Cooking at Home
Before I start posting recipes on here, I want to start out by saying that I am not claiming to be a chef in any way. A chef is someone who runs all aspects of a professional kitchen. It might be hard to believe, but cooking at home and cooking in a restaurant are two COMPLETELY different things. People that know what they’re doing in professional kitchens are intelligent, efficient, and extremely hardworking. This can also be true for home cooks, except you aren’t doing it for hundreds of people every night.
I wanted to start by saying that because I have done both (line cook, not a chef), and i’ve learned a couple things while being in a professional kitchen. The most important thing I ever learned is that you need to be able to use your intuition. Things that you did not expect are bound to happen, even if you’ve made the same dish 100 times. You need to be able to work on the fly. If you don’t have the exact ingredients listed, don’t be afraid to work with what you have. Just because you only have normal mayo when a recipe calls for kewpie, that shouldn’t stop you from making the dish. Get creative. Unless you’re baking, following a recipe to the exact gram or ml likely wont turnout as well as it could have. You’ll find that I almost never use exact measurements for seasonings/garnishes. This is because I taste as I go. This will result in the best possible outcome, every single time. You need to taste and adjust throughout.
Cooking is not about how well someone can follow a recipe. Home Cooking is about making things you enjoy taste great. We all have different tastebuds. I may like my salmon finished with more lemon juice than someone else. This is perfectly fine…the recipes I post on here are simply guidelines. The main point is to get in the kitchen, experiment, and try new things. Who knows, you may actually like it.