Cooking Tips for Beginners

1. Benefits of Cooking
Cooking at home benefits your health, your wellbeing, your mind and your wallet. If you’re still not convinced, here are a few facts.
Cooking is a great stress reliever
Cooking helps you clear your head. By having to focus all your attention on whisking, you get a kind of meditative quality out of it that calms you down.
Cooking makes you happier
Cooking is also therapeutic because it stimulates our senses: you get that fabulous smell, a beautiful visual, the sound of cracking eggs or frying or whisk beating and the end result being a treat for your taste buds. Making a dish or baking a cake will help you feel more confident, just like when you finish any project successfully. By focusing on something positive, we curb negative thinking and this is why cooking is often advised to combat depression. It can also help you bond with your significant other and your children as it’s fun.
Cooking is healthier and cheaper
Ready meals come with a ton of additives that don’t benefit our health. By cooking your own meals, you know exactly what you are eating. You get to eat higher quality ingredients while spending less and benefiting your wallet.
2. Starting Your Cooking Journey
If you work a lot, including cooking in your schedule can seem challenging. But, this doesn’t have to be hard as there are many ways you can step up your cooking game.
Make the time
Unfortunately, groceries won’t magically show up on your doorstep or cook themselves. But, what you can do is pick a day in the week when you’ll order your ingredients online. Just like everything else, cooking is a habit that you will adopt over time. You can also schedule a prep time for the week ahead which will dramatically reduce your cooking time during the week. Making a meal plan will help you stay on track because if you plan your meals right, you can use the same ingredients in several different dishes.
Invest in must-have kitchen items
Appliances such as instant pots or air fryers can make your life easier. They practically work on their own, helping you cook delicious meals in less time while also lowering your PECO utility expenses. Also, you need actual measuring spoons as using regular teaspoons and tablespoons can completely ruin any recipe. Just like you want to buy quality and fresh ingredients, you should also invest in quality equipment such as a good chef’s knife.
Find a dish that has everything
The beauty of dishes like a lasagna is that they can have everything you need: protein, fat and carbs. Don’t be afraid of repetition and large quantities if you like the dish as you can easily freeze a portion.
Don’t improvise too much
Although cooking is great for getting your creative juices flowing, if you are a beginner cook, just follow the recipe. Baking is an exact science that needs everything to be measured precisely. Obviously, if you are allergic or hate an ingredient, you leave it out. But for everything else, wait until you know your way around the kitchen to be adventurous.
3. Gadgets, Tricks and Tips To Become a Seasoned Chef
Here are a few must have gadgets that can help you become a chef in no time.
Instant Pot
All that fame isn’t for nothing. You can cook a meal from frozen, use a delayed start, and generally transform a pile of ingredients into a delish dinner.
Air fryer
It does more than just fry food without oil, donuts included, it can bake or toast. It just makes everything deliciously crunchy on the outside, while still being soft on the inside.
Blender
You have all kinds of immersion blender packages that you can use for whipped cream, pureeing or making a smoothie.
Electric kettle
Almost everyone has one these days and who doesn’t shouldn’t because it’s just so much faster than heating water on the stove and more energy-efficient.
Pancake and tortilla warmer
Now this is something you don’t hear about everyday but so handy to keep your pancakes and tortillas warm while you finish a batch. The beauty of tortillas is that you can make endless breakfast, lunch and dinner recipes with them. Admit it, you need this accessory.
Takeaway – Cooking can be an art. Food is a basic human but besides the science behind it, we have transformed it and its preparation into something more. We have made it into an experience that enriches our lives, so cooking is a way to make sure we enjoy our life more fully. By activating our senses, it benefits your health, wellbeing and our wallets.