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I highly recommend a cookbook. Many websites have recipes, but don't have very good pictures, sometimes pictures make it much easier to understand how to make plating your meal much better looking. Presentation matters too.
I would start with learning basic classical French cooking techniques. The Julia Child books are good for this. Then you can pick up cooking techniques from other cuisines and start incorporating them, but the French techniques are the best place to start.
Watching cooking shows on PBS and The Cooking Channel is a good passive way to pick things up, build your knowledge base, and get ideas. There are a ton of good youtube videos as well. Chowhound discussions are very informative, the users there really know their stuff.
Learn your ingredients. Learn the different cuts of meat and how best to cook them. Learn about all the different fruits and vegetables, how to choose them, when they're in season, how to process and cook them. Smoke points and properties of oils. Which herbs are good fresh, which are good dried, when to add them. Wikipedia is a good resource for these things.
Start acquiring some tools and equipment. A good nonstick pan, a good food processor, a stick blender, a spice grinder, a dutch oven, some pots, citrus zester, mortar and pestle, various knives, a LARGE (can't stress this enough) cutting board, pizza stone, cheese grater, strainer, colander, etc. Stay away from the gimmicky things like slap choppers and egg cookers that you'll never use that will just clutter up your kitchen. Spend more for quality things that work well and will last, you'll be glad you did. You don't have to buy everything at once, just add something every now and then.
Build up a stock of basic shelf-stable ingredients. Herbs, spices, nuts, dried beans and lentils, canned tomatoes, honey, vinegars, oils, dried peppers, rice, bouillon, etc. These are an upfront cost, once you build up your stock it's pretty cheap to maintain it since you don't have to buy these things very often. It's essential to have these things on hand so you don't have to run to the store for 17 things every time you want to cook a meal.
Hit up the Indian and Mexican stores for spices (preferably unground) and dried herbs. They're a lot cheaper and better quality at these places. I usually buy them in ~6+ ounce quantities and store them in jars. It's a whole lot better than buying tiny 3-ounce jars of stale, ground, grossly overpriced McCormick's spices.
The Flavor Bible is good for learning which combinations work well together.
The I Hate To Cook Book by Peg Bracken The Absolute Beginner's Cookbook by Jackie Eddy and Eleanor Clark Betty Crocker's Cookbook by guess who!
The Favorite Recipes Of Home Economics Teachers series Jane Brody's Good Food Book
Not books, but The Americas Test Kitchen TV show is excellent. They explain why, which I think really helps to learn. I know they have a cook book (or more than one). I haven't seen them, but I would expect them to be good.
If you can find the TV shows made by Paul Prudhomme, get them. The man is snoring boring, but he is a real genius about cooking, so try to stay awake and copy what he does when he cooks. His cook book America Cooks is worth every penny and then some. Brilliant recipes and every recipe is good.
The I Hate To Cook Book by Peg Bracken The Absolute Beginner's Cookbook by Jackie Eddy and Eleanor Clark Betty Crocker's Cookbook by guess who!
The Favorite Recipes Of Home Economics Teachers series Jane Brody's Good Food Book
Amazon is selling many old copies of the Fannie Farmer Cookbook and I think they are simple to use, with lots of explanations, and ingredients that are commonly found.
Can you imagine cooking for over 50 years and trying to help someone today start on this venture or adventure. Well I'll do the best I can to help you. When I first started cooking I wanted to cook from my Italian roots plus add southern style American food. To start out was fortunate to have a Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook. It had everything any beginner cook could use and always helps the seasoned cook. I still use it it's faded from red to pink now. Technology has changed so that gives us older cooks more tools to use to find new recipes that are more healthy than the ones we used in the past.
Using search engines, newsletters from favorite web sites, food magazines like Saveur which covers the world cuisines. All these things at our fingertips helps make us the cooks we are today. Keeping a healthy pantry, having proper cooking tools and patience with yourself will help you learn to be the best cook for yourself and others who will enjoy your finished product. Cook from within your heart and it will show in your food. Wishing you the best hope you love it as much as I have over the years.
If you can get yourself to a bookstore, I would take several and sit down with them and read them over. My problem with cookbooks are that I don't use 60 percent of the recipes in them. Look through them and if most of them are something you would eat/enjoy, then buy it. One of the best cookbooks I really enjoyed was
I have been cooking for years and yet I learned something from this book and enjoyed it from cover to cover.
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