Looking to get more comfortable in the kitchen? These cooking tips will help you get started!
Unfortunately, we were not all blessed with skills like Julia Child. If you don’t feel totally comfortable in the kitchen, try these five cooking tips!
By mixing up what you are cooking with and how you are presenting your food, you will slowly but surely impress more people. And who knows… You may even discover a favorite new hobby, learn to love spending time in this room, or uncover a wonderful skill.
5 Cooking Tips for Beginners
1. Always taste your dishes
When you start cooking, as you add ingredients and before you serve your dishes, you should be tasting what you are creating. This will not only help you know if you need to tweak or add anything, but it will also help you learn the flavors and textures of different ingredients, which will assist you with future cooking!
2. Remember mise en place
This cooking term translates to “everything in its place”, and it’s rule number one in professional kitchens. (Maybe the most important cooking tip!) Before you start anything, have all your ingredients measured out, get out all the dishes and utensils you will need, cut up anything that needs to be chopped and so on.
3. Find out where you shine
Cooking is not for everyone, but once you starting doing it more and more (whether it be by putting together a sandwich or creating gourmet meals), you will realize where you shine. If you enjoy dishes with cheese, research unique ways to add more of it into your life.
If you are always cooking for a large family and have had success with a crock pot, become the queen of crock pot recipes. And if you discover a dish that you actually enjoy making, find ways to put fun twists on it.
4. Set a table like a pro
Some people are comfortable with just throwing some napkins on a table and letting everyone grab their own plates and silverware, but if you are looking to properly set your table, remember these tricks:
- Forks go to the left of your dinner plate
- Knives and spoons to the right, with knife blades facing the plates. (Imagine that the knives are protecting the spoons from the evil forks to the left!)
- And when it comes to bread plates and what people are drinking out of, do this: Bring your pointer finger and thumb together on each hand to create a lowercase “b” with your left hand and a lowercase “d” with your right. Then put the bread plate up and to the left of the dinner plate and your drinkware up and to the right of the dinner plate.
5. Get creative
As you get more comfortable in the kitchen, you can start experimenting! Buy exotic ingredients, just to try them. Incorporate fresh-picked flowers or DIY tablecloths into your table setting. Try to make dishes that are all organic, gluten-free or vegetarian. Pick up some fun cookbooks. And remember the most important rule of all, when it comes to this topic and beyond…to have fun!