Help me to learn:)

At the start of almost every meal fry garlic/ chilli/ ginger/ onion/ all of the above in some oil until they go slightly brown. Do not burn them. This flavors your oil and carries flavor through your whole dish.

If you have to clean stuff stuck to your pan you've messed up. Deglaze a pan with delicious stuff stuck to it with wine, stock, rice wine or another liquid.

If you're doing stirfrys, cook stuff in batches. That way you wont overcook anything and you won't crowd the pan steaming stuff instead of frying it.

Add salt to taste to almost everything. Add sugar to taste to almost everything (even just a pinch). Add butter to a lot of things.

Toast some sesame seeds and peanuts and keep jars of them to sprinkle on top and elevate dishes

Herbs.

If you have bones or a carcass, make stock.

Roast vegetables.

Find a local chinese supermarket if you live in a diaspora, it will be a lot cheaper and have interesting ingredients.

Serious Eats is a great site that explains technique and isn't strictly recipes. Anything written by Kenji on it is good.
Maangachi for korean food
Vahchef for indian food
Foodwishes
Cooking with Jack

> Mfw I went on his youtube page and realized hes not a troll

How one man can be so oblivious to his on shortcomings is beyond me.

Fire good.
Cook meat before eating.
You now have all the knowledge you need to survive.

You need things in your pantry for cooking to become fun. This pantry you usually build up by cooking different recipes over time. I thought a friend how to cook last year, he basically only makes chopped salads and rice/bulgur with seared vegetables that looked nice/were in season with some meat.
Basically my advice is to find recipes that look easy enough and turn you on, i can recommen seriouseats for that, thats what started me cooking a lot. Once you learned techniques from following recipes you can easily apply them to whatever soon (knowing ways to cook veg, seasoning, purees,soups w/e)

Equipment wise, you can make do with a wok, a wooden spoon, a knife and a chopping board. I'd recommend the $40 victorinox as it's a great knife regardless of the price.
Some would say that a Dutch oven is more essential than a wok.
Nice things to have are a 12" skillet, a spatula, a balloon whisk and prep bowls, some tongs and baking trays/sheets.
You do not need nor ever will, a strawberry huller, a milk frother or a device that turns vegetables into spaghetti. If a piece of kit is single use and you're not going to use it twice a week for the foreseeable future, it's not worth it.

Buy a half pound of ground beef, some spaghetti noodles, and a can of crushed tomatoes.

Brown the meat, add the tomatoes, a little salt and pepper, and eat it over the noodles.

Keep notes on what you'd like to add and try next time. Maybe some chopped up garlic and basil? Or grates parmesan? From there you'll develop your own tastes and will begin to learn how each addition can affect the dish overall.

>Add sugar to taste to almost everything (even just a pinch).

Wat.
Why? Can't handle acidic/bitter?

Watch America's Test Kitchen/Cook's Country or look at their cook books. I especially recommend America's Test Kitchen Cooking School Cookbook (really good for beginners) and The Complete Cooking For Two Cookbook.

Good restaurants add sugar to almost everything, you would be suprised. It just adds a depth of flavor, it doesn't necessarily make the dish sweet. It's like how there's a pinch of salt in most sweet baking recipes.

I like brown sugar.

Just go for it and try out various things. Go on a cooking channel on YouTube, point at a picture like "That. I'm gonna do THAT." and just do it. Failure is the first step to improvement.

There are loads of recipes found on the internet. Usually you can find a chef with a style you like. Then just try making the recipes. Remember that even if it's not tasty or you messed up a part you cook for yourself.

If OP was cooming asian, then adding sugar would be fairly common for sauces.

Not every dish needs or benefits from sugar, whereas salt is needed sugar can come out naturally from cooked vegetables, but some dishes might benefit from adding sugar to cut tartness (like tomato soup).

>good restaurants do x so i should do it at home

I could make mashed potato like restaurants do with 1 part butter for 2 parts potatoes, but its unrealistic and i don't want to become a fatass

Do i really need a wok to make good stir fry tofu?

Learn a couple simple yet tasty and healthy recipies and repeat them often to get a good grip of the basics. In time, you can vary with ingredients and spices, and find your taste and figure out what certain ingredients do with the taste of the meal.

Don't get discouraged if it's difficult in the beginning or you don't know some basic stuff. Just call your mum or look on the internet for help. When I first left the house I called my mom a couple of times a week to learn how she made stuff. In the very beginning I even had to ask basic stuff like how long potatos should boil.

Always smell spices before putting them in. This will help you identify how they taste in the end result, and will help you figure out if it goes in your dish in the first place. Also, it just smells nice.

Every now and again, if you have a lot of time that day. You might want to look up a more ambitious recipe and simply follow the instructions. Everything you learn you can later use for your own creations.

You'll find that eventually you can improvise a nice meal.

Bonus budget tip: cooking for one can sometimes be a drag, especially if you have many perishable ingredients that will be left over. If you cook for multiple days, you can do more for less money. It's also handy if you're often short on time.

this. many different kinds of soup require you to learn to sear meat and cut veggies. that's a good start. once you have a handle on how to prep for soup, you can basically prep for casseroles or stir fries or anything that's not going to be plated for Veeky Forums snobs to troll.

No way, a pan is fine. With a household range, lots of stir fries are actually better in a saute pan, because you can get the heat higher. Fried rice or noodles like pad thai are really the only common things that are much better in a wok.

Thanks lad ill give it a shot

Thats how I usually cook when i dont bring food from the Deli. Beats cup noodle or instant ramen which my sister eats everyday.

Hey OP I was in that boat too

>sandwiches
>grilled cheese if you can afford cheese
>instant noodles with tuna mixed in
>bacon and eggs
>save the rest of the bacon and eat it with sweet potato
>eggs are also good have fried, scrambled, poached eggs on toast or hash
>cans/bags of soup with bread
>oatmeaaaaal every day
>stir fry
>it's stupid to make your own stir fry sauce because then you have heaps of sesame oil etc just sitting around which you dont need
>buy frozen vegetables
>frozen fish

thekitchn.com/collection/cooking-school-373

this should get you started with the basics. then figure out what cuisine you like and get a cookbook that focuses on that cuisine so you can re-use pantry ingredients and stuff

Buy Julia Child's "The Way to Cook." It's not a cookbook in the traditional sense of a series of recipes, but focuses on technique, it's a bit dated (like shit suspended in aspic, gag) but will teach you everything you need to know. Your goal should be that by 25, you come home from work, open the pantry and fridge, see what you've on hand and say to yourself, "what'll we make for dinner tonight," and create something with no recipe.