How to Cook Everything: The Basics: All You Need to Make Great Food--With 1,000 Photos: A Beginner Cookbook (How to Cook Everything Series, 2)

I've been to culinary school, so I'm a competent cook, but rusty with my skills. This book is a great primer for guidance in the kitchen. The recipes are well written, and I like the section that suggests alternative flavorants to switch up the flavors. The photos are helpful, too.

I'd shared cooking duties for years with my wife, and my subtle teenager summed it his take on my skills: "Dad, your cooking just has a low upside." Ouch!After one too many comments I decided to really learn to cook. So I thought, like any skill, the first step was to fully master the basics, then branch out. So, you can see how I was attracted a book titled "How to Cook Everything - the Basics."As a non-chef interested in learning fundamental skills, here's why I found this book so valuable:- Each recipe introduces you to new skills, starting easy and progressing to more advanced. Even if you don't cook each recipe, you learn a lot just reading through them.- There are pictures showing you how to prepare the dishes. For example, there was a pumpkin pie recipe that showed exactly when to recognize that it should come out of the oven - with just a bit liquidy in the center. While this could have been described, I found it much easier to understand visually. And there are full-color visuals like that for every recipe.- Each recipe includes variations, so you can start to learn how to improvise - what works with what. That also makes the recipes much more varied.- Really helpful for me, he emphasized "taste and adjust" for all your cooking. I never really did that and am learning that it can make the difference between okay and very tasty.- If you go through all the sections, you'll be inevitably be introduced to things you'd never have considered. We made bulgar with feta and shimp. I honestly had never even heard of bulgar, but it was quite tasty!- In the beginning of the book, there's a few sections about what you should have in your kitchen by way of utensils, spices, etc. That's probably in other books but I found it helpful.- I think it introduces you to a very wide range of food types and cooking skills, so that after you've plowed through it you can feel confident you've at least been exposed to most techniques.For me, the big test was Thanksgiving dinner, which I'd never cooked before. In addition to turkey, we had mashed potatoes, stuffing, glazed carrots, and homemade pie. To say my family was amazed was an understatement, and I felt like the How to Cook Everything made it seem simple, and not very stressful.I would like to point out some downsides:- I also purchased the Kindle version. While it's a fine complement to the book, I wouldn't suggest buying it instead of the book. Why? They changed the order somewhat and I found the tips/pictures for preparation pretty hard to follow.- Remember when your third-grade teacher said, when you open a new textbook, you need to "break the binding?" I didn't do that and after a couple months the pages started falling out. So, do open the book the the middle, stretch the pages flat, and so so for every 50 pages or so.- If you're already an accomplished cook, or just not a clueless as I was, this might be too basic. He has a lot of other books I'm sure would be better for you.BUT, if you never learned the basics, read through the book, try a select set of recipes, and you'll be amazed with your new-found cooking expertise!Bon Appetit!

I learned how to make a salad with this book.No, no, don't think "it's so easy, who needs to learn!" No, no.Before this, I make salad this way: go to the grocery, buy pre-boxed chopped vegetable, buy a bottle of dressing like sundried tomato and then a bag of garlic toast croutons.Now, I make a salad this way: buy 4 different kind of fresh vegie, as fresh as I can get. Learned how to clean them, and store them (so important, did you know they last for days?). Make my own croutons, such act that I never knew possible, and easy like making toast (3 mins top, and last for days). Make my own dressing (olive oil, vinegar of some sort, salt and papper). Toss them up and a salad. Flavor is woefully light, vegetable so fresh it's, well, refreshing. Croutons seasoned and not soaked in oil like the ones in the bags. I make my own bread (also in this book, 10 active minute, the rest watching tv and waiting). Everything in this salad is made from the basic ingredients. This is a "made" salad, nothing was processed, nothing pre-packaged. Each component was made from its basic ingredients.So I go around and tell people I learned how to make a salad proudly. They laughed, not understanding the delicate tastes of fresh ingredients and the simplicity of making it. They were a little shocked to taste my salad, so was I. It tastes so different! Well, which restaurant (or person for that matter) ever served us their salad with everything made from scratch (even the bread for the croutons)? None!With this I have learned what kind of lettuce there are, how croutons are made, what dressing consist off (and how light they should be, and how little they should be on the salad). And the time it takes to make a refreshing salad is so little that it shocked me. Like that one time I saw they sell "pre-diced" onions... does it take that long? (I also learned how to dice onion from this book).A true appreciation for food and cooking apparently is not from having tasted the best food, but the joy of how to make a delight meal with the slightest bit of effort, from the fundamentals. I ate my food right in the kitchen, because it felt like a chief seemingly threw something together at the end of his work day, so much different and simpler from what he make all day, and yet manage to blow my mind with it. When he's not trying to impress any guests with fancy techniques and exotic ingredients, his dish is the distillation of his arts.Anyway.I learned how to boil egg yesterday. And I shall be proud to share it to everyone I know.Also, i bought the joy of cooking, found at good will for $5.I learned how to set up a table from that book.

This is a brilliant book that I purchased for my grandson who wants to train as a trainee chef when he finishes school, this book is very useful for a trainee

Mark, thank you!This book is exactly what I needed. I went through so many cookbooks with complicated recipes, no pictures, and obscure ingredients. I became so frustrated. . . then I found this book. Mark lays out of the basics, gives easy (but delicious) beginner recipes, and loads them with pictures. His e-book is expertly designed, and the best part? You can tell Mark is an expert chef. He knows what every spice, ingredient, and food is doing, and he can communicates it so well.Mark, you are a lifesaver!

Great for beginners, has fundamentals and easy recipes to practise on. Recipes are quite simple in flavour, good as somewhere to start. Would recommend.

Great book with a lot of pictures to describe the very detailed descriptions step by step. If it just wasn’t for the stupid cups and spoons measurements. But definitely not the fault of the book.

Like some other reviewers I'm also a single guy who never really had the chance to learn much beyond omelettes and spaghetti. But this book lays it all out in plain English with plenty of pictures and detail where detail is really needed. No 10-course meals or $300 ingredients. Mark walks you through some important essentials and provides many recipes. Great job on this and I'll be looking at more of his books .