Had I things my way, I would just show up at a different one of those 'Burgers, Brew, and 'Que' places every day of the year and order take-out but logistically that is impossible so I have had to learn how to cook.
There are a lot of things you have to have in order to cook. You have to have the right equipment. You have to have the right ingredients, and the right quantities of those ingredients. You have to have time.
Then you just 'follow the recipe', right? Sometimes that works, if you're making something super simple, but most times you cut corners on cooking time, run out of ingredients, substitute this for that because you couldn't source the exact ingredients, forget to measure something correctly, use too much heat/not enough, or.....
There are thousands of cookbooks and perhaps tens of thousands of recipes so you pick one out of the book or one from the listings online and off you go and when all is said and done most times it doesn't taste as good as you think it should. Why is this?
Spicing your dish is critical. Amateurs tend to put in too much, or not enough. Add too much heat or salt and you might as well throw what you made out. You can't cut that stuff enough! Make it too bland and you can add some spice later but it works better when it's introduced during the cooking process. Flavors meld.
I never thought cooking would be as difficult as it is. You do a lot of winging it during the cooking process because things happen quickly sometimes and you have to make decisions.
You learn over time to spice food as you go along. You build a spice arsenal to help you with that.
Fresh vegetables taste better than ones that have been sitting around too long. Properly cooked vegetables call for precise cooking times.
Meat calls for high temperatures sometimes 'cuz you gotta sear that stuff initially to lock the juices in.
Stock is necessary if you want to achieve taste. Fat adds flavor, as does caramelization, zest, sprinkling cheese on top, adding cilantro, etc.
Little touches complete the dish. Little touches are (usually) worth the effort.
Bland ingredients aren't going to taste any better once they're cooked!
Many recipes on the internet are touted as sure winners but a lot of them aren't.
You can spend your whole life cooking and never come close to learning everything.
Professional kitchens use spicing tricks that they won't reveal but if you're lucky somebody will have found out and will tell you what that special something is that they did or added.
When you get something down, you can make it over and over and possibly sell it. People will flock to your table or food joint because you offer a taste found nowhere else.
It helps to know the chemistry of food, why certain things happen, or what is happening when food is undergoing transformation in the pot.
When you get the recipe down, you can scale it up. Chai tea factory?
Prijun Koirala- Unsplash.com
Prep work always takes longer than stated, and cleanup during and after the cooking process as well. This makes take-out attractive but one thing about home cooking is you know what is in the dish because you put it in there!
Unlike stores, where everything is labeled, restaurants don’t have to tell you what is in the food.
You never do a recipe the same way twice because you're always tweaking it this time around.
Over time you build up a huge repertoire of dishes that you have made and you think nothing of it.
I always balk at recipes that call for exotic ingredients. Can't source those where I live and where do you get that kind of stuff anyway?
'Serving size' is sometimes ridiculously small.
Lots of recipes call for more butter, sugar, or salt than I can stand.
Having a freezer stocked with dishes that I have made is my forever goal.
Few people like to cook- but everybody likes to eat.
Soups call for a lot of salt.
Pork loins and chicken breasts call for a lot of seasoning.
Kitchen disasters are just part of the process of learning. Overspice it one time and you'll never do that again.
Try a new recipe out on a small scale before you commit to making large quantities.
There are wildly different tastes to be found in common ingredients. Butter. Olive oil. Tomato sauce. Use the best ingredients if you can afford them.
Deep fryers aren't worth the trouble. Get take-out if you want fried food.
Cooking is best done with a partner. The process is more fun and goes much faster.
Restaurants use food prep short cuts. Read about those. Seek them out. They won't affect taste but they will save you time.
Make too big a batch of food and you'll be eating leftovers forever.
Realistically, working people don't have the time or inclination to source fresh ingredients at the local farmer's market, they won't be found studying produce and buying just enough for ‘tonight's special dish’.
Multiple dishes can be cooked at once. It calls for skill at multitasking but it can be done.
Flavors must be balanced. Flavors are sweet, sour (acid), salt, heat, umami (savory).
Cooking shows are invaluable. Watch some and see how the pros do it.
If an internet recipe sounds like an odd flavor combination, it probably is.
You can get award winning recipes on the internet. All the award winning chili competition cookoff recipes, for example, can be found.
You will make it 'restaurant quality' and surprise yourself. Many times.
Baking is messy. Flour gets everywhere.
You need lots of countertop and island space in order to cook.
Gas stoves rock.