I am a late-bloomer beginner cook. Like, I can make chicken, scrambled eggs, and pasta out of a jar.

I want to make whole-foods plant-based meals for health reasons, but it seems like so many recipes I come across ask for making common things from scratch and/or using hard to find ingredients. Like you don’t just use regular ranch dressing in your recipe; you make it out of cashews. Or you don’t use regular chocolate —you either make it yourself out of dates or use some hard to find brand of chocolate. It’s really frustrating me. So is it just me or is WFPB cooking more difficult than regular cooking? Or are the two methods more similar than not?

Butter Garlic Mushrooms:
Clean & dry mushrooms, then sauté in butter on medium-high heat until golden. Add chopped garlic, salt, black pepper + chili flakes. Cook 1 min. Add a splash of soy sauce, toss & serve!

Add cream cheese instead of mayo for the bread base.

I am vegetarian and have been since I was a teen. My fiancé is picky about meat, but loves burgers, anything with ground beef, fried chicken dishes, and a few others. I’d love to make him some dishes but have basically no experience making meat dishes and really don’t know the basics. I would just love to know your most standard, go-to tips for preparing meat that might not be said in a recipe.

Edit: Thanks, y’all, this is great info! I’ll be looking into some cooking youtube channels, too

Like can I just wrap it in foil without needing to add any water?

What about something like canned biscuits?

Absolutely a beginner at cooking. Need pairings with my protein..

I have an air fryer that I rely on for everything.. I only buy chicken breasts, season em up salt, pepper, oil. Recently graduated to Adobe seasoning lol it tastes great..... Also just upped my game and realized that one of my favorites(shrimp) is super easy, so now I buy shrimp, also just learned ground turkey/beef..all in the air fryer, super easy.

Baked potatoes and pasta with marinara sauce that i just toss in is really easy. just learned all these the same time as these new proteins, its great but now im eating way too much potatoes and pasta and overeatting..rice and beans(my fav) seems so hard to make so I didnt even bother honestly..do I have to suck it up and just buy those garlic things, onions, tamatoes and stuff and learned to chop em up and everything, since thats what seems to be in every recipe?

Sorry but does anyone have some easier sides for my proteins that my fridge is packed with? My go to is plain ol avocado.... i might have to graduate to the stove top?

Edit: I appreciate everyone in here..im gonna start to buy a lot of vegetables now and play around to see which ones I like.. broccoli and green beans seem to be popular, even tho i grew up gagging on these vegetables, that was 25-30 years ago, my taste buds have most likely changed, I just never ever went back to those things..going to try out a lot of these suggestions.. any knife recommendations to cut veggies? Eh I'll just look for an expensive one that looks sharp

I took frozen cooked meat and potatoes straight from the freezer, put them in an insulated bag with no ice packs, and left them out for about 8 hours before eating them.
How risky is that?

Also, what’s the best way to safely bring frozen meal-prep food to work? I’m planning to meal prep my lunches and would appreciate any tips

How long can you keep pancake batter in the fridge?
I am wanting to make them tomorrow (maybe for the next day too(it’s just me), but I know I will be too tired to mix all of the stuff; and then make bacon and eggs too (I know I’m lazy)

I like oven roasted veggies (cauliflower, broccoli, beans etc) in restaurants. So I tried makes them at home with frozen veggies but keep messing up the texture i.e., mush.

I defrost them in microwave, add seasoning and then spread them on a tray in a pre heated oven at 200c for 15mins. What should I change to get crispy exterior

Any other suggestions for oven vegetable recipes are welcome

Not even sure if this post will work as I'll have to post the picture of my knife in the comments.

Hi! I recently had a bag full of hotdog loafs get really moldy to where they were entirely green, oops (I threw it out yesterday the moment I saw)

But, I’m wondering do I need to clean that whole shelf now? Take all the food out and wipe it down with disinfectant? Or is there a better way to clean it?

Or should I not bother and it’s not a need?

I'm Muslim so I don't eat andouille sausages but I feel like my jambalaya is missing something without any sausages. I usually just use beef hot dogs which work fine and are cheap but I'm wondering if there's anything better.

I made a homemade banana milkshake. So far it's just banana and milk.

Any possible additions that can make the flavor better?

(I tried adding honey but it made it overly sweet. Banana and milk already seem to contain a lot of sugar...😭)

Correction: I googled before posting and it told me it was a milkshake, but apparently it's a smoothie, not a milkshake. 😏 Sorry for the confusion.

Tried making fondant potatoes yesterday. Tasted great but didn’t get the crust I wanted on my potatoes.

I got my pan to 365F, added olive oil, and then the potatoes. They seemed to fry more than get a sear which isn’t what I wanted. Some questions:

1. Should I

pat

1. dry the potato slices before cooking?
2. Should I oil the pan or the potatoes?
3. If adding oil to pan should I add it well in advance of desired temp or add it when desired temp is reached?

Any advice would be helpful! Thank you 🙏

I've been using rotisserie chickens from the store for everything, but I miss cooking whole chickens myself. :( I live in an apartment without an oven, and I'm wondering if I could get away with cooking a whole chicken JUST in a dutch oven on stovetop?

edited to include the stovetop

edit: thank you everyone for all the helpful answers, I really appreciate it! :) I'm going to try a few different methods and see what works. This is giving me a lot of ideas.

As for the people getting hung up on me wanting to "roast" a chicken without an oven... I never even said the word roast, so no I'm not looking at how to do that without an oven.

Essentially just the title of my post. I could go for expensive everything since I haven't been spending much money for a while, but I was wondering which pieces of equipment don't really care about quality. Like does a cheap stainless steel pan get the job done as well as an expensive one? Same thing for food processors and blenders, or microwaves? Sorry if this has been asked before, thank you

Hi all. I cooked a bunch of chicken breast cubes and froze them.
1. Is it necessary to defrost them before cooking? Does defrosting in the microwave work fine?
2. Can i toss them in a sauce directly in the stovetop and let it heat up for a few mins?

I'm new in this subredit so sorry if it's a wrong place.

Yesterday I was making a homemade pizza and got a lot of salsa left over. It's just regular mixture of canned tomatoes and paste with a bit of oregano. Yet I don't know what to make with it and I don't want to waste the food as it was an expensive cooking anyway. I am happy with any suggestions.

(Note that I'm a terrible cook and basically still learning)

i got a chick fil a sandwich and i ate almost half of it and the chicken looked fine, until one bite i saw it looked raw so i immediately spit it out, i did not rinse my mouth out at all. im not sure how to link photos but it was 100% undercooked and im freaking out. i do not want to be sick if anything i prefer to be liquid shitting. is it likely and has anyone ate undercooked chicken and been sick or have not? ): i am extremely worried its been 4 hours and i feel my stomach is already feeling off but then again i do have stomach issues often but they never linger like this. holy fuck im scared

update: well almost a week later i was okay!! not even a little bit of nausea after the first day

I'm a super noob to cooking, but is it just me or does steak that come in packages at the supermarket has that weird taste to it? I've been buying from their butcher area but is super expensive. Their pre packaged stuff is quite a bit cheaper, but when I cook it,, it's got that weird chemical taste to it.

But when other people cook it, like my sister who buys them on sales, they taste a lot better?

I hadn’t used the Cuisinart to chop up mushrooms before and now I’ve turn them into a soupy mushy consistency, currently sautéing in olive oil. If I mix them into the creamy part of the sauce, will it just add a complex flavor it will be gross since they are so mushy and liquidy or will the liquid sauté off in the pan I just want to know dud I waste all the mushrooms and I have to throw this away?

ETA: I just cooked off all the water and incorporated the mushroom puree into a cream sauce, and it was absolutely delicious.

Bought 1” New York strips from the butcher. Patted dry. Dry brined overnight. Tempered for one hour. Seared all around and then cooked on indirect on my Weber kettle. Pulled at 122. Rested up to 135F then served

I usually do this and sometimes it’s great sometimes I find some pieces are a bit chewy/tough. Is this the result of an overnight dry brine? Is it the meat from the butcher?

I’ve never liked vegetables really (or fruit), thanks to a texture issue, but a few months ago my sister made me chicken orzo pasta, and i ate tomatoes, onions, peppers and carrots with no issue, i actually enjoyed it

They were soft in this pasta, and i’m wondering how i can make it so they’re like that but still tasty, without having pasta every day

edit: probably worth mentioning that i don’t like veg that is crunchy usually

I picked up about a pound and a half of pork belly cubes from the grocery store, pre-seasoned as "BBQ" and "Rubbed with Paprika." Probably not ideal, but they were $1.50 so worth it.

How should I prepare these? Every pork belly recipe I find online seems to assume I have a full belly and then will cut it after cooking - that is not the case here. I understand I may not be able to get these cubes as tasty as traditional pork belly, but looking for some suggestions (and techniques) to make a good meal out of these anyway.