As an avid cook (I'm going to need a storage locker for all my cookbooks soon), I'd love to be able to turn my friends on to cooking. All my non-cooking friends say they want to learn how to cook well, but that it's just too hard, and the obvious sources for learning how to cook (TV shows, cook books) are no help. Based on their comments and observations of my own, I'd say that the popular cookbooks and TV shows are no help because they're incredibly intimidating. They fall into one of:
1) The "authenticity at all costs" camp -- obscure/expensive ingredients that no one could ever find or afford, or incredibly involved "the only way to do it" recipes (ever seen Julia Child's recipe for French bread?)
2) The "cooking as event" camp -- presentation and theater are king. Can you say Emiril?
3) The "insanely narrowly focused" camp -- all Italian food (for example) all the time. Great, but how do I boil water, much less make a sublime saltimboca?
What suggestions would you have for somebody who wants eventually to cook like the pros, but needs to start at the ground floor?
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As an avid cook (I'm going to need a storage locker for all my cookbooks soon), I'd love to be able to turn my friends on to cooking. All my non-cooking friends say they want to learn how to cook well, but that it's just too hard, and the obvious sources for learning how to cook (TV shows, cook books) are no help.
Based on their comments and observations of my own, I'd say that the popular cookbooks and TV shows are no help because they're incredibly intimidating. They fall into one of:
1) The "authenticity at all costs" camp -- obscure/expensive ingredients that no one could ever find or afford, or incredibly involved "the only way to do it" recipes (ever seen Julia Child's recipe for French bread?)
2) The "cooking as event" camp -- presentation and theater are king. Can you say Emiril?
3) The "insanely narrowly focused" camp -- all Italian food (for example) all the time. Great, but how do I boil water, much less make a sublime saltimboca?
What suggestions would you have for somebody who wants eventually to cook like the pros, but needs to start at the ground floor?