London.  My flat mates and I decided to do ‘family-style’ dinners where we would all have dinner together and one person would be responsible to prepare the meal, we took turns each week.  I found a recipe for shrimp scampi.  I remember looking at the ingredients and thinking it didn’t sound too hard.  So I walked over to Sainsbury and bought all the ingredients, including pre-cooked shrimp that I had to warm up, and came back to the apartment and prepared it.  I remember everyone enjoying it, although this was ten years ago so my memory is foggy.

This was one of the first times I thought to myself that I really liked cooking.  This wasn’t the first time I lived alone, but it was the first time a dining hall or cafeteria wasn’t close by (and food in London was expensive, especially to a twenty-year-old college student).  I brought my lunch to school most days, a variety or sandwiches and hummus.  I really enjoyed making meals and food for myself.  I also found that I liked being in the kitchen a lot.

My flat mates also attempted dishes that to this day astound me, one made chicken cord en bleu and the other fish and chips.  Both seemed so difficult, but they managed them so easily.  Seeing this made me feel like I could at least try to make anything.

Now that was over ten years ago and here I am today, I’ll try to make anything.  And trust me, I have had failures and dishes that are too salty or too overcooked.  But I tried and next time, I can adjust and try again.