Cooking Tips For Beginners

Cooking seems scary for beginners when holding the knife and imagining cutting like a pro chef, when dealing with different levels of temperature, uncertain to select the right cooking method, having hard time tenderizing the meat and deep frying at home. Yes, all these sound scary when kicking off but it's not as difficult as it seems. Little practice will make you perfect in a short time.

Let's delve into all these cooking tips one by one.

1. Knife Holding Tips

When we first enter the kitchen to cook, first encounter comes up with a knife. These days, life is easy with gadgets but you have to know the basic knife skills to work safely and perfectly in the kitchen to cut your meat and vegetables.

A knife is used to peel, chop, dice, slice, Julianne, and mince.

Select Your First Knife

Here are a few tips to select the knife.

For beginners, it's preferred to have stainless steel, 6 to 8 inches knife with sharp edges as it's easily manageable to do small-scale cuttings.

After, selecting the knife, then invest in a good cutting board as it will make a measurable difference to boost confidence while cutting.

Find a Stable Cutting Board

A good cutting board needs to be stable and stuck on the surface so it will be easy for you to get a grip while cutting. I personally love to use a good quality thick plastic cutting board as it's easily washable, sticks on the surface and is nonporous to stay safe from bacteria.

How to Hold the Knife

It's tricky to hold knife but here are few standards to hold the knife properly in order to get more grip to cut the food.

Handle Grip: It's recommended for beginners to hold the knife with a handle to do the entire cutting.
Pinch Grip: It's a blade gripping technique where you will hold the knife blade from upside with your forefinger and thumb. Keep your index finger at the top and thumb at the bottom.
The Claw: Here you will hold your object on the cutting board with all your fingers. Like place the onion on your board and hold it with all your fingers to form a letter C position. In this way, it's easy to chop the onion. Take a few practicing sessions and believe me you will be an expert in cutting.

Here is the picture illustration to hold the knife. Have a look! It will tremendously help you to get essential knife skills.

2. Understand Cooking Methods

For beginners, learning the right cooking method is essentially important to cook the food according to their recipe requirements. It's easy to understand if you follow a specific recipe.

Cooking methods will guide you, when to;

saute,
steam,
blanch,
sear,
roast,
grill,
broil,
braise,
poach
boil.

Every cooking method has its own significance in cooking. For beginners, it's advisable to follow a recipe based on these cooking methods and make it one by one. In this way, you will get an idea to apply all these cooking methods in general cooking without following the recipe.

For example; if you want to reheat the mashed potatoes then which cooking method is best to follow? You have to know about it.

In the same way, if you are making soft tortillas or bread then how can you make it using the gadget or with hands. Here I posted, how to make soft chapati in chapati maker.

3. Learning Cooking Measurements

Understanding the cooking ingredients and their addition to cooking at right time and size is the real art of cooking. If you know this then nobody can stop you to be a good cook.

As beginner, it's difficult to convert oz, gms and liter but it's easy if you know the cooking conversions. I always use google to do this task as it's simple and quick. You should have measuring cups and spoons to add proper ingredients in your recipe.

1 tablespoon = 3 teaspoons

Sometimes the mistake comes up when tablespoon used to add a teaspoon. Yes, it seems silly but it happens. So need to focus in this area to avoid recipe failure.

4. Method to Tenderize Meat

Everybody wants to eat tender, juicy, and moist meat in their food. Tenderizing meat with all its juices and flavor is a real success for beginners.

I remember, my first attempt to bake chicken and it became rubber in texture just because of overcooking. So understanding the temperature, cooking time, and cooking methods all are related with each other.

Over cooking and undercooking can give the hard time to fix the food. It's better to understsand the right way to cook your meat.

Chicken and sea food is gently and easy to cook but cooking red meat require more time to tender meat. So to keep it easy, here I am listing some tips that might help you...

Always cook the meat on high heat to seal the pores to intact juices. To do this, fry meat in oil for 3 to 4 minutes on high heat until it started to change color then add spices and simmer on medium to low heat.
Small pieces of meat will tenderize in more tasty way rather using big pieces.
Brining (soak in salt water) the meat before cooking can improve the flavor of meat.
Never cook seafood for long time as it will lose the taste and flavor and will become mushy.
Natural meat tenderizer can increase the tendering process.
Wisely monintor the cooking temperature to cook your food.

Never ever underestimate the value of cooking temperature. Food cooked on right temperature will be more tasty even you used less spices. A good chicken only spiced with salt and paper with the drizzle of oil if baked on righ temperature with tender and juicy texture is good to serve with mashed potatoes and roasted tomatoes.

Smart cooking doesn't need lot of ingredients, it require to amalagamate right cooking method at right temperature.

5. How to Thicken Curry(Stew)

Watery or runny curry is the sign of bad curry preparation. Curry always needs to be smooth, semi thick and consistent in texuture.

Begineers always get hard time to thicken the curry. There are many reason or possible solutions to thicken the curry with different ingredients and cooking methods.

Here are quick tips to fix the watery curry:

Use high heat cooking method. Simmer the curry on high heat if the meat is tender and curry showing water and inconsistent texture.
Use the spoon as a whisk and stir the curry to blend all the ingredients to show one tone homgenous texture.
If meat is hard and curry is watery then use slow heating method and simmer for few mintues to tender meat and thicken curry.
You can also use thickening agent based on the type of your curry like tomato paste, yogurt, and nuts paste.
Cornflour or cornstarch is also helpful to thicken the curry. You can make the roux and add it in curry according to thicken requirements.

6. Follow Recipe with Guide

As begineer, there is no harm to get cooking lesson from your home.. It could be your mom, dad or grandparents. They can guide you about basics to start. In this way, you will get many tips and understand the organized way to work in kitchen.

Don't try anything of yourself. You can if you know the entrie recipe but I always recommend to search the best recipe on internet and make a complete follow up list at your end. Like; arrange the ingredients, follow the instruction, cooking method and recipe tips. These little step will save your time and give better understand to cook like a pro. Best idea to get the print out of recipe and keep it with you while cooking.

7. Quick Hacks

Everyone makes blunders so no problem if you are doing the same. After failure, we learn from experience and learning cooking is the ongoing process but few hacks can save our time in kitchen. Let's look into this...

1. How do you stop tears when cutting onions?

If you want to experience happy onion cutting without tears then just rinse it right after removing the upper skin. It's best practice tips that will help you to get rid of tears while cutting an onion. Alternatively, keep it in the freezer for 20 to 30 minutes.

2. How Long To Boil an Egg?

It takes 4 mins to boil the egg with a runny yolk. 9 minutes to get firm and soft yolk and 12 to 15 minutes to get hard-boiled eggs. Overcrowding the egg in the pan might disturb the heat so timing may disturb.

3. How to Store Green Chilies for a Long Time?

A simple way to store green chilies is just removed stems of chilies and packed in an airtight container and place in the fridge. Take out when you need. In this way, you can store the green chilies for 1 month.

4. How to Peel Tomato Skin Easily?

Just keep the tomatoes in the microwave for 1 minute. Skin will detach so it will easy to remove and cut tomatoes. IF you don't have a microwave then place in hot boiling water for 2 minutes and remove the skin.

5. How to Store Mint Leaves?

The best idea to store mint leaves is to place mint in a damp paper towel. Wring it if you feel a paper towel is wet or watery. Place the towel in a plastic bag in the fridge. It will help to refresh the mint for 10 to 15 days.

6. How to Stop Being Thirsty in Summers?

If you are feeling thirsty in hot and humid weather then just limit salty food in your diet. Also, try to drink fresh water rather drinking sugar enriched beverages. Don't have carbonated drinks. Eat kidney-friendly diet fruits with your meal like apple, blueberries, cranberries, etc.

7. Which Oil is Best for Weight Loss?

Canola, peanut and sunflower oil are the recommended oil if you are choosing oil for weight loss. Canola contains a high amount of Omega 2 fatty acid and low value of saturated fat. Coconut oil is also recommended.

8. What is the Healthiest Frying oil?

Extra light olive oil and sunflower are great options to use when you deep dry foods. Both have high smoking points and healthy unsaturated fats. You can also include canola, sunflower, and peanut oil.

9. How to Store Used Frying Oil?

Wait to cool down the oil then strain using a sieve. Pour oil in the airtight bottle to reuse. Try to avoid reheating the same oil multiple time.

10. How to Manage Extra Salt in Curry?

The best way is to add yogurt in curry and cook on extra high heat to blend the taste. Another option is to add potato or any other vegetable in the curry to balance the salt. You can also use tomato paste to manage salt quantity. Just add tomato paste and cook on high heat.

11. How to Get Rid With Slightly Burnt Milk Smell?

Change the pan first. Add little water in milk and few pods of green cardamom. 5 is enough in 1 liter milk. Boil it for 5 minutes on medium heat. If you don't have cardamom then use bay leaves.

12. How To Stop Oil From Foaming When Frying?

First, use the right oil and manage the temperature. Sometimes oil reheating makes foam in oil. Add a pinch of turmeric in oil and check the difference. It will eliminate in few seconds.

13. How do I get the smell of garlic off my hands?

14. How to Easily Squeeze Lemon Juice?

Microwave the lemon for 10 - 15 seconds. Heating will make the lemon soft so it will easy to squeeze. In the same way, you can also dip lemon in hot boiling water for 2 minutes to squeeze easily.

Easy Recipes For Beginners

Baked Chicken Breast: Simple, easy, and quick recipe for beginners to try oven-baked chicken breast.
Oven Fries: Prepare quick and easy fries. It's simple and healthy to serve with dinner.
Roasted Tomatoes: If you are making baked chicken breast then pair up with roasted tomatoes.
Garlic Butter Rice: Simple stir-fry rice recipe with garlic and butter.
Honey Garlic Sauce: Best to serve with chicken wings, thighs, and baked chicken breast.
No Knead Dinner Rolls: Quick and easy recipe of dinner rolls that anybody can make.
Sauteed Mushrooms with Garlic: Use a skillet and saute fresh mushrooms in 5 minutes.