Learning to cook & bake as a hobby

Learning to cook: How to quickly create delicious dishes

The great thing about cooking and baking is that there is always more to learn. Regardless of if you are an absolute beginner or have been making food for many years, you will always find new ways to improve. If you decide to cook or bake regularly, you will quickly see that you get better with each dish as you learn and improve.

You will also be able to choose dishes that suit your lifestyle and keep you healthy. In addition, cooking for yourself can help you save money, and you can learn a lot about other countries and cultures by recreating their recipes.

Cooking tips for beginners: How can I learn to cook quickly and easily?

To make sure that your first dishes turn out well, follow a few cooking tips that can help you hit the ground running in your new hobby:

• Attend a cooking course: A cooking course offers you the opportunity to learn the basics and some important techniques under professional guidance. Not only will you learn the necessary know-how, but you will also meet other local cooking enthusiasts. Cooking courses can be found at adult education centres, cooking schools, restaurants or online.
• Buy a beginner’s cookbook: In addition to simple recipes, you will find many tips and tricks in cookbooks that you can start with right away. Start with simple recipes and slowly build-up to the more complex ones.
• Take your time to cook: If you are planning to cook a dish give yourself plenty of time, otherwise you might get stressed and make mistakes. Just enjoy the moment and immerse yourself in the new world of cooking.
• Preparation is important: Before you start frying and cooking, read through the recipe and get an idea of each of the steps. It’s a good idea to prepare all the ingredients and do the cutting and preparation work in advance. This lets you concentrate on the cooking later on.
• Everyday cooking: If you don’t have much time to cook during the week, quick dishes with few ingredients that you can prepare in no time are a good idea. For the weekends, set yourself bigger goals and cook dishes of your choice that you feel confident with. You can cook more at the weekend and freeze the meals for the week ahead.

In addition to these tips, you may need to buy some basic cooking equipment. This includes good knives (for meat, vegetables, bread, etc.) and different cutting boards (for onions/garlic, vegetables, and meat). You should also have a selection of different sized pots and (non-stick) pans. Once you have the equipment, nothing will get in the way of your cooking.

Cooking styles at a glance: Opportunities for further improvement

If you regularly impress your guests with your cooking skills and are looking for a new challenge, there are plenty of new things to try and ways to improve. That’s why we’re introducing you to different styles and styles of cooking that you can try your hand at:

• Fusion cooking: As the name suggests, this involves mixing different ingredients to create a new taste experience. For example, you can combine ingredients that don’t seem to go together at first glance or create something new from two typical national specialities.
• Soft Health Cuisine: This cuisine focuses on fresh fruit and vegetables as well as seasonal products. The focus here is on cooking as healthy as possible, but tasty. Vegetarian and vegan cuisine is a great challenge here.
• National cuisines: Once you have familiarised yourself with our local recipes, it is worth looking at other national dishes. Asian cuisine is considered quite sophisticated and gives allows you to discover new techniques and ingredients.
• Haute cuisine: This is the top class of cooking and was shaped by the star chefs of this world. Here, cooking becomes a true art and every dish a masterpiece. Find a few dishes from top chefs on the internet and you can try your hand at and create your own works of art.

Baking tips for beginners: Creating delicious cakes and pastries

To help you get started in your new hobby, follow these baking tips to help make your first baking attempt a success:

• It’s best to start small: Start with a simple recipe and don’t try to do too much at once. You can gradually increase your skills and learn more and more as time goes by. Simple muffin recipes, for example, are a good place to start.
• Attend a baking class: You can learn the basics and get many useful tips. In addition, a special baking course (e. g. cake design) offers you the opportunity to expand your knowledge later on and take on new challenges.
• Be well prepared: First read the recipe and familiarise yourself with each of the steps. You can also weigh, measure, and prepare ingredients in advance so that everything runs smoothly.
• Pay attention to the temperature of your ingredients: Unless otherwise specified in the recipe, your ingredients should all be at room temperature. This means, for example, that you should take eggs and butter out of the fridge some time before baking.
• Get to know your oven: Every oven is different. Especially if you have an older model, your oven may have developed little idiosyncrasies. Maybe it bakes more on one side than the other? If so, you should turn your pastry halfway through. Also, you should always preheat your oven.
• Use a cake tester: You can find out whether your baking is cooked through by inserting a cake tester (e. g. a thin skewer or a toothpick) deep into the cake. If no batter sticks, your cake can be taken out of the oven. This method works well with sponge cakes and muffins.

It is important that you follow your recipe exactly and weigh the ingredients carefully. Later, you can deviate a little from the recipe or try your hand at more sophisticated cakes once you have mastered the basics.

The basic baking equipment: What do you need to start baking?

If you simply want to try out some recipes and start baking as a hobby, you don’t need too many kitchen tools at first. We recommend this basic equipment, which you can steadily expand over time:

Conclusion

The unique thing about cooking at home is that you make something that you can enjoy with friends and family afterwards. You can make an everyday task a lot more fun, and afterwards, you can bite into it with pleasure. All that matters is that you take the first step and start cooking or baking. It’s normal that not every attempt will be perfect at first, but you will get better and better over time and be able to impress your guests.