W hy did I develop this? I was an out of work software engineer with a working wife. Being a dutiful husband, I made dinner. A lot of dinners. After a couple of months of my existing repertoire of salads, steaks, chops, chicken and pasta, it was time for a change.
I started simple. It did not take long to realize a recipe does not teach you how to cook. So I found myself digging through cookbooks. Digging and digging. I made up the lists for what to shop for and went off to the store. Oops, what kind of ham was that? Okay, looks like I have to make sure I really know how to select it. Okay, it’s time to start. What’s the difference between dice, mince and chop? What’s medium high? How do tell when the meat is really "browned" and on and on. Long ago I worked with a software product called RAMIS. It was also known as "R ead A ll M anuals, I t’s S omeplace". That’s how I was starting to feel about cooking. I can’t find out where the following came from, but at this point in my cooking career, when I read it, well, I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry:
I read recipes the same way I read science fiction.
I get to the end and think, "Well, that’s not going to happen."
There are LOTS of resources on Cooking. There are Cooking Shows galore. Websites — hundreds. Cookbooks — thousands — maybe millions.
I remember:
Searching cooking websites for a simple Tomato Pasta Sauce. Oops, that’s an enormous amount to wade through.
Click, Click, Click, Click, Click, Click, Click, Click, Click,Click, Click "Whats all this, Where is the RECIPE?", Click, Click, Click, Click, Click, Click, Click ...seeing a site with video instructions on how to prepare a leg of lamb. Bought the leg. Got home, getting ready — the page was gone.
watching a show and taking notes. Oops, how did I miss that? What were all those ingredients? Why doesn’t mine look or taste like theirs? What gives?
Some cookbooks are pretty good, but way too often, they try and shoehorn the content into what fits on a page. My favorite is the Joy of Cooking. But too often, it reminds me of RAMIS. The Frugal Gourmet has lots of great ideas, recipes and tips; however, when I am planning and cooking, its hard to watch TV. The Galloping Gourmet, both past and present versions are fun to watch. There are a few websites that will give, for free, some of the basic information you need to learn to cook. But they are not integrated, the searches are often primitive and more often than not, you will do a lot of clicking (and spend a lot of time) getting what you are looking for.
But what I wanted was a decent tool, book, website or class that was geared towards the beginning cook. Something that imparts the basics, shows you how to actually cook.
I’m a big fan of books; I think they’re FANTASTIC. It’s great that all that information is available on all those websites. It’s nice that they have all those television shows on cooking. But its a lot of information to wade through. Lots of blind alleys, too. I am not a big fan of PDF files or the other "Electronic Book" formats. I would rather have the book. If you are reading it on your computer, there is certainly a lot more you can do to make the reader more productive, make the presentation more interesting and make looking things up A LOT EASIER. In no small part, my motivation is to provide more and better content, for less. I knew I could do a better job. I hope you agree. If you want better vehicles for education, order up a copy of the CD.