Before quarantine started, I was a dedicated fast-food goer. It was at the point that the workers at Dunkin’ Donuts knew my name and order every time I walked up to the counter. When I did cook at home, which was a rarity, the best I would do was some steamed vegetables and instant mac and cheese. Now that COVID-19 caused most restaurants to shut down, I’m in quite the pickle. So far, I have lived off of TV dinners and store-bought iced coffees, but I’m trying to protect myself from a virus here, so I figured I should start eating healthier and maybe give cooking a shot.
I would like to clarify a few things before I get into my cooking journey. I’m the type of person that burns water. One time, my mom asked me to get her a clove of garlic from the grocery store, and I came back home with an onion. During the fall semester, I made the fire alarm go off when I tried cooking chicken breasts on the stove. This happens to people all the time, but I got so preoccupied with turning off the alarm that I ended up burning the chicken! On top of this, I have this irrational fear that I will somehow manage to stab myself if I even go near a knife (I watch too many horror movies). So, when I say that I am bad at cooking, I mean that I am the physical embodiment of Gordon Ramsey’s “idiot sandwich” in the kitchen.
The day we were supposed to cook, my cousin turned my fear of getting stabbed into a reality when she was washing the knives in the sink. In retrospect, I should have taken this as a warning and given up then because it was all downhill from there.
The dish called for mung bean sprouts, but my mom bought raw mung beans. None of us were aware that you had to soak the mung beans overnight to make them sprout; we figured that they would sprout when they cook. Since I considered myself to be a professional chef, I didn’t even bother to look it up. This came back to haunt me when we were serving the dish and found out that the beans were still undercooked. Needless to say, we ended up ordering Chinese food instead.
This was the first of many failed cooking attempts during the quarantine. I know now that I am no Julia Child or Gordon Ramsey, but I can at least cook a chicken breast without burning it. If you’re stuck alone in your apartment, or if you’re back home, maybe try learning how to cook a few meals. It saves a lot of money in the long run, and, personally, I’ve noticed that my skin has been looking a lot better since I’ve stopped eating out.
You will mess up a little, granted, probably not as much as I did, but it’s all part of the learning process. Find four dishes a week that you think you would enjoy eating and practice cooking them until you get the hang of it. Start simple and work up from there and do not get cocky, or you will end up ordering UberEats. You never know, at the end of quarantine you might fall in love with cooking.
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