Cooking is Terrible: The Book
Oct. 7th, 2021 04:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alias_sqbrI just bought the low-effort cookbook Cooking is Terrible after seeing it recced a bunch on tumblr, and I feel like it was worth $5USD for me, even having to scroll past anything reliant on cheese/beans etc. I haven't actually cooked anything from it yet, but I recognised a bunch of things I already make, and got a bunch of interesting ideas I intend to try. And I was inspired to create something new and tasty(*)
Where it differs from traditional cookbooks is that it's designed for people who don't have the energy for a lot of thinking or preparation. So the easiest stuff is at the front: a list of things you can eat with no prep at all. Then come suggestions for nice sandwich fillings, moving on to general advice for making soup plus some nice combos of ingredients etc.
I can see it being useful to scroll through when I'm hungry and have enough ingredients and energy to cook something but nothing seems both attainable and appealing. I might take the text as a base for a personalised version, removing all the things I will never eat and adding in extras.
The tone in the chatty bits is folksy/cutesy in a tumblry way and assumes a lot about the reader, I found it more charming than obnoxious but ymmv. Also the taste and advice is pretty American, but there's enough generalness and variety that it wasn't TOO bad for me as an Australian.
It doesn't teach very basic cooking techniques. It doesn't assume (or use) very advanced skills, but will say, like, "add a fried egg if you want" without explaining further.
It makes some effort to take food intolerances and preferences into account, and is implicitly helpful for physically disabled people, but doesn't feel aimed at us (it does feel kinda aimed at mentally ill and neurotypical people). So there's no consideration of whether recipes require standing/lifting/fine motor skills etc, though these sorts of things do tend be minimised by the overall aim of being 'easy', and some of the chatty bits assume more ability than I have. It does try to keep things cheap.
Here's some more description from the author, including a recipe.
(*)chopped green capsicum/pepper and chicken salt. That's not in the book(**) but definitely a result of it encouraging me to me to think outside the box.
(**)Afaict Americans don't even have chicken salt?? So their culinary opinions can only be trusted so far. EDIT: Ok so turns out cooked sweet potato and spices in a smoothie is pretty great. Score one for America, I guess.
Where it differs from traditional cookbooks is that it's designed for people who don't have the energy for a lot of thinking or preparation. So the easiest stuff is at the front: a list of things you can eat with no prep at all. Then come suggestions for nice sandwich fillings, moving on to general advice for making soup plus some nice combos of ingredients etc.
I can see it being useful to scroll through when I'm hungry and have enough ingredients and energy to cook something but nothing seems both attainable and appealing. I might take the text as a base for a personalised version, removing all the things I will never eat and adding in extras.
The tone in the chatty bits is folksy/cutesy in a tumblry way and assumes a lot about the reader, I found it more charming than obnoxious but ymmv. Also the taste and advice is pretty American, but there's enough generalness and variety that it wasn't TOO bad for me as an Australian.
It doesn't teach very basic cooking techniques. It doesn't assume (or use) very advanced skills, but will say, like, "add a fried egg if you want" without explaining further.
It makes some effort to take food intolerances and preferences into account, and is implicitly helpful for physically disabled people, but doesn't feel aimed at us (it does feel kinda aimed at mentally ill and neurotypical people). So there's no consideration of whether recipes require standing/lifting/fine motor skills etc, though these sorts of things do tend be minimised by the overall aim of being 'easy', and some of the chatty bits assume more ability than I have. It does try to keep things cheap.
Here's some more description from the author, including a recipe.
(*)chopped green capsicum/pepper and chicken salt. That's not in the book(**) but definitely a result of it encouraging me to me to think outside the box.
(**)Afaict Americans don't even have chicken salt?? So their culinary opinions can only be trusted so far. EDIT: Ok so turns out cooked sweet potato and spices in a smoothie is pretty great. Score one for America, I guess.
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Date: 2021-10-07 09:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-10-07 10:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-10-07 05:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-10-07 09:45 pm (UTC)I googled and according to epicurious you don't, they suggest importing some from Australia. It's chicken flavoured salt designed for putting on hot chips/french fries. Afaict it's not totally dissimilar to something like Old Bay spice and other such seasoned salts that you do have, but chicken-y-er.
Ingredients vary significantly but the one I have is: Salt (70%), Wheat Flour, Flavour Enhancers (621, 635, 327), Wheat Starch, Onion Powder, Sugar, Maltodextrin (from corn and tapioca), Food Acids (330), Anticaking Agent (341), Flavours, Spice, Beef Fat, Bell Pepper Powder, Herbs, Soy Sauce Powder, Seasoning, Caramel Colour (150c).
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Date: 2021-10-07 11:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-10-15 02:42 am (UTC)Nah it definitely doesn't taste like beef, though whether it tastes like chicken either is arguable. A lot of them are vegan and/or msg-free and just spices.
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Date: 2021-10-08 04:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-10-08 12:25 am (UTC)We also don't have vegemite, which I've been wanting to get ever since I first tried it...ten years ago?
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Date: 2021-10-15 02:40 am (UTC)nods sadly
Meanwhile I fell in love with peanut powder (powdered peanut butter?) when we visited the US and noone sells it here :(
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Date: 2021-10-15 04:09 am (UTC)I think I actually found a grocery store today that purports to have Vegemite! I won't be able to investigate it for a while, but maybe my decade-long dream will be realized.
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Date: 2021-10-17 10:56 am (UTC)It's great for stuff like salads and crumb coatings where mixing in peanut butter or solid peanut pieces is troublesome.
I wish you every success in your Vegemite quest! I know there's places to order it online, too, though don't know about costs/location limitations etc. When you get it, remember to apply it very thinly!
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Date: 2021-10-17 06:04 pm (UTC)And thank you! :D