One of the Most Important Skills in Life: Cooking

How good of a cook are you? I’m sure many of you are great cooks and fully know the joy a home cooked meal can bring you. I’m confident, however, that the greater proportion of you cannot cook. There’s a probably even a few of you who mix up salt and sugar from time to time. All of this is perfectly fine. In fact, with our busy and stressful lifestyles, fewer and fewer people are taking the time out of their day to make a nice hot meal. Cooking is a not a necessity. But being able to cook has a number of advantages.

I’m sure you’re asking now what kind of advantages these are. First and foremost is cost. And by cost I’m referring to both time and money. Ingredients bought from a store cost a fraction of what they cost in a restaurant. If you buy in bulk, these costs are reduced further. Admittedly, if you’re cooking a huge 4-course meal the time costs can often outweigh the monetary costs, but I submit that this is usually a special situation. There are plenty of recipes to be found on the internet where a full meal can be cooked in twenty minutes or less. This is less time than it would take for you to go out to a fast food joint, get food, and return. Larger scale meals can take up to an hour, which makes them longer than fast food but still shorter than a trip to a restaurant. So as you can see you save not only money on the meal, but also money for the gas you would use to go to the restaurant and a large chunk of time.

Another substantial advantage is nutrition. If you’re buying the ingredients, you know exactly what you’re putting into your body, and how much. Can you say the same about any restaurants? In fact, this one factor makes cooking almost a prerequisite for any successful diet. Because if you don’t know what you’re eating, how can you be sure you’re staying on target for your diet? And since you’re cooking you can personalize recipes to your tastes. If you feel you need more protein, you can put additional meat or beans into the recipe. If you feel you should scale back on fats, you can substitute butter for olive oil or butter substitutes in many recipes. By personalizing recipes, you can take back control of your nutrition.

The last few benefits are not as concrete as the previously mentioned two, but just as important. Do you know the feeling of creating something? The meal will literally taste better since you will know that through your own effort it was created. Also, since eating is often a social activity, you can plan parties around cooking or just cook a nice meal for your significant other (or if you really want to wow a date). So why wait? You can look online for huge amounts of easy recipes – Food Network is one fantastic resource. But if you’re really clueless you might want to look online for some cooking lessons. Who knows – if you work hard you might just be the next Iron Chef!