I've always loved food. I fit in the category of "live to eat" rather than "eat to live". My mother was the chef in the household growing up while my dad was the BBQ master. She passed on some her skills and I eventually learned my way around a kitchen.
Source:Pexels
I'm no master chef but there's always something new to learn and it's a great feeling when improvising works out. It also makes you reevaluate HOW you eat when you actively see the cooking process and what is going in your body. It's easy to just buy food and ignore what went in it.
Cooking gives you a bit more control.
The act of cooking and eating is the very best part but that's leaving out 2 others steps...prepping and cleaning. I watched a few Gordon Ramsay videos and it's made me a much more efficient at cutting and chopping but it can be a bit tedious at times. Well let's be honest, it's a pain in the ass.
Source: Pexels
I recently went to Tokyo and I got to visit the Tsuboya Fish Market. We woke up early and other than trying some tasty fish and sushi, I wasn't expecting too much.
It WAS mostly fish and delicious snacks but we found this one stand selling kitchen knives (and a few wicked looking swords):
I've often seen Japanese cooking knives and they just kind of stand out to me. I ended up making an impulse buy and I bought one for about $100 or so. Apparently, the company crafts their blades based on old forging techniques when they used to make samurai swords.
Here I am with my new knife. I also bought a sharpener to go along with it. After a couple weeks, I returned to where I live in China and did some cooking and it's literally the sharpest knife I've ever handled. I was a little scared at first how easy it cuts through everything.
This has made cooking SO much better and way more enjoyable. If you cook at home and have never had a good quality knife, it really is worth it.
Finally, I'll share one of those Gordon Ramsay vids I was talking about: Chopping an Onion
Any cooking tips for an amateur? Share them below!!
