Think You Can't Even Boil Water? Master Your Kitchen With These Simple Cooking Tips

Many people see preparing meals as a tedious task. The tips below will offer you a few great suggestions you can use to make cooking an enjoyable event.

Use an oven timer as well as a watch timer. Your watch timer or wearing a stopwatch on a cord around your neck can help you monitor the cooking time and not miss the beep of the oven timer regardless of where you might be in your home.

Potatoes come in many different varieties, and you can't always substitute one for another. Waxy potatoes are good for boiling or using in potato salads, but they make poor french fries or mashed potatoes. When making those foods, potatoes which are fluffy, like Russets, are best.

Buy fresh cloves of garlic and mince them yourself for use in recipes. Older garlic tends to smell and taste woody, while fresh garlic ensures a sweet, yet savory flavor. You will also find that fresh garlic has firm skin and is free of bruises.

If you want to cook a roast but don't have enough time, you should keep the bone in. The bone can quicken the cooking process by distributing the heat directly to the inner portion of the joint. When the meat has cooled enough to let the juices settle all you have to do is go around the bone when cutting and serve.

Do you ever have difficulty determining how long you should grill your meat? Try using a good quality meat thermometer, to see whether the inside of the meat has reached the right temperature for proper cooking and good taste. Try grilling with the lid on if your pieces of meat are particularly thick to lower the cooking time.

Make a flavored butter to add a new twist to staples like dinner rolls or ears of corn. Allow the butter to be at room temperature when serving. Next, blend your butter with garlic, fresh herbs or sauces. You can dabble in any sort of taste from hot peppers to acidic citrus, or even the sweetness of honey.

If you need to prepare food for large gatherings of your family, you are probably feeling stressed about it. Instead of succumbing to panic, do as much of the prep work as possible on the preceding night. Measuring spoons, casseroles and non-refrigerated ingredients can all be set out the night before on the kitchen counter.

As you've read, there are a variety of ways that cooking can be made fun and exciting, and not just a chore. Following the advice presented above will help you see cooking as way to get creative, instead of it being boring and annoying.