Essential skills for cooking

Cooking is a great skill virtually everyone should learn to become more self sufficient, improve health, save money, and express their creativity. Cooking can be a form of mindfulness, a source of relaxation, and a cornerstone of social events. People with cooking skills also tend to appreciate food more, no matter who made it.

Learning to cool involves a variety of fundamental skills. The following skills should form a solid foundation for anyone that wishes to learn to cook.

• Food Safety: Understanding how to properly store and handle different types of food, prevent cross contamination, and ensure food is cooked to the proper temperature to prevent food-borne illness.
• Kitchen Equipment Knowledge: Knowing how to use various kitchen tools and appliances effectively and safely is also important.
• Knife Skills: Knives require special attention toward safety and is crucial for efficiency. Learn to chop, dice, mince, and julienne various types of food.
• Understand Different Cooking Methods: Food can be cooked by baking, grilling, frying, sautéing, braising, boiling, steaming, poaching, roasting, and more. Each method produces different results and is appropriate for different kinds of food.
• Reading and Following Recipes: Being able to accurately follow a recipe is an essential cooking skill and a great way to practice before making up your own.
• Seasoning: Understand how different herbs, spices, vinegars, and other seasonings can enhance the taste of your dishes. Go beyond salt and pepper.
• Time Management: Cooking often involves multi-tasking and making sure that different components of a meal are ready at the same time.
• Understanding Ingredients: Different ingredients have different properties and interactions when combined. Some ingredients go well together while others do not. Some ingredients need to be cooked at high temperatures while others need to be cooked slowly and gently. Understanding these things can help you make better decisions when cooking on the fly.
• Presentation: How food is presented can enhance its appeal. Plating and garnishing skills can make even the simplest meals seem more appetizing.