Anyone Else Just Not a Good Cook?

[Benjaminswife]

Okay I am accepting the fact I am not that good of a cook. I can make enough things to get by but I will never be the type of mom whose children will miss their cooking when they go away to college. I just tried to make a cake and it looks horrible. Last week I made french toast and it was a disaster. I just don't have the right gene I don't think. I follow the recipe exactly and it still comes out bad. Anyone else like me?

[KitKat]

You know, it's the cookbooks. You follow the recipes exactly and they won't come out right, too many variables. Altitude and humidity in your area will change the cooking times and in some recipes, the amount of liquid needed. You need to find a mentor (that's what I had) that is a wonderful cook and can help you learn how to do things by looks and feel (for doneness) and smell (for taste).

Plus, I would suggest starting with something that isn't baking. For instance, start with learning how to make sauces, and meats. Baking can be difficult because of what I mentioned above. Cooking itself is easier than baking for alot of people. Hey, I have been baking for years, but I still rarely bake a cake from scratch, it never comes out right. So, give yourself a break and try something different.

Oh and french toast always comes out best for me, if I cook it on a griddle. Pans heats are vary too much.

[ChristianMother27]

i can't make stuff on the fly but i can follow a recipe. there are a few things i can make without a recipe but usually i need a recipe to make something edible. i've made some pretty nasty things not following a recipe before :lol

[Quiteria]

:hug

Horrible cook here...dh and dd do not eat anything I make. Still learning, I guess. And I have low taste standards and healthy ingredients, so what I'm willing to eat is stuff they won't try. Tastes fine to me, or at least not bad enough to waste. :shrug :scratch

[CountryGirl]

YES!!! I hate almost everything I make from a recipe. I finally gave up on recipes and now I watch the food network. I get some great ideas of how to incorporate a few new ingredients and they also give a lot of information (especially on shows like Good Eats) of why a food is prepared a certain way and that has really helped.

So without recipes I've freed myself up to experiment with all sorts of things. I love to cook if it's quick and easy, (think semi-homemade) so I use a lot of "cream of _____" soups. It's great as a sauce for veggies, meat and yesterday for lunch I used cream of chicken over some whole wheat egg noodles and threw in some frozen peas. It was YUMMY.

I've also found that all of my meats turn out better on the bbq. So much so that we bought a nice gas grill this year and hubby got a huge outdoor umbrella so that I can cook on it year round. I watched a show on marinades and found out that low sodium soy sauce goes great with anything and is excellent for bbq chicken... I throw in all kinds of crazy stuff- peanut butter, garlic, salt, thai chili sauce, Tabasco, bbq sauce- whatever hits me when I open the fridge.

I guess I've just learned a few short cuts to get around in the kitchen with my cooking "disability". Maybe we need a thread that is tips for the cooking challenged...

Jenni

[Irene]

nd I have low taste standards and healthy ingredients, so what I'm willing to eat is stuff they won't try. Tastes fine to me, or at least not bad enough to waste. yeah me too. also, I have a "mentor" in a way I guess, my mom ;) and shes like "well, you just mix it till it looks right!" :lol I also did a class, and still my stuff doesnt turn out right. Cooking, baking, everything, Im just not good in the kitchen :( I have dh make meat if it needs to be grilled, I will throw it in a crock pot, but yeah, I just seem to ruin everything :/ I will eat it ;) but no one else will. its hard too because food is so expensive that I feel like hundreds of dollars a month I ruin :/ *sigh*

oh, and then i have everyone who knows my mom is a great cook and expect me to be as well :doh

[ChristianMother27]

wanted to add - sometimes i am so jealous of DH - he has a nose for cooking - wanted to be a chef at one point in time (but he'd have to go to school in like florida to make it a reality...) but he can literally smell something i am making and say "oh it needs x" or "you need more y". and everytime he makes something it is good lol

[KitKat]

Maybe the cooking gene skips a generation or something. My mother is a horrible cook, but I can hold my own. So who knows, maybe when your kids get older, they can cook FOR you. SEE, then you get yummy food AND you get out of kitchen duty. :tu

[snlmama]

I can *cook*, but I"m a terrible baker.

[Benjaminswife]

Well see it doesn't matter if I use a recepie or not, it's never that good. My DH is a wonderful cook though so that helps. I am okay with not being a good cook when I realized that was ok... :yes

[Benjaminswife]

Maybe the cooking gene skips a generation or something. My mother is a horrible cook, but I can hold my own. So who knows, maybe when your kids get older, they can cook FOR you. SEE, then you get yummy food AND you get out of kitchen duty. :tu


My mom hates to cook but I think my grandma was really good at it. So maybe my kids will take after her...:)

[SouthPaw]

i think i cook great but DH disagrees a lot of the time :lol we have very different tastes.

baking i am getting better at :tu i made a lemon meringue pie from scratch for DH's birthday last year and it was totally yummy. cooking, i tend to experiment and then i mess the stuff up. i do better with recipes that tell me exactly what to do (then i add a couple tablespoons of cayenne to make DH happy. yes, to everything.)

[ChristianMother27]

i'm a lot better at baking too :) with cooking i find that i go with the stuff that i am familiar with and build from there.

[Leslie]

I don't have the cooking gene, either - my sister is a great cook, I think she got her gene and mine. I prefer for someone else to do the cooking and I'll clean up. My sons (age 16 and 13) make dinner one night a week and they're already better at it than I am.

I'm doing a mostly raw diet now - lots of salads and smoothies - and I think I've found my niche. No cooking! :tu