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

[Sarin]

In what way is your own question not answered literally in the first line of the OP?
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It's still very badly defined. For example, I can prepare several distinct recipes that use "sweated" onion (pan-fried at low heat), and it's optional for some recipes. Does it mean that, say, scrambled eggs with onion and ham are distinct from scrambled eggs with bacon, but only if I don't use the onion in other recipes? Does real carbonara count distinct from "alla carbonara" with cream, but only if I don't use cream in other recipes?

 

[Samson]

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.

So that is at least six, and a lot more if you count roasting while stuffed as different to just roasting, and boiling and serving whole different to chopping, boiling and mashing and different again from making a stew with. If those are all different I think I could get over 9000 if I thought hard enough.

How many different ingredients can you get off one animal? How many different ingredients are sirloin steak, fillet steak, heart and kidneys?

 

[Kyriakos]

It's still very badly defined. For example, I can prepare several distinct recipes that use "sweated" onion (pan-fried at low heat), and it's optional for some recipes. Does it mean that, say, scrambled eggs with onion and ham are distinct from scrambled eggs with bacon, but only if I don't use the onion in other recipes? Does real carbonara count distinct from "alla carbonara" with cream, but only if I don't use cream in other recipes?

In so many words, yes, the spirit is for it to mean that. If you use the specific preparation of the ingredient already, it can't be counted again. If not, it is to be counted.

So that is at least six, and a lot more if you count roasting while stuffed as different to just roasting, and boiling and serving whole different to chopping, boiling and mashing and different again from making a stew with. If those are all different I think I could get over 9000 if I thought hard enough.

How many different ingredients can you get off one animal? How many different ingredients are sirloin steak, fillet steak, heart and kidneys?

This is overkill ^^
Btw, I did include some more stuff in my previous post (about what can 'logically' count as a method). But yes, I'll just post the differential equation in a few posts

 

[Kyriakos]

So you have two sets. One is of prepared ingredients(x), the other of used methods(y). The lower bound for your score (how many meals you can prepare) is (cardinality of) x, and the upper bound is (likewise, cardinalities) x(y). That should suffice for the limits. If other elements are needed, we can look into them too in tonight's episode of Cooking with Beards.
Which reminds me I also know how to fry eggs! Yay, gets me up to 5.

 

[Fippy]

Essential pizza dough making:

* mix water with fresh yeast, sieve flour into your bowl and mix them together until happy with the consistency. Ideally water & flour are both either cold or lukewarm (goes for most cooking, temps should match). Why sieve flour? Unwanted pieces are filtered out - and kneading will be a bit smoother.
* add some salt..always widely discussed if salt can hamper the yeast process if it's added earlier. From my experience maybe a little.
* knead for ~7mins (machine or hands) until your dough is soft and "developed"
* form into a ball, sprinkle with some flour so it's not sticking to your bowl later.
* Cover with a slightly wet towel or similar (some moisture always helps), and let it rest for ~1 hour at room temp.
* Size should ideally have doubled or more before it's ready.
* do not use a dough roller to form your pizza There are plenty videos on how it's done better via hand, why press out all those bubbles that will make your pizza look crispy?

I have maybe 7+ years experience with that by now..for how many cooking steps does it count?

 

[Kyriakos]

Essential pizza dough making:

* mix water with fresh yeast, sieve flour into your bowl and mix them together until happy with the consistency. Ideally water & flour are both either cold or lukewarm (goes for most cooking, temps should match). Why sieve flour? Unwanted pieces are filtered out - and kneading will be a bit smoother.
* add some salt..always widely discussed if salt can hamper the yeast process if it's added earlier. From my experience maybe a little.
* knead for ~7mins (machine or hands) until your dough is soft and "developed"
* form into a ball, sprinkle with some flour so it's not sticking to your bowl later.
* Cover with a slightly wet towel or similar (some moisture always helps), and let it rest for ~1 hour at room temp.
* Size should ideally have doubled or more before it's ready.
* do not use a dough roller to form your pizza There are plenty videos on how it's done better via hand, why press out all those bubbles that will make your pizza look crispy?

I have maybe 7+ years experience with that by now..for how many cooking steps does it count?

While qualitatively it is clearly far more advanced than (and not just including) boiling an egg, I fear that with the current math formula (I tried to have) used it is only one meal

 

[Samson]

So you have two sets. One is of prepared ingredients(x), the other of used methods(y). The lower bound for your score (how many meals you can prepare) is (cardinality of) x, and the upper bound is (likewise, cardinalities) x(y). That should suffice for the limits. If other elements are needed, we can look into them too in tonight's episode of Cooking with Beards.
Which reminds me I also know how to fry eggs! Yay, gets me up to 5.
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So to get over 9000 you need at least 71 ingredients plus cooking methods, and if you only know 10 cooking methods you need at least 450 ingredients. That is going to be pushing it so I think I am under 9000.

It is a little minimalist to call a beef bourguignon the same as a british beef stew even if the ingredient list may be the same.

 

[Kyriakos]

Can you break down the math? Because (?) it doesn't appear to be cumulative anywhere regarding the upper limit, to allow for differences in numbers. The implicit cumulative aspect made me think of limited sets, eg arrangements of birthdays and establishing possibility of common birthday, but why consider such here? (and there's no reason I can see to not identify the upper bound as x(y) ).
Naturally not all igredients can meaningfully be prepared using all methods, but if that was the gist, surely the numbers still need explanation

 

[Samson]

Can you break down the math? Because (?) it doesn't appear to be cumulative anywhere regarding the upper limit, to allow for differences in numbers. The implicit cumulative aspect made me think of limited sets, eg arrangements of birthdays and establishing possibility of common birthday, but why consider such here? (and there's no reason I can see to not identify the upper bound as x(y) ).

Sorry, I changed my mind about the possible number of cooking methods half way through my post and did not change them, and I am not sure how I got the 71. It should be:

So to get over 9000 you need at least 95 ingredients plus 95 cooking methods, and if you only know 20 cooking methods you need at least 450 ingredients. That is going to be pushing it so I think I am under 9000.

 

[Kyriakos]

Still worth it, shows why humans + serendipity is a cool combination ^^

 

[schlaufuchs]

I just think it's a misunderstanding of what cooking is?

Like there are so many other components to preparation than just ingredient and top-level cooking technique?

Just as a quick example there is a *huge* difference in outcome - in texture and flavor - achieved just in how hot the pan is when you put the food in. Scrambled eggs where you bring the eggs up to temperature in the pan vs eggs where you add into a hot pan versus a *very* hot pan will produce different effects. We might call them all "scrambled eggs," with the same ingredients and same top-level preparation technique (frying in a pan with a fat - and mind we haven't even touched different flavors and effects from different fats), but they are very different foods for very different uses. Same for which pan you use for the cooking, same with the degree to which you scramble the eggs, same for how/when you stir the eggs in the pan.

And we still haven't touched spices. Take for instance:

Dish 1: I cube potatoes. I boil them in a pot. I drain them and toss them in a spice mix consisting of: cumin, paprika, chili powder/tajín, garlic&onion powder, salt&pepper. I fry them in oil
Dish 2: I cube potatoes. I boil them in a pot. I drain them and toss them in a spice mix consisting of: cumin, coriander, mustard seeds, fennel seeds, turmeric, salt&pepper. I fry them in oil

Are these two different dishes? I would say they are, and they certainly entail different "ingredients." But if different spices = different dishes then we really can get to well well over 9000 dishes with very few non-spice ingredients and preparation techniques.

 

[Kyriakos]

This is just one proposed way of counting. Others obviously exist, but it's an issue if they are more practical here. You are of course free to suggest alternatives
At the very least, you aren't going to find a way that is easier to establish a specific low and high bound, which certainly helps with counting when the numbers get large.

 

[Quintillus]

Like everyone else, my power level is under 9000.

I do somewhat like the application of "autarky" in the context. Not entirely accurate, of course, unless one also grows all of their own vegetables, catches their own chickens, milks their own cows, etc. - but there is some degree of self-sufficiency in knowing how to cook.

But "types of meals" - that's not exactly the same as "types of cooking techniques". Because you can use the same cooking techniques on multiple ingredients, or combinations thereof, and wind up with different meals. I'd argue that you can combine potatoes and eggs in various ways and wind up with different types of meals. Maybe not always radically different, but different.

So I can look at this from the lens of preparation techniques - I can pan-fry, I can poach a chicken, I can bake, I can sear, I can make a roux, I can deglaze, I can boil, I can broil, I can simmer, I can stir-fry in a wok, I can sautée, and I can roast, and that's already 12. But I can combine those in various ways and with a lot of ingredients to make a lot of different dishes. A Sardinian fregola and a French ratatouille may both involve some combination of sautéeing and simmering, but I'd posit they are different types of meals. I can make risotto, and it's basically "stir the [correct type of] rice a lot and add some stock every 90 seconds or so", but Italians would argue it is its own type of meal.

But my recipe manager (yes, I'm a bit of a cooking nerd) says I've made 102 of the recipes that I've added to it, and I didn't start using it until 4-5 years ago. Not all of those are main courses, although a lot are. But that's probably a more objective evaluation of how many types of meals I can make. Mushroom stroganoff and jambalaya and chili are all different types of meals. Are all the Italian pastas I make different types of meals? That is likely a fraught question that would receive different answers depending on where you ask it. But 11-9000 is a sufficiently large category to say I fall into it.

And now I kind of want to make some mushroom stroganoff. Too bad they don't sell mushrooms this late at night.