If you’re new to cooking, it’s hard to be a confident cook. A lack of confidence can prevent you from trying new things and even asking others to try your cuisine – and that’s not a feeling that should stick around.
Being more confident in the kitchen can help you to eat healthier, cheaper, and develop an overall more exciting palate. Meals are much more interesting if you experiment, and you have the opportunity to find your new favorite foods.
As with all skills, practice is going to be your best friend. If you don’t give yourself the time to practice and learn different things, then you’re not going to get better any time soon.
Watch others cook
A good way you can learn and improve your cooking skills is through watching others. There are plenty of chefs you can watch online, and through that, you can learn many new time-saving techniques. On top of that, you could find new ways to approach your current cooking styles and get a better look at how some recipes are cooked.
Learning from experts is generally an excellent way to improve anything you like doing, and it’s completely free.
Repetition is okay
If you already know what you want to cook, repeating your recipes is a good way to make you more confident. Having to refer to the recipe constantly can make the cooking process a bit shaky, and you’ll often be wasting your time and fumbling while preparing it. Try remaking your meals whenever you feel like them, and don’t be afraid to mess around with them while cooking. Trying out new things in your recipe can improve any recipe to meet your tastes better.
Write your own recipes
You don’t have to come up with a new meal or idea, but taking the time to rewrite the recipes you use can be a good way to learn them better. Instead of just reading off of a list that someone else has written, you’re getting them in a form that’s much easier and clearer for you to understand.
Writing them out makes it much easier for you to get all of your favorite recipes in one place, so you won’t be looking online every time you plan to make that meal. Sure, it takes time, but you get a much clearer understanding of it when you have to write it down for yourself.
You can get some practice now by writing out this shaking beef bo luc lac recipe now, and don’t be afraid to give it a try yourself!
Push the boat out
As previously mentioned, low confidence in cooking can prevent you from trying out new recipes that seem more complex, but that’s also an excellent way for you to practice. As long as you’re not too afraid to fail, trying out more complex recipes allows you to prove yourself wrong. If you can finish a recipe that you would usually find difficult, then that goes to show that you’re already a better cook than you thought you were.
Make sure you have the right equipment
Do you find yourself falling behind when trying to prepare ingredients? It could be that your knives aren’t that great or that you’re missing the tools that would help you prepare things faster. A lot of issues that beginner chefs have in the kitchen can be tied to the equipment that they’re using. As long as you know your techniques, you should ensure you have the right tools for the job.
You’re not alone if you’re afraid to pick out a sharp knife for chopping, but you should know that a dull blade is much more dangerous. If you’re using a blunt knife, there’s a lot more chance of you slipping or missing where you plan to cut.
Look for what went wrong
Being afraid to fail is going to hold you back no matter what you attempt in life, and instead, you should be ready to use failure as a learning experience. If your recipe doesn’t turn out how it was supposed to, you should look for how you could do it better next time. The problem might be something as simple as missing a step in the recipe or using the wrong ingredient.
Don’t take every recipe that turns out wrong as a fault in you, as there are often other reasons for it. Your ingredients may have been going off, or the recipe didn’t fit your tastes.