I'm looking for websites, particular webpages, Youtube channels, etc.
I'm about to google this stuff but I'd still like suggestions to help me just do it and make sauces myself for basic sauces like sweet and sour, tikka masala, butter chicken, curry (many kinds).
I've started to make most of my meals in a Dutch oven. I throw frozen vegetables in there along with some kind of frozen meat and cook it all for ~45 minutes.
The next thing for me to do is make sauces myself.
It's only very recently that I finally cured myself of my Pavlov's Dog habit of buying frozen meals so I could stick them in the microwave oven and hear that ding. The food usually isn't that good and I know even as lazy as I am - I can do better than that.
steal the pdf for kenji lopez-alt's "food lab," it has a ton of great reasons behind how cooking works so you can apply the information to other recipes and cooking in general.
This exactly. Kenji is a modern food GOAT, and truly cares about the greater community. Regularly lets other people publish his big findings, will make YouTube videos demonstrating his techniques and findings. Owns a restaurant and has been as based as possible throughout COVID.
Kenji is someone that I will support when I have the money for it, but he's also the kind of guy that would tell you to just pirate the book if you don't have the money for it.
i totally have the hardbound copy and it's easily my most used book. i don't really think it would be a stretch to say that kenji's approach and techniques have had the largest single impact on any modern online cooking resources.
If you want to learn the science behind it than you can't do better than Serious Eats. Their recipes are stupid complicated but they do a good job of explaining why you're doing everything
Serious Eats.
That seems educational and it can~~'t~~ help to distract me from war doomscrolling.
Ninja edit: Freudian slip?
Give it a shot! Learn to make something really good and enjoy it with company. Plenty of Hexbears to man the comms, rest a spell
If you tolerate "Youtuber voice" I've found Adam Ragusea and Ehtan Chlebowski to be informative but somewhat nerdy.
Ragusea puts out good videos but my goodness the man has built a tolerance to the smell of his own farts
Adding Kenji López-Alt to that list. He doesn't go in big on the editing or YouTuber voice, just clean honest vids. Fuck Joshua Weissman though that guy is unbearable.
Kenji is the new Alton Brown. He's brilliant and he's changing the food game. A few weeks ago I thought, "do other people use this ingredient like this?" Top result is from Kenji. Then a few hours later I think, "Can I put this dish in the oven and roast it instead of watching the pot?" First result is Kenji.
Every time I make anything I try to push the envelope. I rarely look up any recipes. I just cook to better my dishes, but every time I think "did I just come up with something no one has ever thought to do?", I find that no I haven't, and Kenji already perfected its execution 4 years ago.
Thanks.
If you tolerate "Youtuber voice"
I'll see if I can stomach it. Bah boom.
In all seriousness - I really wish people would just talk in their normal voices.
https://youtu.be/8ZMZT3wCBjw?si=k4oHzBCVVAcd8zeI
Adam Ragusea is a super weird lib but his videos are definitely helpful and this one specifically seems relevant to what you're talking about. Also just check out like any recipe from Chef John. Both of these two go out of their way to make cooking anything feel genuinely accessible and I have learned a lot from watching both of them
Besides Kenji's food lab, learning the 5 French "mother" sauces is necessary. Almost every sauce is just a variation of those sauces.
Learning how to make a bechamel will give you the biggest reward IMO. Gravy, cheese sauce, cream sauces for pasta, all of those are just a bechamel with different things added. Garlic cream sauce for pasta? Add garlic to a bechamel. Gravy for potatoes, beef, chicken, or whatever? Add some thyme, rosemary and onion to a bechamel. Cheese sauce for Mac and cheese, or a cheese dip? Add cheese and some mustard powder to a bechamel.
Ridiculously simple, takes only a few minutes, and come thanksgiving, everyone will rave about your gravy since everyone seems to just buy the jars of flavorless garbage gravy.
I HIGHLY recommend the “Binging with Babish” channel. He makes all kinds of good stuff and explains it, but probably more to your liking would be the “Basics with Babish” series where he goes over the basics of cooking. He has on particular video on sauces which you should most certainly watch.
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLopY4n17t8RD-xx0UdVqemiSa0sRfyX19&si=BrlAziE1hw_8bedu
I would recommend picking one emulsion sauce and getting really good at it. Emulsions are tricky and can easily break so you'll want to get a sense for how to fix them.
The simplest I can think of is making aglio e olio. The emulsion is peppery-garlicky olive oil and water with starch to bind. The dish is actually very different depending on if you get the emulsion to... emulsify. It will be sticky and (more) delicious instead of oily and still delicious.
