How many - different - types of meals do you know how to cook?

[Kyriakos]

This is a poll, about basic autarky. As "different", you can count meals that are distinct from any other already factored in your list. For example, if you can boil an egg, also can fry potatoes, a meal consisting of boiled eggs and fried potatoes isn't "different", so that's still only two.

I still haven't learned to cook much. In fact only can prepare meet, potatoes, eggs and a basic salad. So I am in the 1-5 category /chef's kiss

 

[GoodEnoughForMe]

A lot; I like cooking, do all the cooking, and have gone to some one off classes.

 

[schlaufuchs]

Certainly nowhere near 9000, but I know how to cook a lot of things.

But also I'm a bit confused by how you define different meals here? Like you say you can prepare meat, potatoes, eggs, and salad, but what does that mean?

Like for meat there's a big difference between pan-frying, deep-frying, slow-roasting, roasting, barbecuing, grilling, sautéing, sous-videing, etc. There's a big difference in different types of meat and different cuts in terms of spice profiles, preparation methods, cook times, etc. And then there's sauces: are you making a reduction sauce? Which liquid are you using for the reduction? Are you making a gravy? How are you preparing the gravy? Are you doing a marinade? What flavors and spices are you choosing for the marinade? Are you making a chutney or a chimichurri? A rub? etc. etc. Like all of those would be questions that I would define as very different dishes, and it's like 90% of the fun of cooking. For instance, on the one hand, you could say bulgogi and say, al pastor are the same: you make a marinade, you let the protein sit in the marinade for some amount of time, after which you pan fry or grill the protein to the desired temperature or consistency. But there are so many nuances to how you prepare the marinade, how you tweak it, what ingredients to choose, how you treat the protein, what you pair it with, etc., that I wouldn't feel at all comfortable to say "if I know how to make a mean al pastor, that means I also know how to prepare bulgogi."

And then eggs...I mean the ingredient is so versatile in the ways you can approach and iterate off its preparation that it's a notorious test/demonstration of culinary prowess.

At the end of the day a lot of the techniques in cooking are pretty straightforward. You prepare a protein, you make a sauce to highlight the part of the protein you want to highlight, you make some side dishes to complement the protein, and that describes like a very large chunk of western cuisine. And yet there are still hundreds to thousands of very very good restaurants specializing in western cuisine innovating on that basic framework and bringing something fresh to the table.

 

[Kyriakos]

Hey, I meant any type (different enough) I have no issue with counting sufficiently different methods of using the same ingredient as different types.
For the record, I just pan-fry meat.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Hm. Cooking. I used to do more of it when I had a stove. But even then it wasn't any more complicated than basic soup or porridge, or maybe a grilled cheese sandwich. Making applesauce and Rice Krispie squares are literally the only cooking-related skills I learned in 2 years of home ec. in school. As for the squares, I accidentally improved on the recipe at home and did it that way ever since.

I used to make home-made pizza (yes, with pineapple).

I'd help my grandmother make cookies and Swedish flat bread.

My real cooking-related talents are in the realm of chocolate, though. Haystack cookies, my own original recipe for peanut butter cups, my own techniques for chocolate/yogurt-covered grapes and maraschino cherries, and marbled chocolates (no, they don't have real marbles in them)...

Those take a lot of work, though, and since I've got no one to make them for now, I haven't bothered.


For everyday... toss it in the microwave for the specified number of minutes, add whatever sauce or pepper may be required, and eat. Sharing with the cat depends on what it is.

 

[Gorbles]

I'm limited myself by stuff I don't have (and historically could never afford). We're back to a hand blender after the main one died. Still don't even have an ovenproof thermometer. Most of what I do are in pans that are 10 years old, hah.

But yeah, between 11 and 9,000. Unfair advantage in that I've been around a cooking kitchen for most of my life.

 

[AmazonQueen]

I'd think anyone who can actually cook is going to be in the 11-9000 category. Its rather broad.

 

[CKS]

I don't really understand the question. Do you mean without using a cookbook/recipe? Otherwise I don't see how anyone could be under 11. Actually I don't see how anyone could be under 11 anyway unless you count meals in a strange way or you really mean "do you cook" instead of "can you cook."

 

[Kyriakos]

I don't really understand the question. Do you mean without using a cookbook/recipe? Otherwise I don't see how anyone could be under 11. Actually I don't see how anyone could be under 11 anyway unless you count meals in a strange way or you really mean "do you cook" instead of "can you cook."

That's semantics, though The question is specifically about how many stuff you know how to cook. Certainly if one tends to cook, they will know more than just 11.

 

[Arwon]

I think I can prepare most things if I have the desire, ingredients, and a loose recipe. I do all the cooking in my family.

I don't bake a lot I guess, and I don't really do outdoor heat methods given I live in an apartment.

 

[Gori the Grey]

No, I think Cutlass's question needs to be answered:

Off the top of my head: 11-9000 (probably like forty or so)

With recipes: infinite. ("Over 9000" on this chart)

 

[Sarin]

Are we talking about preparation from very scratch, from the commonly bought ingredients, or even using the stuff like pre-made sauces and such? Does boiling some pasta and slapping a pre-made store bought sauce on them count as a meal? Does putting a frozen pizza in an oven count?

 

[Samson]

I also think the question is poorly defined. For example, my cupboard is currently a little bare, and the main foodstuffs I have are lambs hearts, butternut squash and beetroot. I reckon I could make a meal out of all of them in five combinations: all cooked together, all cooked individually and each combination of two cooked together and the other cooked separately. Each of those combinations could involve pretty much any ratio of the ingredients. Is that one meal, five meals or infinite meals? Does the fact that I have not actually made all those combinations, but know how to if I wanted to count? Does it matter that none of them have a name? Does it matter that some may not be very nice?

 

[Gorbles]

Recursive cooking with CFC: how many meals can you get out of n ingredients. Solve for 1 through 43.

 

[Kyriakos]

I also think the question is poorly defined. For example, my cupboard is currently a little bare, and the main foodstuffs I have are lambs hearts, butternut squash and beetroot. I reckon I could make a meal out of all of them in five combinations: all cooked together, all cooked individually and each combination of two cooked together and the other cooked separately. Each of those combinations could involve pretty much any ratio of the ingredients. Is that one meal, five meals or infinite meals? Does the fact that I have not actually made all those combinations, but know how to if I wanted to count? Does it matter that none of them have a name? Does it matter that some may not be very nice?

In what way is your own question not answered literally in the first line of the OP?

 

[schlaufuchs]

but if you boil potatoes and fry an egg?

 

[Samson]

In what way is your own question not answered literally in the first line of the OP?
View attachment 664704

Because these all seem more different than boiled eggs and fried potatoes:

• Roast hearts served with roast butternut and boiled beetroot
• Heart, butternut and beetroot stew
• Heart stuffed with butternut served with roast beetroot
• Heart stuffed with beetroot served with boiled butternut
• Roast hearts served with mashed beetroot and butternut

 

[Kyriakos]

Because these all seem more different than boiled eggs and fried potatoes:

• Roast hearts served with roast butternut and boiled beetroot
• Heart, butternut and beetroot stew
• Heart stuffed with butternut served with roast beetroot
• Heart stuffed with beetroot served with boiled butternut
• Roast hearts served with mashed beetroot and butternut

But if you aren't satisfied with just different methods of preparing ingredients, counting as "different" here, we would obviously need to define different mathematically (doable), since allowing it to go to infinitely many variations is beating the point of asking for a number.
Infinite is reachable even with one thing, as in spam with spam with spam etc ^^

 

[Samson]

But if you aren't satisfied with just different methods of preparing ingredients, counting as "different" here, we would obviously need to define different mathematically (doable), since allowing it to go to infinitely many variations is beating the point of asking for a number.
Infinite is reachable even with one thing, as in spam with spam with spam etc ^^

So what is the number there? 3?

 

[Kyriakos]

So what is the number there? 3?

It'd be the sum of all the individual products for method(ingredient), if we go by my suggested way of counting "different" in the thread. Another way of saying that in this way you just identify any unique method of preparing a single ingredient as a "meal", but their combinations in more "complex" meals as not to count again.
It does leave a lot of room for interpretation, I agree (does "mashed" count as a method? I'd wager that for something to be a "method", a person who has never done it shouldn't be readily able to do it, so no - but "stuffed" can be a method in various cases). So tldr, the math formula will be needed ^^