Cooking 101: The Basics of Cooking Series

Why the basics of cooking series?

While writing recipes, I have understood that there is no way around using technical terms or certain basic assumptions. Though I try to give explanations and keep it simple, I have always had something at the back of my mind that needs to be done. I finally had that 'aha! moment' today. I need to write about the basics of cooking. 

How will a person who has never cooked before get around to feeling more comfortable with it? Simple, by knowing the beauty of each technique and spice that goes into the process and what outcomes it brings. For that I need to write down all this implicit knowledge that we have of cooking. 

I have picked up a lot of knowledge about cooking from my grandma, mom, aai, aaji, bhabhi, professional chefs' articles and recipes. Most of this has been passed down orally or during show and tell. And I WRITE recipes. That's the gap that needs to be filled.

I need to write down why do I feel comfortable when I read a recipe. Why do I know what I know about the steps in a recipe when I read it? These things can't be explained in every recipe. But having explanations of it can make new readers of recipes and budding cooks feel more competent to attempt them. 

So here's writing down the goals of this series that I am attempting. This is to the knowledge of cooking that we know and have not easily expressed in recipes! This goes out to all the first-time cooks to whom I say welcome to magic!