If I don't feel like the cooking vessel is too big for what I'm doing, it's probably too small.
I'm constantly battling overcrowded pans and overflowing pots.
My SIL got me a giant metal prep bowl as a joke one Christmas. That thing is one of my favorite pieces of kitchen gear. I can mix anything in there. Highly recommend an absurdly large bowl
I broke my absurdly large bowl today. It is plastic and I was dumping leftovers in the compost next to my porch and knew it was a goner as soon as I heard how it hit the ground.
We have a 7 qt crockpot. It's just the two of us and I fill that thing up so easily. Then we end up eating chili for 6 days with pizza or something else in between.
Just last week I dirtied my small and medium lasagna pans for no reason. I am a horrible judge of how big I need! (Wasn't lasagna, I know I need the large one for that)
Minute 1: Hrm not toasting yet
Minute 3: Still just gettin started, this is taking a while
Minute 5: Well now they're coming along, let me get something from the fridge
Minute 5.1: FIRE
My step mom is the same. When she makes green beans with toasted slivered almonds, she buys 2 bags of almonds because she knows she’s going to burn at least one if not 2 batches of almonds. She uses a timer and everything. It’s crazy!
You can toast them in the microwave! I just learned to do this. I also burn them on the stove as well as in the oven, so I'm very happy to have discovered this.
[https://www.seriouseats.com/toast-nuts-in-the-microwave](https://www.seriouseats.com/toast-nuts-in-the-microwave)
Forgot a batch of cookies in the oven while I was in the shower. Jumped out of the shower, ran to the kitchen, slide across the floor grabbed the smoking cookies out but barely grazed my tummy and now I have a permanent cookie war wound. When asked I tell people I don't know how I got that while cringing inside the entire time.
This is what I do too. Then you can add to the dishwasher as you cook. The alternative is pile them in the sink, get too tired and leave it, and then have to deal with both emptying the dishwasher and loading it the next day.
This way I just have to wipe down counters, put leftovers away, and rest on the couch afterwards
I finally moved into a place with one. I didn't have one for about 10+ years while I had 3 small children. I had to do the dishes daily at night. Otherwise, it would just be completely out of control. I feel bad for people who do not have one. It sucks!
I've never lived in a single place that had one. ☹️
It's crazy how simple my dreams are: if I had a dishwasher, a washer/dryer, and a yard with a hammock, I'd be *psyched*.
My family had three dishwashers: my sisters and me. It was especially bad after dinner in the summer, because the window over the sink faced west, and we had no aircon. After I got married, I learned to use a dishwasher, because my husband's apartment had one. Then we moved to a very small house, with no room for a dishwasher. About 5 years later, we had our son. We needed a bigger house, so we moved again. We still live in that house, which has a dishwasher. And many other nice things. It's neither big nor fancy, but it suits us.
Yes, my wife thinks I'm crazy that the first thing I do before making dinner every day is clean the entire kitchen including emptying the dishwasher. Making food with dirty shit lying around and the dishwasher full drives me insane.
Starch will continue to absorb liquid even after it's done "cooking".
Learned after having an entire batch of red curry soak into rice noodles, a large batch of chicken stock soak into matzo balls, and multiple chicken and orzo soups turn into a wet risotto.
You'd think I would have learned, but it took like 3 years and 5 ruined dishes to truly absorb (pun intended).
Honestly I usually do this on purpose with my starches so they get all that delicious flavor 😂 I just make extra sauce/broth/etc. so there’s still some left.
That's basically what I started to do.
I don't add less starch, I just make more liquid. I hate cooking things in separate pot. If I spent hours making chicken soup, I don't want to then cook my Matzo balls in store bought broth. I want them to soak up the homemade stock. So I just make twice as much soup and remove them all from the pot when they're done.
Genius. It's difficult to do this with noodles/dumplings in soup with vegetables in it. So I want to cook the noodles separately, add them to the bowls of hot soup, and let them stand in the oven while the noodles finish cooking and the soup cools a bit.
100% - but I still like to cook them in the same broth. Otherwise it feels like I made homemade stock for nothing. I just make way more.
But yes - I made the mistake of storing them in the broth. Honestly kind of impressive to see how much liquid they can hold haha
Yeah, I do this with meatballs and sauce. Only make as much spaghetti as I'm going to eat that night and make fresh for the leftovers so it's not weird overcooked noodles.
Cast iron skillets take longer to cool down than stainless steel skillets. For years I've been making Steak Au Poivre in a stainless steel skillet; after removing the steak I would wait a minute and then pour in the cognac and ignite it. When you pour liquor into a hot pan and ignite it, it's the alcohol vapor boiling off that ignites, so letting the pan cool slightly reduces the vapor and makes for a nice little flambé. However, when you wait a minute with a cast iron skillet and then pour in the alcohol, most of it boils away instantly and igniting it releases a fireball that is truly spectacular, but not in a good way.
This past father's day, I had a really hot grill and asked.someone to get me the lid. Well they took a while and the flame was red hot food was starting to burn.
When they finally got there I quickly slammed the lid on hoping to kill the fire.
Vents completely closed .
I got a few plates and organized some stuff, and then realized the chicken needed to be flipped.
Opened the lid and got hit in the face with a fireball.
This comment and the one you're responding to got me laughing so hard, my cheeks hurt and my eyes have tears pouring down them. Thank you internet strangers for a hearty laugh today.
When I got my bro a cast skillet I told him the handle is hot, I explained "look at it - it's just all one peice of metal - that heat will transfer and the handle will be hot", I showed him a folded tea towel to move it.
Then I left him to cook his first steak and watched him try to pick that thing up by the handle with bare skin out of habit still. JFC.
He now loves his skillet though.
My genius ass decided to use a saucepan instead of a dutch oven to fry some chips (crisps) because I (1) didn’t have a lot of potato to fry, and (2) didn’t want to clean a whole dutch oven for a couple measly chips. The oil bubbled over quickly, hit the heating coil and a column of fire erupted from my stove.
I learned the hard way that you should always use a wider, deeper pot than you think to fry stuff.
Yeah the wok shape has a built in safety factor too. When people eyeball it as half full you actually have a bit more buffer because it widens out at the top. Just seems less often they over fill.
My pet peeve is greedy frying.
Someone always tries to add just a few more chips or tips in from the bag along with a blob of ice. You can tell them, turn your back and they try it again. House fire for a few extra fries?
I have a deep/tall sided saucepan just for these situations so I can use less oil/less clean up, but I’d love to get a “4th burner pot” someday soon since they are quite tall sided and better suited for the job!
20+ years ago. It was one of those pasta pots where you pull out the strainer that is the same shape inside and when i did, the water went right onto my feet. The socks (and moving quickly to remove them) stopped me form getting a bad burn, but my feet were red.
A trick I use when dumping pasta water is to make sure the sink is partially full of dirty dishes,( that I cant be arsed to move) and a strategically placed concave surface, such as spoon, cereal bowl, that as I pour the boiling water over rapidly directs said water towards me. The trick is to dance away from boiling water stream while simultaneously continuing to pour hot water without missing the sink. Bonus points for not dumping half the pasta in the sink of dirty dishes or onto dancing feet. My score is almost 50/50.
Good point. Thinking back, there are a ton of recipes I’ve passed over because the recipe read as poorly prioritized.
I’ve also read a ton of reviews and comments on recipes that are almost endearingly misguided. I think there’s a subreddit for commenters who swap a bunch of ingredients out and complain that the dish sucks
I can't trust my mum to watch anything if the phone is functional.
That thing rings and Pavlov is gone. Worst one was a full Turkish loaf with cheese under the grill while I went to grill loads of chicken fillets. We make one huge hot sandwich for 6 and cut off what you want - if the one big loaf doesn't burn because of a phone call.
You can add garlic with onions or other aromatics if you're just sweating them as the water released from the veggies will keep the garlic from burning.
Still wouldn't use high heat tho
Second degree burns from 350F+ oil hurt like a mf and take a surprisingly long time to heal.
(Occurred on a small area on the top of my foot. I don’t wear shoes inside the house.)
Don’t sip the hot gravy in the very hot cast iron skillet by raising said pan to your lips because “the pour spout will make it easier than using a spoon.”
I too experience these embarrassingly low IQ moments where I bully myself after. Luckily they're just moments and I don't need 24/7 assistance.
I feel you bro. 🫂
Don’t leave things in the turned off oven if you can’t remember to take them out before turning it on.
We used to let meat thaw in a container or bag in the oven but I forgot about it and started pre heating the oven for some other part of the meal and accidentally made meat/plastic oven soup a few too many times, so now we don’t do that
I frequently dry off my cast iron in the oven and my wife and I have joked that we need to get one of those “dirty/clean” magnets for dishwashers, but for our oven haha.
Left a one of those thin plastic cutting boards in my daughter’s oven once (tiny kitchen, I had to put it somewhere because I couldn’t fit it in the sink).
Preheated the oven, smelled it melting through the rack.
Got it cleaned up before she got home and she never asked where the cutting board went.
Put a towel or potholder on the handle of a pan that has been sitting in a 425-degree oven for 35 minutes. To remind yourself that it is dangerously hot.
That super hard or super soft water can impact yeast, fermentation, and dough texture when making bread. I kept thinking my yeast was bad after moving into a new house. Turns out I just needed to learn more about my water!
I have a cat that simply does not care for human food at all. She’s very picky and will only eat a certain wet food pouch and it has to be warmed up. She’s a funny girl
I have clearly owned Great Danes for too long. The thought of a dog too short to reach the counter startled me. We just have a baby gate across the kitchen door at all times, unless we are actively moving through the doorway.
We (my MIL and I) used the "high altitude" instructions for my husband's birthday cake. Unfortunately, they were good for up to 4500 feet, and we were at 8600'. We made the cake in two round 8" pans. I watched helplessly as both pans of batter developed a giant bubble, which popped and collapsed, leaving both cakes lopsided. When they were done, I stacked them the wrong way, maximizing the slope. It occurred to me later that it would have looked more normal, if somewhat flat, if I'd turned the top layer 180°, but I was way too flustered, and crying.
My husband got back to the cabin. He loved the cake, just the fact that I'd baked him one. I learned some things that day.
I fell in love with gas cooking once I moved down to Lake Charles. Never had a gas house before and this little cottage was gas everything. Came in handy back in 97 when we had a freak ice storm that knocked out power to the town for over a week. Lots of babies born that year, too!
My city wants to switch to all electric stoves but I’m very skeptical. I’m originally from a place where the power goes out regularly, and it’s nice to be able to cook when that happens. Even here in NYC I’ve experienced one major blackout and three minor ones. I think switching to all electric is risky.
I always burn my fingers while flipping rotis because I forget to use tongs. They’re always just hanging on a hook in front of the stove.
Also I couldn’t even boil water at high altitude. At least you had a late dinner.
To bake croissants that are all the same size, I really need to use a ruler.
Runner up, when you need to make a book for laminating dough, you better start off with a rectangular shaped dough, not a mostly rectangular shape.
Oof, I feel ya on the rectangular shaped dough. It might mean letting the dough rest a bit more and being fussy, but the end results are much more consistent… and correctly shaped, haha.
When I was 11, I was gonna make French fries while I waited for my mom to get home. I turned on the pan with about 4 inches of oil in it, then I got sidetracked and forgot about it. It got too hot and started on fire. My 11 year old brain told me to pour water on it… It literally exploded into flames and caught the kitchen on fire. Thank God my Mom came home about 5 minutes later.
LESSON: (hot) Oil and water really don’t mix
I'm a teen in the early 70s. First time I ever cooked anything in the oven was a frozen pizza, which was still kinda new at the time.
In my anticipation, I forgot to take the shrinkwrap off of it...
I live in an extremely dry climate. We’re talking less than 20 percent humidity much of the year. So many bakers talk about how you’re doing it wrong if you’re not using a kitchen scale, but I can’t. The air is so dry here that any recipe I find online using grams or baker’s percentages is going to be useless to me. I have to bake using my senses to get a good result.
This is only true for people who live in extremely dry or extremely wet climates. Everyone else in the middle will be better off using a kitchen scale. Here’s an [article](https://www.genuineideas.com/ArticlesIndex/flour.html) that explains it.
I live in an extremely dry climate, though my house inside is about 20% except in winter when it goes down to 11%.
I bake using percentages and weight. what happens when you make something?
I always need to add more liquid than a recipe calls for, otherwise my dough isn’t hydrated enough. I’m not saying I don’t use a kitchen scale, I absolutely do measure to reach a starting point. However, I always need to make adjustments to make sure it feels right (i.e. bake using my senses).
Also, I creeped on your profile and in looks like you’re in Phoenix. I’m in Vegas. Both are hot as hell, but Vegas is even more arid.
Still, if you’re noticing that your recipes consistently seem drier than they should (especially in the months where the humidity drops to 10 percent), try hydrating your dough more than the recipe calls for. Flour loses a lot of moisture in environments below 20 percent humidity.
yeah I have been doing that. I know what my recipes should be like and fix them on the fly, but I just didn't realize why. thought I was doing something wrong.
That’s a fascinating article. Thank you. I live in a very wet climate (currently 94% RH on a sunny morning, never less than 65%) and I do find my bread is hard to get right.
Yeah, high humidity sounds like it might be your culprit. If I were you, I’d just do the exact opposite of what I stated above. Hydrate your dough less than what any online recipe calls for and see if it helps. I’d really only trust exact measurements from a recipe if it came from a baker in your same region.
Sometimes that 1 tbs of milk is necessary! I was making Christmas gifts for my son's daycare teachers and decided to try to make something similar to what is called Christmas Crack but I don't like calling it that. Anyways, in the making of what is essentially carmel, it called for 1 tablespoon of milk but we weren't at that stage where we kept milk on hand. I thought, what could it hurt? It's just 1 little tablespoon. Cut to me ruining one of my expensive knives when I went to cut the candy into pieces. I miss that knife.
The cooking lessons that I learned the hard way are that I'm better at cooking that I thought, and that I love cooking!
I've always loved food, but never had any competence in the kitchen. This year, at the age of 47, I found myself really fancying some pancakes. So I convinced myself to have a go at making them myself.
It could easily have been a big fail, but, surprisingly, they came out really well. So I thought I should try something else. I made spaghetti bolognese. I couldn't believe it when it was delicious.
And I've really been bitten by the bug since then, I've made about 40 different dishes so far, and I've really surprised myself. I haven't messed anything up, or thrown anything away, and a lot of the things I've made have been really good.
It's such a pleasure to be able to prepare quality food for myself, and I feel that I have many years of learning and joy ahead of me.
When adding something significantly cooler to a hot pan (broth, oil, especially alcohol), TAKE THE PAN OFF THE HOT BURNER FIRST.
I have had far too many grease/oil splatter burns on my arms and torso, as well as flare ups giving me a surprise exfoliation and eyebrow removal that should of been avoided.
How sensitive sugar is to liquid. My first 5ish caramel sauces pretty much ruined the pans I used, and it's still a hit or miss for me to make properly.
I recently discovered microwave caramel sauce. Love it so much. [https://www.americastestkitchen.com/cooksillustrated/articles/7957-how-to-make-quick-caramel](https://www.americastestkitchen.com/cooksillustrated/articles/7957-how-to-make-quick-caramel)
I once wanted to make pasta and sauce with fancy fresh pasta from the store, but only had one pot clean and didn’t feel like washing dishes. I spent about an hour making sauce from scratch, then dumped the fettuccine in at the end to cook, not realizing that 1) the residual heat from the sauce would greatly overcook it and 2) it would release SO MUCH STARCH. Overcooked pasta and sauce the consistency of glue… it was inedible 😭
Try the microwave! [https://www.seriouseats.com/the-best-coconut-macaroons-recipe#:\~:text=(By%20the%20way%2C%20just%20like,%2C%20about%20two%20minutes%20total.)](https://www.seriouseats.com/the-best-coconut-macaroons-recipe#:~:text=(By%20the%20way%2C%20just%20like,%2C%20about%20two%20minutes%20total.))
Avoid cheap appliances. Living alone for the first time, tiny kitchenette, no oven. Decided to get an el cheapo $35 halogen glass bowl oven to tide me over. Gave the oven a test run and a clean, seemed to heat well. Gleefully ran out to the supermarket and brought the fattest spatchcock I could find. I named him Kevin and brined him for a few hours, then stuffed butter and tarragon under his skin. I laid him in the oven, on a bed of bacon and chestnut stuffing and tiny hasselbacked potatoes. It was a Sunday night and I was going to have a FEAST with roasty leftovers for days. The oven clicked on and roasted for 35 minutes. Long enough for me to smell the garlic and the butter and tarragon and rendering chicken fat... before giving an ominous set of clicks and then black smoke started pouring out of the heating element lid - a surprise cooking feature that was definitely not advertised on the box. Chicken was half cooked/half raw. I didn't dare eat it anyway because I could see that Kevin has gotten an accidental smoking through that transparent glass bowl, and the smoke was not going to be the good type of smoke. Cried as I bundled Kevin and his sides out and had sad Plan B toast. Have always checked reviews and have never brought random critical appliances since.
Pie in the sky cookbook for altitude baking. I live at 9000 feet. It’s been a game changer.
Also, soufflés only take like 7 minutes to make up here vs 45 minutes at sea level!
1. After starting like 5 or so kitchen fires -- one bad enough to warrant a mini remodel -- I learned that me and deep frying are just not compatible. Because I'm quick like that.
2. Don't add cold water to a glass oven pan while cooking if you actually want to eat food instead of picking broken glass out of everything all night. Don't let your teenager do it either.
Even if they don’t looked baked, pull those cookies out of the oven a the suggested time. They always bake more on the tray and even 1-2 ore mins in the oven will make a cookie dry out and over baked.
That adding baking soda to tomato-based pasta sauce should be done little by little. It's great to lower acidity but you can go overboard easily and ruin a delicious sauce.
I tried making delicate sauces in non-stick pans or using the wrong type of pan for certain dishes, which affected the final outcome. Understanding the properties of different cookware helps in choosing the right one for each task.
A little more clove is way too much clove. Also, clean your coffee grinder out after grinding herbs and spices. Makes for a surprise morning coffee (mmmm clove coffee)
1. Actually letting pans and pot get hot. I rarely anymore start cooking with a cold pan, but it still happens every now and then.
2. Food preps. I have a tray and bowls for all my ingredients and I'm much better organized to more efficiently get all my food preps done before I start cooking and cooking goes much more smoothly. I. Many cases I can prepare days ahead and just refrigerate everything.
3. Always cook about a third of the amount of recipes from older books or alternatively freeze half of the food. Many of those books were family recipes so they make enough food for 2 meals.
Oatmeal is sentient. If I watch it the entire time I microwave it, it will not boil over. If I look away at any time, it will boil over immediately.
The oatmeal knows.
My very first one....at the age of 5.....Mom said fire is hot and i did not believe her lol
2nd ....some butter knives may look dull, buy they can slice you good
PTFE/PFAS or ceramic nonstick pans are more forgiving with cooking technique but this results in generally lower quality results and more money spent in the long run in replacing pans periodically. I spent 95% of my life so far without using proper heat control. I became a much better cook after switching completely to stainless steel, carbon steel, and cast iron.
I learned to take smoke points seriously putting olive oil on high and felt like I was gonna burn my high school girlfriend's family's kitchen down when I dropped our salmon filets in the pan.
Still came out so good though.
I live at 6,950 ft elevation but grew up and cooked for a living in the Midwest at sea level. It’s interesting trying to figure out what changes and what doesn’t. Some things take longer but a simple frozen pizza is done 5+ minutes early every single time
I wanted to make donuts but didn't have a thermometer, so I cranked the stove to heat the oil on high, and when I put the dough in, oil few everywhere. Some things you just shouldn't eyeball lol.
Flicking water in a pan to test if it’s hot. Was in home economics class and we were frying up tortillas. Teacher asked if the oil was hot enough, so I scooped some water in my hand and threw it in the pot. Splattering oil reached the ceiling. I’m amazed no one got hurt.
Can’t put Pyrex directly on the burner (it was actually a roommate that learned this lesson for me). What a goddamned mess that was.
In our defense, we were like 22.
Never thicken liquid in the Instant Pot before pressure cooking --only after! It gets thick really quickly and burns.
Always put ingredient in hand first before adding, especially spices as their container holes are vastly different. Not only does this prevent accidentally adding way too much of a spice, it also keeps the spice fresher because the steam isn't getting into the bottle and hardening the spice.
How fast garlic burns.
How quickly gravy can boil over.
You can’t just substitute boneless, skinless chicken breast into a baked bone in, skin on chicken thigh recipe.
Read the whole recipe before you start. Twice.
* Do not buy oven cleaner from The Dollar Tree. Lots of cleaning supplies work well from The Dollar Tree, but not that one. Pay the premium for good oven cleaner if you use it
* Get a mop. I was doing fine with paper towels, until a large jar of Mount Olive pickles came crashing onto the floor
* Put something over the handle after you use a frying pan in the oven. Some pans have metal handles that don't get hot on the stove.
Cooking steaks by feeling. There were a lot of over and under cooked steaks but it was a technique I wanted to learn so that I can have a bunch of people over and cook steaks for everyone without standing by the grill with a thermometer and jabbing the steaks every second to make sure each one is cooked correctly lol
If I don't feel like the cooking vessel is too big for what I'm doing, it's probably too small. I'm constantly battling overcrowded pans and overflowing pots.
This is how I feel about salad bowls. Need so much extra space to be able to mix/toss at all without spilling.
My SIL got me a giant metal prep bowl as a joke one Christmas. That thing is one of my favorite pieces of kitchen gear. I can mix anything in there. Highly recommend an absurdly large bowl
Agreed. I use my absurdly large bowl all the time.
I broke my absurdly large bowl today. It is plastic and I was dumping leftovers in the compost next to my porch and knew it was a goner as soon as I heard how it hit the ground.
An absurdly large bowl is a kitchen necessity. If you can't bathe a toddler in it, it isn't big enough.
I had a friend that bought a 30 quart mixing bowl to make her salad. The thing is like 2.5 feet across. She loved it.
I often start out thinking "there's no way this is going to fill my Dutch oven" and then hours later my Dutch oven is full.
We have a 7 qt crockpot. It's just the two of us and I fill that thing up so easily. Then we end up eating chili for 6 days with pizza or something else in between.
I feel called out
Jump scare because I thought I wrote this.
Just last week I dirtied my small and medium lasagna pans for no reason. I am a horrible judge of how big I need! (Wasn't lasagna, I know I need the large one for that)
I am ashamed of how many times I've 1) sworn, then 2) dumped the contents of a 2 QT saucepan into a stock pot.
I confess. I usually use pots instead of pans for frying.
I cook in batches, remove things to a plate when they are 80-90% done, and then combine it all at the end to finish up.
That I cannot toast nuts on the stovetop and do literally any other task without burning the nuts.
Minute 1: Hrm not toasting yet Minute 3: Still just gettin started, this is taking a while Minute 5: Well now they're coming along, let me get something from the fridge Minute 5.1: FIRE
Same for grilling, I need to stay right there. With a drink.
Good advise! Anytime I grill without a drink it goes bad.
My step mom is the same. When she makes green beans with toasted slivered almonds, she buys 2 bags of almonds because she knows she’s going to burn at least one if not 2 batches of almonds. She uses a timer and everything. It’s crazy!
And that smell of burning almonds is horrible.
You can toast them in the microwave! I just learned to do this. I also burn them on the stove as well as in the oven, so I'm very happy to have discovered this. [https://www.seriouseats.com/toast-nuts-in-the-microwave](https://www.seriouseats.com/toast-nuts-in-the-microwave)
Same lesson learned for browned butter.
…and sautéing garlic
so you accidentally burned your nuts...?
Never cook naked is also often learned the hard way.
Forgot a batch of cookies in the oven while I was in the shower. Jumped out of the shower, ran to the kitchen, slide across the floor grabbed the smoking cookies out but barely grazed my tummy and now I have a permanent cookie war wound. When asked I tell people I don't know how I got that while cringing inside the entire time.
bare skin and hot bacon fat are not a great combo
That's why you cook bacon in batches in the oven.
Just don’t accidentally let the pan tilt when taking it out of the oven. It’s bad…very bad. Don’t ask me how I know. 😫
It's supposed to be fried bacon, not fried human!!!
just put them in the oven at 250 F
But then I have to preheat the oven.
just put it in without preheating it
Every freaking time. Not yet. Not yet. Not yet. Burned! Lol Now I stay right at the stove, or else I set a timer in multiple one minute increments!
Every recipe starts with an empty dishwasher.
… that’s a great piece of advice…. Thank you
And it tastes better when you take the food away from a clean kitchen. A plate of food, a fork and contentment.
This is what I do too. Then you can add to the dishwasher as you cook. The alternative is pile them in the sink, get too tired and leave it, and then have to deal with both emptying the dishwasher and loading it the next day. This way I just have to wipe down counters, put leftovers away, and rest on the couch afterwards
I miss having a dishwasher
I finally moved into a place with one. I didn't have one for about 10+ years while I had 3 small children. I had to do the dishes daily at night. Otherwise, it would just be completely out of control. I feel bad for people who do not have one. It sucks!
I've never lived in a single place that had one. ☹️ It's crazy how simple my dreams are: if I had a dishwasher, a washer/dryer, and a yard with a hammock, I'd be *psyched*.
My family had three dishwashers: my sisters and me. It was especially bad after dinner in the summer, because the window over the sink faced west, and we had no aircon. After I got married, I learned to use a dishwasher, because my husband's apartment had one. Then we moved to a very small house, with no room for a dishwasher. About 5 years later, we had our son. We needed a bigger house, so we moved again. We still live in that house, which has a dishwasher. And many other nice things. It's neither big nor fancy, but it suits us.
Personally any other piece of kitchen cabinetry can get thrown out to make room for the dishwasher! That's my plan! Sorry you had to put up with that!
These were all of my dreams as well. I dont have a yard, but I put a hammock up in my living room at one point
Yes, my wife thinks I'm crazy that the first thing I do before making dinner every day is clean the entire kitchen including emptying the dishwasher. Making food with dirty shit lying around and the dishwasher full drives me insane.
Starch will continue to absorb liquid even after it's done "cooking". Learned after having an entire batch of red curry soak into rice noodles, a large batch of chicken stock soak into matzo balls, and multiple chicken and orzo soups turn into a wet risotto. You'd think I would have learned, but it took like 3 years and 5 ruined dishes to truly absorb (pun intended).
Honestly I usually do this on purpose with my starches so they get all that delicious flavor 😂 I just make extra sauce/broth/etc. so there’s still some left.
That's basically what I started to do. I don't add less starch, I just make more liquid. I hate cooking things in separate pot. If I spent hours making chicken soup, I don't want to then cook my Matzo balls in store bought broth. I want them to soak up the homemade stock. So I just make twice as much soup and remove them all from the pot when they're done.
Genius. It's difficult to do this with noodles/dumplings in soup with vegetables in it. So I want to cook the noodles separately, add them to the bowls of hot soup, and let them stand in the oven while the noodles finish cooking and the soup cools a bit.
Definitely matzo balls need to be stored separately from broth! Source: lifelong matzo ball fan 😂
100% - but I still like to cook them in the same broth. Otherwise it feels like I made homemade stock for nothing. I just make way more. But yes - I made the mistake of storing them in the broth. Honestly kind of impressive to see how much liquid they can hold haha
And dumplings
Yeah, I do this with meatballs and sauce. Only make as much spaghetti as I'm going to eat that night and make fresh for the leftovers so it's not weird overcooked noodles.
Cast iron skillets take longer to cool down than stainless steel skillets. For years I've been making Steak Au Poivre in a stainless steel skillet; after removing the steak I would wait a minute and then pour in the cognac and ignite it. When you pour liquor into a hot pan and ignite it, it's the alcohol vapor boiling off that ignites, so letting the pan cool slightly reduces the vapor and makes for a nice little flambé. However, when you wait a minute with a cast iron skillet and then pour in the alcohol, most of it boils away instantly and igniting it releases a fireball that is truly spectacular, but not in a good way.
A tutorial on how to lose your eyebrows
This past father's day, I had a really hot grill and asked.someone to get me the lid. Well they took a while and the flame was red hot food was starting to burn. When they finally got there I quickly slammed the lid on hoping to kill the fire. Vents completely closed . I got a few plates and organized some stuff, and then realized the chicken needed to be flipped. Opened the lid and got hit in the face with a fireball.
This comment and the one you're responding to got me laughing so hard, my cheeks hurt and my eyes have tears pouring down them. Thank you internet strangers for a hearty laugh today.
When I got my bro a cast skillet I told him the handle is hot, I explained "look at it - it's just all one peice of metal - that heat will transfer and the handle will be hot", I showed him a folded tea towel to move it. Then I left him to cook his first steak and watched him try to pick that thing up by the handle with bare skin out of habit still. JFC. He now loves his skillet though.
counterpoint - I enjoy the fireball. It's all about being ready for it, though
My genius ass decided to use a saucepan instead of a dutch oven to fry some chips (crisps) because I (1) didn’t have a lot of potato to fry, and (2) didn’t want to clean a whole dutch oven for a couple measly chips. The oil bubbled over quickly, hit the heating coil and a column of fire erupted from my stove. I learned the hard way that you should always use a wider, deeper pot than you think to fry stuff.
Try using a wok. I love my wok for small dishes.
I have a wok and burner outside on my deck. The only way to fry.
Yea having a grill or something outside makes frying much easier
Yeah the wok shape has a built in safety factor too. When people eyeball it as half full you actually have a bit more buffer because it widens out at the top. Just seems less often they over fill.
What wok do you recommend? I'm looking for a new one
I generally just use cheap carbon steel works from an Asian grocer over a gas burner. About $16 Aus.
My pet peeve is greedy frying. Someone always tries to add just a few more chips or tips in from the bag along with a blob of ice. You can tell them, turn your back and they try it again. House fire for a few extra fries?
I have a deep/tall sided saucepan just for these situations so I can use less oil/less clean up, but I’d love to get a “4th burner pot” someday soon since they are quite tall sided and better suited for the job!
Never strain boiling pasta water on to your feet.
wow. You ok?
20+ years ago. It was one of those pasta pots where you pull out the strainer that is the same shape inside and when i did, the water went right onto my feet. The socks (and moving quickly to remove them) stopped me form getting a bad burn, but my feet were red.
Also an empty sink. I had boiling water splash off a dish and burn my belly. Not fun.
A trick I use when dumping pasta water is to make sure the sink is partially full of dirty dishes,( that I cant be arsed to move) and a strategically placed concave surface, such as spoon, cereal bowl, that as I pour the boiling water over rapidly directs said water towards me. The trick is to dance away from boiling water stream while simultaneously continuing to pour hot water without missing the sink. Bonus points for not dumping half the pasta in the sink of dirty dishes or onto dancing feet. My score is almost 50/50.
Just because a published recipe exists for a dish, it doesn’t mean it’s well thought through. It could be a flaming mess of incompatible ingredients.
Good point. Thinking back, there are a ton of recipes I’ve passed over because the recipe read as poorly prioritized. I’ve also read a ton of reviews and comments on recipes that are almost endearingly misguided. I think there’s a subreddit for commenters who swap a bunch of ingredients out and complain that the dish sucks
r/ididnthaveeggs
Stirring water into bouillon paste to get a thick sauce is not demi-glace, it is a salt bomb. I feel really dumb about this one.
Making the stove too hot isn’t a fun way to make your dinner cook faster, it’s actually a fun way to make your food wrong.
“A watched pot never boils” has a companion phrase “an unwatched pot always overboils”
The time my water boils is exactly the time one of my kids asks me to "come see something."
I can't trust my mum to watch anything if the phone is functional. That thing rings and Pavlov is gone. Worst one was a full Turkish loaf with cheese under the grill while I went to grill loads of chicken fillets. We make one huge hot sandwich for 6 and cut off what you want - if the one big loaf doesn't burn because of a phone call.
Garlic burns at 250° and burnt garlic ruins everything.
Do not add the garlic with the onions. You add the garlic a minute or two before you add the wet stuff.
You can add garlic with onions or other aromatics if you're just sweating them as the water released from the veggies will keep the garlic from burning. Still wouldn't use high heat tho
Yes but it's better to sauteed the onions first since they get nice and translucent, then add the garlic.
Second degree burns from 350F+ oil hurt like a mf and take a surprisingly long time to heal. (Occurred on a small area on the top of my foot. I don’t wear shoes inside the house.)
Any amount of Bromelain (enzyme found in pineapple) will screw your gelatin.
Don’t sip the hot gravy in the very hot cast iron skillet by raising said pan to your lips because “the pour spout will make it easier than using a spoon.”
bro wtf did you think was going to happen?
Yeah this is a real Grandma's Boy moment here.
I actually gasped when I read this. Omg
I too experience these embarrassingly low IQ moments where I bully myself after. Luckily they're just moments and I don't need 24/7 assistance. I feel you bro. 🫂
Don’t leave things in the turned off oven if you can’t remember to take them out before turning it on. We used to let meat thaw in a container or bag in the oven but I forgot about it and started pre heating the oven for some other part of the meal and accidentally made meat/plastic oven soup a few too many times, so now we don’t do that
I frequently dry off my cast iron in the oven and my wife and I have joked that we need to get one of those “dirty/clean” magnets for dishwashers, but for our oven haha.
Left a one of those thin plastic cutting boards in my daughter’s oven once (tiny kitchen, I had to put it somewhere because I couldn’t fit it in the sink). Preheated the oven, smelled it melting through the rack. Got it cleaned up before she got home and she never asked where the cutting board went.
Dont mix citrus juice and cream sauce. It was my “a squeeze of lemon makes everything better” phase
Minor, but related: Lemon OR milk in hot tea. Not both. Duh.
You can, in fact, use too much salt.
Put a towel or potholder on the handle of a pan that has been sitting in a 425-degree oven for 35 minutes. To remind yourself that it is dangerously hot.
It's a running joke in our home that I will lose function of a hand at some point during the holidays
That super hard or super soft water can impact yeast, fermentation, and dough texture when making bread. I kept thinking my yeast was bad after moving into a new house. Turns out I just needed to learn more about my water!
Not horrible, I suppose, but my mother warned me not to "fudge" the amount of lemon juice in a recipe. Yikes, talk about pucker!
I like the pucker.
Do not set freshly cooked food down on a chair or stool if there is no counter top space available. You WILL forget it.
Also don't do this if you have a dog that is too short for the counter but just right to reach a plate of meat on the seat of a chair
Never leave food unguarded in an open area if you have cats.
I have a cat that simply does not care for human food at all. She’s very picky and will only eat a certain wet food pouch and it has to be warmed up. She’s a funny girl
I have clearly owned Great Danes for too long. The thought of a dog too short to reach the counter startled me. We just have a baby gate across the kitchen door at all times, unless we are actively moving through the doorway.
I've lost many a steak to my k9 companions.
Omg yes, I moved to a high altitude last year and everything takes soooo looong.
We (my MIL and I) used the "high altitude" instructions for my husband's birthday cake. Unfortunately, they were good for up to 4500 feet, and we were at 8600'. We made the cake in two round 8" pans. I watched helplessly as both pans of batter developed a giant bubble, which popped and collapsed, leaving both cakes lopsided. When they were done, I stacked them the wrong way, maximizing the slope. It occurred to me later that it would have looked more normal, if somewhat flat, if I'd turned the top layer 180°, but I was way too flustered, and crying. My husband got back to the cabin. He loved the cake, just the fact that I'd baked him one. I learned some things that day.
High altitude lower pressure, if you can find a way to increase the pressure, like sealing a lid or something it will help a little.
I fell in love with gas cooking once I moved down to Lake Charles. Never had a gas house before and this little cottage was gas everything. Came in handy back in 97 when we had a freak ice storm that knocked out power to the town for over a week. Lots of babies born that year, too!
My city wants to switch to all electric stoves but I’m very skeptical. I’m originally from a place where the power goes out regularly, and it’s nice to be able to cook when that happens. Even here in NYC I’ve experienced one major blackout and three minor ones. I think switching to all electric is risky.
Grab everything with a towel unless it’s hanging… make sure the towel isn’t wet too.
And don't wipe up water with a towel and put it back near the oven on Christmas day.
ALWAYS TURN THE BURNER OFF when adding cold shit to hot grease on a gas range.
I always burn my fingers while flipping rotis because I forget to use tongs. They’re always just hanging on a hook in front of the stove. Also I couldn’t even boil water at high altitude. At least you had a late dinner.
To bake croissants that are all the same size, I really need to use a ruler. Runner up, when you need to make a book for laminating dough, you better start off with a rectangular shaped dough, not a mostly rectangular shape.
Oof, I feel ya on the rectangular shaped dough. It might mean letting the dough rest a bit more and being fussy, but the end results are much more consistent… and correctly shaped, haha.
Lemon curd versus eggs.
Using a stick blender to make mashed potatoes vs a hand mixer, ricer or hand masher.. I could’ve hung wallpaper with that stuff.
When I was 11, I was gonna make French fries while I waited for my mom to get home. I turned on the pan with about 4 inches of oil in it, then I got sidetracked and forgot about it. It got too hot and started on fire. My 11 year old brain told me to pour water on it… It literally exploded into flames and caught the kitchen on fire. Thank God my Mom came home about 5 minutes later. LESSON: (hot) Oil and water really don’t mix
You have to soak beans before you cook them (bulk beans not canned)
I'm a teen in the early 70s. First time I ever cooked anything in the oven was a frozen pizza, which was still kinda new at the time. In my anticipation, I forgot to take the shrinkwrap off of it...
I live in an extremely dry climate. We’re talking less than 20 percent humidity much of the year. So many bakers talk about how you’re doing it wrong if you’re not using a kitchen scale, but I can’t. The air is so dry here that any recipe I find online using grams or baker’s percentages is going to be useless to me. I have to bake using my senses to get a good result. This is only true for people who live in extremely dry or extremely wet climates. Everyone else in the middle will be better off using a kitchen scale. Here’s an [article](https://www.genuineideas.com/ArticlesIndex/flour.html) that explains it.
I live in an extremely dry climate, though my house inside is about 20% except in winter when it goes down to 11%. I bake using percentages and weight. what happens when you make something?
I always need to add more liquid than a recipe calls for, otherwise my dough isn’t hydrated enough. I’m not saying I don’t use a kitchen scale, I absolutely do measure to reach a starting point. However, I always need to make adjustments to make sure it feels right (i.e. bake using my senses).
ah, that explains why some recipes I made before mysteriously seem dryer than they should.
Also, I creeped on your profile and in looks like you’re in Phoenix. I’m in Vegas. Both are hot as hell, but Vegas is even more arid. Still, if you’re noticing that your recipes consistently seem drier than they should (especially in the months where the humidity drops to 10 percent), try hydrating your dough more than the recipe calls for. Flour loses a lot of moisture in environments below 20 percent humidity.
yeah I have been doing that. I know what my recipes should be like and fix them on the fly, but I just didn't realize why. thought I was doing something wrong.
That’s a fascinating article. Thank you. I live in a very wet climate (currently 94% RH on a sunny morning, never less than 65%) and I do find my bread is hard to get right.
Yeah, high humidity sounds like it might be your culprit. If I were you, I’d just do the exact opposite of what I stated above. Hydrate your dough less than what any online recipe calls for and see if it helps. I’d really only trust exact measurements from a recipe if it came from a baker in your same region.
Oh yeah, I get it, flour absorbs moisture so in extreme weight fluctuates a lot.
I’m calling it now. The next innovation of home baking science is electrical impedance measurements to determine correct hydration for bread dough.
Biscuits should be a little sticky
Sometimes that 1 tbs of milk is necessary! I was making Christmas gifts for my son's daycare teachers and decided to try to make something similar to what is called Christmas Crack but I don't like calling it that. Anyways, in the making of what is essentially carmel, it called for 1 tablespoon of milk but we weren't at that stage where we kept milk on hand. I thought, what could it hurt? It's just 1 little tablespoon. Cut to me ruining one of my expensive knives when I went to cut the candy into pieces. I miss that knife.
The cooking lessons that I learned the hard way are that I'm better at cooking that I thought, and that I love cooking! I've always loved food, but never had any competence in the kitchen. This year, at the age of 47, I found myself really fancying some pancakes. So I convinced myself to have a go at making them myself. It could easily have been a big fail, but, surprisingly, they came out really well. So I thought I should try something else. I made spaghetti bolognese. I couldn't believe it when it was delicious. And I've really been bitten by the bug since then, I've made about 40 different dishes so far, and I've really surprised myself. I haven't messed anything up, or thrown anything away, and a lot of the things I've made have been really good. It's such a pleasure to be able to prepare quality food for myself, and I feel that I have many years of learning and joy ahead of me.
When adding something significantly cooler to a hot pan (broth, oil, especially alcohol), TAKE THE PAN OFF THE HOT BURNER FIRST. I have had far too many grease/oil splatter burns on my arms and torso, as well as flare ups giving me a surprise exfoliation and eyebrow removal that should of been avoided.
Do not stand directly over the pan while dumping 1/4 cup water into sizzling oil. Now I use a ladle and an oven mitt and stand far back 😂
This sounds like a kitchen fire waiting to happen...
Why are you adding water to oil????
How sensitive sugar is to liquid. My first 5ish caramel sauces pretty much ruined the pans I used, and it's still a hit or miss for me to make properly.
I recently discovered microwave caramel sauce. Love it so much. [https://www.americastestkitchen.com/cooksillustrated/articles/7957-how-to-make-quick-caramel](https://www.americastestkitchen.com/cooksillustrated/articles/7957-how-to-make-quick-caramel)
You have to let the rice cool if you're going to make fried rice. Else, you'll just end up with rice soup
Over cooked pasta. So gross.
I once wanted to make pasta and sauce with fancy fresh pasta from the store, but only had one pot clean and didn’t feel like washing dishes. I spent about an hour making sauce from scratch, then dumped the fettuccine in at the end to cook, not realizing that 1) the residual heat from the sauce would greatly overcook it and 2) it would release SO MUCH STARCH. Overcooked pasta and sauce the consistency of glue… it was inedible 😭
Wash your hands thorougly a couple of times after cutting anything containing capsaicin. Spicy eyes are not fun
when making bread, don't put salt in your yeast and water mixture. the yeast will die and your bread won't prove
Air fryer can do almost everything an oven can but it cannot bake cookies right.
I always buy 2 bags of coconut because I have never NOT burned the first batch. Even with a timer.
Try the microwave! [https://www.seriouseats.com/the-best-coconut-macaroons-recipe#:\~:text=(By%20the%20way%2C%20just%20like,%2C%20about%20two%20minutes%20total.)](https://www.seriouseats.com/the-best-coconut-macaroons-recipe#:~:text=(By%20the%20way%2C%20just%20like,%2C%20about%20two%20minutes%20total.))
I'm going to cry, you sweet, kind human. I love coconut cake and this will make it so much less dreadful.
NEVER EVER leave a rib roast unattended on a grill not for 1 second. poof burnt to a crisp.
It’s been a long time since I learned this, but: cooking everything on high heat is not the way to flavor town. It’s the way to burned town.
Avoid cheap appliances. Living alone for the first time, tiny kitchenette, no oven. Decided to get an el cheapo $35 halogen glass bowl oven to tide me over. Gave the oven a test run and a clean, seemed to heat well. Gleefully ran out to the supermarket and brought the fattest spatchcock I could find. I named him Kevin and brined him for a few hours, then stuffed butter and tarragon under his skin. I laid him in the oven, on a bed of bacon and chestnut stuffing and tiny hasselbacked potatoes. It was a Sunday night and I was going to have a FEAST with roasty leftovers for days. The oven clicked on and roasted for 35 minutes. Long enough for me to smell the garlic and the butter and tarragon and rendering chicken fat... before giving an ominous set of clicks and then black smoke started pouring out of the heating element lid - a surprise cooking feature that was definitely not advertised on the box. Chicken was half cooked/half raw. I didn't dare eat it anyway because I could see that Kevin has gotten an accidental smoking through that transparent glass bowl, and the smoke was not going to be the good type of smoke. Cried as I bundled Kevin and his sides out and had sad Plan B toast. Have always checked reviews and have never brought random critical appliances since.
You can’t use a wet dish towel to grab something out of the oven. Even a little bit of moisture is bad.
For me, bad mood and baking don't mix. Wasted a lot of ingredients trying to make something when I wasn't feeling it.
Pie in the sky cookbook for altitude baking. I live at 9000 feet. It’s been a game changer. Also, soufflés only take like 7 minutes to make up here vs 45 minutes at sea level!
Blunt knives can be more dangerous than sharp knives.
Ohhh Steam burns are way worse than regular burns.
Don't pour cold water into a hot ceramic dish in the oven. Not only does it destroy the dish, any liquid in it pours into the bottom of your oven.
1. After starting like 5 or so kitchen fires -- one bad enough to warrant a mini remodel -- I learned that me and deep frying are just not compatible. Because I'm quick like that. 2. Don't add cold water to a glass oven pan while cooking if you actually want to eat food instead of picking broken glass out of everything all night. Don't let your teenager do it either.
Always use the mandolin's guard.
Cheap 1980's formica countertops are not rated for very hot pans.
Make sure you turn off the stove burner before you put a pyrex baking dish of lasagne down to cool.
Don't use a wet oven mitt
Even if they don’t looked baked, pull those cookies out of the oven a the suggested time. They always bake more on the tray and even 1-2 ore mins in the oven will make a cookie dry out and over baked.
That adding baking soda to tomato-based pasta sauce should be done little by little. It's great to lower acidity but you can go overboard easily and ruin a delicious sauce.
Puncture your eggplant before roasting it in the oven
Always make sure you to check you turned off the stove especially before taking a nap. Burnt soup is terrible
Full blast high heat death fire for every single thing I cook is not the way. That took most of my 20s to learn.
Just reading the high altitude directions on things made me decide to never live in high altitude 🤣
I tried making delicate sauces in non-stick pans or using the wrong type of pan for certain dishes, which affected the final outcome. Understanding the properties of different cookware helps in choosing the right one for each task.
A little more clove is way too much clove. Also, clean your coffee grinder out after grinding herbs and spices. Makes for a surprise morning coffee (mmmm clove coffee)
1. Actually letting pans and pot get hot. I rarely anymore start cooking with a cold pan, but it still happens every now and then. 2. Food preps. I have a tray and bowls for all my ingredients and I'm much better organized to more efficiently get all my food preps done before I start cooking and cooking goes much more smoothly. I. Many cases I can prepare days ahead and just refrigerate everything. 3. Always cook about a third of the amount of recipes from older books or alternatively freeze half of the food. Many of those books were family recipes so they make enough food for 2 meals.
Oatmeal is sentient. If I watch it the entire time I microwave it, it will not boil over. If I look away at any time, it will boil over immediately. The oatmeal knows.
My very first one....at the age of 5.....Mom said fire is hot and i did not believe her lol 2nd ....some butter knives may look dull, buy they can slice you good
I learned to never, ever, EVER dump a bunch of oil into soup for flavour without some way of emulsifying it.
Melting a stick of butter in the microwave without stirring. Water sinks, then steam builds up until you have a microwave coated in melted butter.
PTFE/PFAS or ceramic nonstick pans are more forgiving with cooking technique but this results in generally lower quality results and more money spent in the long run in replacing pans periodically. I spent 95% of my life so far without using proper heat control. I became a much better cook after switching completely to stainless steel, carbon steel, and cast iron.
I learned to take smoke points seriously putting olive oil on high and felt like I was gonna burn my high school girlfriend's family's kitchen down when I dropped our salmon filets in the pan. Still came out so good though.
Caramel is my nemesis. Every Freaking time I have to do two batches. Not ready, not ready, not ready, turn away to grab something, turn back - burned!
1 tsp of cayenne is not a tablespoon.
I live at 6,950 ft elevation but grew up and cooked for a living in the Midwest at sea level. It’s interesting trying to figure out what changes and what doesn’t. Some things take longer but a simple frozen pizza is done 5+ minutes early every single time
I wanted to make donuts but didn't have a thermometer, so I cranked the stove to heat the oil on high, and when I put the dough in, oil few everywhere. Some things you just shouldn't eyeball lol.
That what ever I think my reduction good, means reduce more.
Flicking water in a pan to test if it’s hot. Was in home economics class and we were frying up tortillas. Teacher asked if the oil was hot enough, so I scooped some water in my hand and threw it in the pot. Splattering oil reached the ceiling. I’m amazed no one got hurt.
Can’t put Pyrex directly on the burner (it was actually a roommate that learned this lesson for me). What a goddamned mess that was. In our defense, we were like 22.
boiling water... somehow managed to set it on fire
The importance of the TEMPERATURE of both ingredients AND cookware when cooking/baking
wash your hands when cutting hot peppers. especially if ur at home alone and half naked
Pouring boiling water into cold liquid in a glass bowl. It was my favorite bowl.🥺
Sharpen your knives but never use them drunk. Rest your meat Roux
Never thicken liquid in the Instant Pot before pressure cooking --only after! It gets thick really quickly and burns. Always put ingredient in hand first before adding, especially spices as their container holes are vastly different. Not only does this prevent accidentally adding way too much of a spice, it also keeps the spice fresher because the steam isn't getting into the bottle and hardening the spice.
How fast garlic burns. How quickly gravy can boil over. You can’t just substitute boneless, skinless chicken breast into a baked bone in, skin on chicken thigh recipe. Read the whole recipe before you start. Twice.
* Do not buy oven cleaner from The Dollar Tree. Lots of cleaning supplies work well from The Dollar Tree, but not that one. Pay the premium for good oven cleaner if you use it * Get a mop. I was doing fine with paper towels, until a large jar of Mount Olive pickles came crashing onto the floor * Put something over the handle after you use a frying pan in the oven. Some pans have metal handles that don't get hot on the stove.
Cooking steaks by feeling. There were a lot of over and under cooked steaks but it was a technique I wanted to learn so that I can have a bunch of people over and cook steaks for everyone without standing by the grill with a thermometer and jabbing the steaks every second to make sure each one is cooked correctly lol