QUESTIONS YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO ASK OTHER MEMBERS, BUT FELT TOO LAZY OR AWKWARD TO DO SO.

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this is why i keep a kitten-based explosive device containment and disposal unit (KBEDCDU) in my house

content-filled post while I'm at it:

This might have been asked before. How many of you guys/gals cook? Are you good at it? Do you LIKE to cook? Are you like me in that you are an incredibly food-motivated individual who views food as the ultimate creature comfort, therefore you put massive amounts of thought and planning into your meals?

It seems like a shocking number of people my age (mid 20s) can't cook and essentially live on take-out, microwaveable food, etc. Not only are they spending lots of extra money on food, most are getting a bit pudgy and slow as a result of their diet :p

edit: sucking with words wtf brain
i love cooking and i love eating what i have cooked myself. i am probably 6/10 on the scale of actually being good at it though
I love turning on a new movie on the big screen and then cooking whatever I planned up earlier in the day. When I finish I'll restart the movie if I'm really interested/was mostly focused on the cooking and finish watching the movie while eating.

I'm pretty bad at it though, I hate cooking when other people are in the kitchen (and that is 95% of the time) so I rarely get that much experience cooking. I'm also terribly indecisive when it comes to deciding what to try and sometimes that ends up with "throw something in the oven/leftovers"
post=142765
i love cooking and i love eating what i have cooked myself. i am probably 6/10 on the scale of actually being good at it though

This is pretty much me exactly.

also thanks for the neat replies and discussion from my question on the last page, everyone. Great stuff!
There's a terrific chef inside you just waiting to burst out of that bashful shell GRS.

Also Goons With Spoons is a great source of home cooking info for the novice and pro alike dudes (yes, Something Awful actually has some subforums that are good for things)

How are you guys rating your own cooking ability? I love eating what I cook and almost always get nice positive feedback from people I feed (except for "i don't really like onions" type things, a lot of my friends have the palate of a picky 3 year old when it comes to certain veggies) but objectively speaking I have no idea where my cooking skills are at
Yellow Magic
Could I BE any more Chandler Bing from Friends (TM)?
3154
I an an expert at eggs but that's about it...know how to make curry though that's always a plus.
my cooking skills aren't very good, but i can't say i've had much practice. i sort of cook the same things over and over again because it's easy
always my own>microwavable though, no matter how bad it turns out
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
I can cook a few things when I have the facilities. I eat very few things (picky eater) so that limits what I can cook but I have been told I make a mean home made chicken noodle soup (I make the stock from scratch and ev'ything).
I recently received How to Cook Everything as a birthday gift from my brother-in-law. It's like a hip "The Joy of Cooking".

Anyway, I've been cooking meals for myself more and more. Mostly chicken-based dishes, and salads. I did manage to cook a pot roast, which was delicious, and later an eggplant parmesan. That was pretty awesome.

Cooking is fun and very necessary. I've lived on my own for about four years now, and I can say that eating fast food/junk food too frequently can take a hard toll on your body. I don't think I can ever touch another hot pocket for as long as I live.
I am a legitimately horrible chef. Even when I follow the instructions to the letter it usually turns out badly. And heaven help me if I try to modify a recipe or *gasp* try something on my own. It probably doesn't help that the Imperial system of measurement baffles me AND that I find recipes hard to read (why isn't it formatted like code, rather that a giant blob of text? With no eye-catching whitespace and formatting I end up skipping or screwing up the order of steps).

I think that the only original thing that I've tried that turned out good edible was pan-fried green beans with Montreal steak spice and garlic.

Gusteau had it wrong - not everybody can cook.
I've used Goons with Spoons before (although as a lurker), I think I just need experience and some better fundamental knowledge. Hell my first time I tried to stirfry some thick egg noodles with tiger shrimp and whatever veggies I could find in the fridge started with me trying to do it all at once because I was being retarded and thought that's the way to do it.

My Spaghetti is decent, even if it is just prego+ground beef+Worcester sauce+garlic with whatever noodles and lightly-toasted toast. It's also my most commonly made dish too.
I tend to make extremely basic dishes - speed is an advantage here as I still don't like to spend overly much time cooking even though I've largely managed to break my previous mindset of food = mostly annoying necessity. Slowly gaining appetite and willing to put more effort into it!
Outside of very easy to cook meals. "Eggs, Spaghetti, Mac and Cheese" I'm generally not that good at cooking. I'll say with confidence though that I can skillet some mean Bacon. mmm yum.
Hexatona
JESEUS MIMLLION SPOLERS
3702
I hate cooking because I don't know some of those fundamental rules about cooking. Every cook book tells you the HOW, but I want to know the WHY. Why do I have to cook this at that temperature? Why do I need a stainless steel pan for this? What's so different about a dutch oven that I can't use some other pot? Why does this need to soak? why evaporated milk? What does it matter if I use olive oil or canola oil? The differences in cuts of meat?

Above all, I want the rules that give specific outcomes. Like, How to cook meat in order to dissolve connective tissue; Is there a way to cook onions without the EXTREMELY hard to get off residue on my pan? Etc.

I hate cooking. It's like playing Unlimited Saga in Pre-Shakespearian English.
Cooking, or any chemistry for that matter, is one of those things that I'm okay with having instructions for all the time. I don't ever feel like I need to be at a point where I can know these things off the top of my head. I feel like alot of what you mentioned Hexatona is kind of common knowledge though.
post=142974
I hate cooking because I don't know some of those fundamental rules about cooking. Every cook book tells you the HOW, but I want to know the WHY.


I hope you don't apply this logic to everything you do, like sex.
spaghetti is easy, first make ramen, don't add the flavoring, drain the water, add prego sauce. booyah
That sounds gross, bro.
My idea of food is very simple.

edit: The most elaborate thing I've ever made was brownies from scratch. Also for a girl, so I had the LOVE mixed in! (brownies made from a mix still tasted better though :/)