When I said it was time to get ready to cook, I didn't mean set your hair and fish out your pearls. We do not cook in a twinset and heels. I don't care if that's how your Grandma did it. Yes, that means that the martini has to go too. The drain, not your throat. Ok. I guess we can work around your Stepford get-up and get down to the real business of making this meal. Where is the recipe? Yes, we'll need the recipe. This isn't Ready Steady Cook. You're not quite ready for that yet. Right. You have the recipe and you have the ingredients. What do you do first?
You're looking lost, but I promise that it's perfectly logical. Read through the recipe and see how long it's going to take to prepare and to cook and also, see what components are going to take the longest to work with. You're still frowning. Ok... let me simplify it slightly. Does anything need to be cooked for a long period of time? Is there anything that needs to be blanched or peeled or chopped before it can be used? Do you need to pre-heat the oven? This information will help you to plan out what you need to do and in what order and help you not to panic while you're cooking. No... you're NOT going to panic. Don't worry... most recipes will tell you in step 1 what temperature you need to turn the oven onto. In fact, most recipes will tell you step for step what you need to do and in what order, but sometimes these directions assume that you know more than they're telling you, so this is to help you over those tricky patches.
Ok. Now you've read the recipe, turned the oven on and you're facing your ingredients. It's like an unconquered mountain waiting to be hiked, but it's a whole lot easier and more fun. Start by peeling the ingredients that need to be peeled and chopping all those that need chopping. Prepare meat and make sure that you've got all your ingredients ready. Measure out and prepare everything that you can ahead of time so that you can save yourself some time when you're cooking. This will help you to feel more in control which can make all the difference in the world when you're trying something new. What do they mean by chopped? Weeeelllllll... that would be when you reduce something in size and shape from its original state through the judicious use of a sharp implement, usually a knife. Don't look at me like that, you asked the silly question. Oh. You meant HOW would they like it chopped when they just say "chopped". Ok, I'll grant you that that isn't such a silly question...
Recipes will often use descriptions like chopped, sliced, diced, cubed, etc and this leaves a lot up to us in terms of interpretation. It helps if maybe you've seen a photo of the finished dish, but if you haven't, you'll need to make an educated guess. For example, most dishes in which onions are added at the beginning and cooked for a long time would need finely chopped onions, but if you're making fried onion for burgers, you would want to chop it into chunky pieces or even slices. If a vegetable dish has a short cooking time, the chances are that smaller pieces are going to cook faster and better than larger ones and for something like a stew, larger chunks would be better so that they don't just cook away into "smoosh". Yes, "smoosh" is a real word. It's a highly technical part of chef terminology. No, I can't prove it. Yes, you'll have to take my word for it.
Ok, so by now, you've read the recipe and you've turned the oven on and you've prepared the ingredients, so now it's time to get cracking on this new dish of yours. Remember, the friend who suggested this dish is someone you care about (yes you do) and your friends are coming for dinner later, so pay attention and do your best. No. No drinking until they're here. No. Not even 1 glass :-) It's important to pay attention when you're cooking something new. To be honest, when we're cooking the dishes that we do regularly, we get into autopilot mode and tend to cook without paying much attention to the individual steps... a kind of "kitchen memory". The dish will turn out great, but you may as well have been in another room for all the focus you had on the process. With a new dish, you have to follow each step and make sure that you don't ruin ingredients, curdle sauces, burn oil or triple salt a dish. Now... the food is busy cooking and you've discovered that it's not that scary after all. Don't look shocked, I told you it would be easy and I'll bet you're having fun too? I see that smile. No, wiping it off your face isn't going to stop the fact that you smiled. You ARE having a good time.
Why? Well, I think that it's the challenge of the new dish. It's like finding a new adventure to take. There are new flavours, textures, ingredients and there is a tremendous sense of accomplishment that you can get from taking those raw elements and presenting a delicious and innovative meal at the end of it all... Now, you've hopefully been washing up the dishes as you've been going (you HAVEN'T? Oh dear...), but no matter if not. Unless you're serving dinner in your kitchen it isn't too serious. Pack away everything you didn't use or haven't finished up and wipe down the surfaces at least. Stack things neatly by the sink and then check that the oven and stove are under control and go and get yourself ready for your guests. Yes... now would be the time to fish out the twinset, but really, I think jeans and a blouse would be ok for your friends.
So... go and freshen up, open that bottle of red (the one you didn't drink already) and soon enough you'll be able to serve up your newly mastered dish to your suitably impressed friends!
Until next time...
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