How to Learn to Cook?

What foods do you like? Start with that. When you go out, what do you order?
Are there food aversions (ie - some people I know either love or hate things like onions or cilantro).
Are you willing to try new foods?
Allrecipes.com is a great start - you can type in the ingredients that you want or don;t want and look for new ideas (or twists on the items you already make).

My grandma taught me. I taught my kids the same way. My kids at ten can cook better than most adults.

I would suggest a good cooking class. Cookbooks teach you recipes but they don't teach you how to cook.

Honestly, I improved my cooking skills (and am still improving them) by watching cooking shows on PBS. My personal favorites are America's Test Kitchen and Cooks Country (They are both from the same people and have most of the same cooks on them) they show you how and why most recipes fail, and how to make it right. Their websites have videos on how to do things and how to make things. You can sign up on their website, they have a lot of free content, but if you want access to all the recipes and videos I think you have to pay for a subscription. If memory serves me, I don't think it costs a whole lot, but I have never paid for the content.
The websites are http://www.americastestkitchen.com/ and http://www.cookscountry.com/

Master the basics. Keep it simple. Find out what YOU like and what you want to explore further.

You don't need tons of equipment. You DO need the right equipment.
A good frying/sautee pan that you can get really hot. A good pot.
A chef knife and sharpener (Victorinox Fibrox Chef knife -- cheap and very good) and a decent size cutting board (rubber feet are good). Easy access to fridge, trash, sink, stove.

Get used to cooking on the stove top with high heat. SEAR! People should be able to smell it across the street.

Forget about cilantro -- learn vegetables and meat.

Veg:
Use SALT, pepper, olive oil, butter.
Raw is often good. Seared to the point of smoking up your house is also good.

Meat:
Use SALT, pepper, olive oil, garlic, cayenne, lime/lemon/vinegar/acidity.
(Simplify things even further -- whatever is left in the pan can be made into a sauce by adding some milk or water and simmering -- plus it helps clean the pan)

Serve with bread, tortilla, rolls, corn bread, tuber (potatoes and their cousins), or skip the carbs altogether.

Things you can avoid and no one will care:
-- stuffing anything into anything else. Just serve them side-by-side.
-- store-bought spice envelopes
-- any box of 'food' that you're supposed to add water or oil or egg, etc.
-- complicated spice combinations -- save it til you know what you like.
-- recipes with a lot of steps -- save til you have your components down.

Have fun. Basics. Buy fresh produce and meat. Have seasonings on hand. Cook with salt and heat.

I used to know how to cook only a few dishes. Growing up, my mom cooked the same 4 or 5 things all the time and I never knew any different. And because of this, I was very picky even as an adult. But since my husband and I have gotten together, he has gotten me to try different things and I have found that I do like other things when they are prepared the right way. I am not, by any means, a "natural" when it comes to cooking. But I am really good at following directions. I have scoured the internet and cookbooks for new recipes and now we have a lot of things that I cook and my husband cooks that we all love. You can teach yourself to cook, it's just going to take time and practice. I even taught myself how to cut onions correctly on ehow.com. Just keep trying and I am sure you can become a great cook! Good luck!

Rebecca has some great suggestions. My mom didn't really teach me to cook, it was more watching what she did. And very basic. I expanded by watching food programs and getting basic cookbooks. Cookbooks can vary so much from fancy to basic and everyday. FoodNetwork is a great source for watching some of the programs. I like Alton Brown because he explains how things work rather than just tell you what ingredients to use. Rachel Ray is usually basic without getting fancy or ingredients you never use again. Also, you want to make sure you have the tools needed, a full set of pots and pans rather than 2 pots and a fry pan (does not have to be expensive either), measuring cups and spoons. A friend of mine could never figure out why no body EVER wanted much of her food because she did not measure anything so things were either really bland or salty/spicy./etc. She finally measured things until she could do visually. She also made spaghetti in a small pot so it got all stuck together.

I think that in order to be a good cook (not the same as being able to follow a recipe), you have to have some passion for food. Without that, it's just not gonna happen. Maybe you can do some grocery-store or restaurant hopping and find something that actually tastes yummy to you. I mean, find something that makes you want to know "how do they do that?" and then set out to duplicate it. Hopefully, it can be fun for you, and you'll figure out other stuff along the way, to add to your knowledge. Chat up the "old" ladies buying produce. I find that they enjoy sharing tips. Sit in restaurants where you can see the cooks. Does that fascinate you at all? Develop an interest in how the food is prepared or how it tastes or the texture...and run with it.

Btw, I hate cilantro, but then I tasted somebody's cilantro rice, and it was yummy. Do you cook rice? Cook it in chicken broth and add a little butter and cilantro. See if that can work for your whole family. (Make your own chicken broth by boiling your chicken before you "cook" it.)

Good luck to you.

ETA: How are you cooking your vegetables to make them turn out "awful"? Are you cooking them too long? Try this:

Broccoli--Buy fresh and wash. Put in pan with water on high. Once it gets to a good boil, turn it off and pour off the water. Don't let it sit in the water after that. Add butter and garlic and salt and pepper, and leave it all in the warm pan.

Do the same with other vegetables, and play with spices.

Buy fresh spinach and cook it in a pan with olive oil and garlic.

It also makes a difference if your range is electric or gas. For example, when you turn off the fire, it's off, and the heat that continues is mainly from the dish. When you turn off an electric stove, it takes a while for the coils to cool, so yoru food will continue to cook for a while after you want to be done.

Learn by cooking one recipe at a time..

Whenever I want to make something different, I go online and read up about different recipes. I will look for a few things, one.. ingredients (does it have ones that my family will like) two, does the recipe have good reviews.. lastly, how easy or not is the recipe and does it appear that I can do it....

Sites I like are myrecipes.com foodnetwork.com ,marthastewart.com and Test Kitchens of America.

I will say that NOT all recipes I have ever tried by some famous person and or their book has turned out great... yet some have..

Here's an example.. I made Rick Bayless' "Choco Flan Cake" (aka, Impossible Cake") his name for it.. :)

The first time I made it was a bit messy.. DUH.. I used a springform pan (as I had done for many other cakes) but this cake was different , you also pour in Flan.......... guess what happened, my FLAN.. fled.......... yes, it all poured out of pan seal......... WAH!!!!! LESSON LEARNED.... so mishaps will happen.. you just have to keep trying out new things..

NOW, I can make that cake like a pro... Even Rick would be proud..

Monday, for my husband's birthday, I am going to try out a new recipe I saw on Foodnetwork... "stuffed Pork chops" now I have NEVER stuffed a pork chop in my life, but I aim to try it out...

Basically, cooking is trial and error.. don't be afraid to just try something out... start with simple recipes and then advance as you go along..

P.s. that those Test Kitchens of America has some great tips..... what's good too is that they EXPLAIN exactly why they do this or not..
check it out sometime..

good luck to you

I like to cook. But I like to cook because I get complements on what I cook.

Allrecipes.com has lots of recipes. They also have videos on how to prepare different dishes. They are easy to understand and follow.

To start, get some basic cooks' tools. A set of measuring cups and measuring spoons. (The more precise you are the better your food will turn out.) You need a good set of cookware. Some like stainless steel and some like non-stick. I have stainless steel and a cast iron skillet. If you choose non-stick get the tools for non-stick cooking pots and pans.

Get some simple cook books first. I gave my son a cook book when he first got out on his own. The title was something like, "Five Ingredient Cook Book." It was very simple. As the title said, all the recipes required only five ingredients. He hadn't done much cooking and loved the cook book. He said everything turned out wonderful.

BTW I cook rice with canned chicken broth instead of water and it tastes great. Take the rice cooked in chicken broth and a can of chicken soup like healthy choice makes and heat up the chicken soup. Put a scoup of the rice on the plate and some of the healty choice soup and put on top of the rice like a gravy. Three ingredients (rice, chicken broth, chicken soup), and you have a flavorful meal.

BTW, I said healthy choice, but you can use any premade brand of soup.

A great cooking show is "Diners, Drive-ins and Dives". The host has the chefs at the restaurants he higilights on his show prepare one or more of their best recipes. You will see how the best of the best cook.

Good luck to you and yours.

I have never been a natural cook. Honestly, I cook by recipes. I find a well reviewed recipe that looks great, and follow it perfectly. I make it enough times to just remember, and then it becomes natural. If I see a recipe with more then a handful of ingredients, I pass it up. Too complicated. The crockpot and casseroles are my friend. It's pretty hard to mess up those kinds of dishes!
I never just cook without guidance, it's not one of my gifts!! Look for videos on youtube and see if there are cooking technique videos.

We took Rachel rays 30 minute meals and started at the furst recipe. We made each one and the family did a vote of who loved it who hated it and we wrote it in the actual cookbook on the pages of each recipe.it got out family to try new things and I have a celiac in my family so we simply adjustednecessary ingredient changes. As far as learning technique there are many places such add whole foods, park districts and Jr colleges have short cooking classes and some that you could take kids with and all learn together

I have trouble following following complicated recipes. So my advice is expand on the things that you already know how to make. You know how to bake chicken breasts. So try different sauces and seasonings for them, like teriyaki sauce, tomato sauce, etc. Next try baking a whole chicken or salmon fillets with a sprinkle of a spice mix like zatarains on top. You know how to make spaghetti and hamburgers, next try making lasagna or tacos. Then try some other casserole-type dishes.
I learned how to cook plain rice first in a rice cooker, then on the stove. Next I learned how to make fried rice, rice pilaf, and vegetable sushi rolls. Vegetable stir fries are another simple dish, and the seasoning can be added at the end or to the individual plate. It takes some trial and error to cook the vegetables through til they're evenly soft instead of burned on the outside and raw in the middle. Generally, you chop everything in similar size pieces and put the firmer vegetables in first(onion, bell pepper, broccoli, carrots) and the softer vegetables in last(zucchini, mushrooms, snow peas).

Go to youtube, type in what you want to cook, and there will be vids on how to prepare lots of things from start to finish.

ETA: I dont know why they stopped doing home-economics classes at school.
We HAD to take a cooking class when I was in school in the 70s. I'm sure many of us that graduated in the 60's and 70's took a cooking and sewing class, it was required.
It's a shame they dont do that anymore.... WHY IS THAT?
It's a basic life skill.
Kids that have working parents dont always have the luxury of a parent teaching them to cook at home, school was good at picking up that slack back in the day.

I would watch food network and the cooking channel. I have learned a lot from watching them. But, if you dont' have time for a lot of watching, I've had years, then I would start by watching Alton Brown on Good Eats. He breaks things down very simply, and shows you how to use the same ingrediant in different ways. You can find him on youtube and probably other places online too.

Cooking will never taste great if it isn't made with love, but it will taste good, and you will learn to add the love as you get better and more confident.
You can also find some really easy recipes online, or pm me and I'll try to give you some good tips if you think of something you want to make. I try to make food that is easy, quick, and doesn't have a lot of steps or time involved (this is to counter my chef husband who takes 2 hours to make steak tacos). I know you can do it!!! GL!

I left home for college not knowing how to cook much. I knew some basics but not much. I was given some favorite cookbooks by a couple people and over the years I bought some. I just started trying out random dinners in cookbooks that looked good to me. Foods my mom never in a million years cooked. I'm an adventurous eater. :) Over the years I just kept trying more and more recipes and now I know how to cook so many different things and it really is now like 2nd nature to me. This is 20 years of practice though. So, my advice is to go browse a bookstore or library and bring home a couple cookbooks that look yummy to you. Then just start by making one new recipe a week. The other thing I do is if a friend serves something extremely delicious I get the recipe!

Trial and error is the approach I took, and it has worked very well for me over the years.

You will learn what sorts of flavors go well together, and what things do not, and you will be able to make a meal out of anything once you teach yourself how to pair the right ingredients together!

You will make a lot of crappy meals along the way but it doesn't take long to become a good cook!

Start by looking up some recipes and if you don't have all of the ingredients, try seeing what substitutions work and make it something of your own.

Cooking doesn't have to be hard and it shouldn't be a chore, it should be fun! It can be a creative outlet for you - who knows, maybe you are the next top chef?!

I'd say start hunting around online for recipes. If there's something you like to eat, then google it and you'll find several different sites with many different versions of the recipe. Start with simpler stuff of course, but then just follow the recipe to start with. The more you follow recipes, the more you'll learn and the more willing you are to experiment with your cooking. It's kinda like learning to cook with training wheels. You could also pick up a basic Betty Crocker cookbook. Often in the front they'll have explanations of various cooking terms, like the difference between chopping and dicing. I started cooking when I was about 12 so my working mom didn't have to, but 17 years later I'm still learning. If you can make the basics, you can make just about anything.

Betty Crocker's basic book was a Godsend for me. It gives really detailed instructions and offers pictures. It gives definitions for different kinds of cooking, like sauteing and flash frying and such. It tells what utensils to use. It gives very basic simple recipes for every type of cooking, from breads to eggs to pastas, to veggies, meats and desserts.

I teach cooking classes in homes. I am a consultant with Pampered Chef and through our tools and recipes and my background in foods and nutrition, I teach classes. You invite a group of friends - we can do a power cooking show or dinner in 29 min. or less. Let me know.
My email is ____@____.com
M. Hay

If reading a recipe doesn't work for you, look it up only in video form. This is actually how my husband and I learned to cook the Viet-Thai cuisine we serve in our restaurant. Videojug.com is a great start, but there are so many available. I grew up watching Wok with Yan and Julia Child, I couldn't learn from reading a description of it.

Start simple, learn to make each ingredient in a recipe separately. Learn what al dente pasta tastes and feels like, and how to properly steam a vegetable, for instance. And you probably will never like cilantro, it's a taste bud thing. I will never like beer no matter how many kinds I try. Everyone I know that doesn't like cilantro says it tastes like soap.

Not sure how close you are to Indianapolis but maybe this will help give you some leads

http://www.ehow.com/how_###-###-####_learn-cook-indianapo...

Try a slow cooker. I got one for $30 at Bed, Bath, and Beyond a few years ago and it is a Godsend. You just throw in some chicken, some broth, a little wine, some salt and pepper and put it on low for 6 hours or so. I am a terrible cook (I always overcook, the food tastes too bland or too spicey, blah blah blah) and even I can't ruin the food with a slow cooker. Go to the internet for recipes. Also, and please don't laugh, I have had great luck with recipes from Campbell's soup cans-very easy, very fast, and surprisingly tasty and healthy.

i only just started cooking actual dinners this year -you know besides macaroni n cheese, burgers, frozen pizza..stuff that doesnt really involve much cooking -.. anyway i didnt really learn.. i mean my mom n grandma always cooked but no1 actually taught me.. it started with me seeing a recipe online that i thought looked awesome so i just went for it.. it turned out amazing and that was all i needed to get started, now ill pretty much try making anything
i say just start looking through recipes, find something u like and try it out
..and theres tons of stuff u can do with chicken if u alredy know how to make it

Sounds like you need to add more fruits/veggies. There are many cookbooks that have easy recipes you can even search online. And being more open to eating healthy foods would help

Bless her heart, my mother's a terrible cook. The only thing I learned from her in regards to cooking is presenting a balanced meal. So I started teaching myself how to cook in my mid 20s by following recipes. Verbatim. The ones that my husband and I liked, I tweaked here and there according to our tastes and perfected them. But I always tried the recipes as they were written first. Honestly, learning to cook just comes with practice. To this day, I don't really experiment and throw things together. I have a notebook of probably 75 recipes that we like and I alternate those. I'm constantly pulling recipes from Sunset Magazine, too. Allrecipes.com is a great site to start with because you can see which recipes are the most popular based on user ratings. Good luck and just have fun with it.

Start with the basic meals the old food pyramid. Make your food colorful and everyone will want to eat it. Get yourself some plain old white dishes so that they do not detract from what you put on the plate. As others have said get good cookware as you will be using these for at least 15 to 20 years and they will pay for themselves. You will need two glass measuring cups 1 cup size and 1 quart size. Measuring spoons, wooden spoons, a rubber spatula to clean out the bowls, cooking spatulas or turners, a colander or strainer and a set of mixing bowls.

Get a Betty Crocker cookbook, Martha Stewart or a regular book. Make sure the book has substitues for spices and measurements like 3 teaspoons equal a tablespoon in case you don't have one.

Pick a recipe and read it several times. Write down any ingredients you don't have and pick them up from the store. Do this before you begin any recipe so that you don't have to stop in the middle of cooking. Take your time when you cook. Read twice and measure once. If need be print the recipe off and check off the items as you go so that you know that they have been put in the pot or roaster.

Know that any meat you cook will take longer than a vegetable so start with your meat first. As you get better you will learn how much time things take to cook. Above all don't be afraid to mess up the meal this is how you learn to cook. If you don't over spice (season) the food when you cook, people can add seasoning at the table.

Also start a food journal with what you cook and make this your new family cookbook. Just practice, practice, practice and you will get the hang of it. Your family will just have to get used to the new you and the new tastes of food.

Good luck to you.

The other S.

PS Contact the high school and see if the home ec department will get you in touch with someone.

I love Fannie Farmer cook books!!! It'll tell you how to cook any type of meat or veggie and then other dishes to make with it too! I'd start with the basics of learning how to cook different meats - pick up whatever is on sale.

Recipies are a great place to start and follow the measurements until you get the feel for cooking.

Instead of thinking about a culinary art school perhaps a local chef may be willing to give you lessons. Check out Craig's list or something like that. You may be surprised at what you find.

Ask friends for recipes of foods they have made and you have liked. I basically taught myself to cook I have a few easy pretty healthy things my family likes, shoot me a message if you would like me to share with you! Good Luck!

I think allrecipes.com has a lot of basic, healthy and delicious recipes. You can register and they'll send you a daily recipe for free...the recipes they email out are usually their highest rated and often very good.

I personally would steer clear of any cookbook that claims to be a healthy kids cookbook, while the authors mean well, I've never had much luck with getting my family to eat any of the meals. No Whine With Dinner for example did not work for us.

Betty Crocker and Joy of Cooking are both good cookbooks. *Try to cook with healthy oils like olive and canola over vegetable oil.