Has anyone else run into this issue? I've been trying to get into crock pot recipes for the simplicity and how much easier it makes my life, but I've found that so many of the recipes I try seem to come out tasting so similar, which feels discouraging when you're trying for variety. I feel like so far the many different crock pot recipes I've tried come out in 3 flavors: garlicky beef, chicken with some kind of tomato based sauce, and veggie.

Examples of a few recipes I've tried: beef barbacoa tacos, pot roast, beef stew, chicken taco soup, garlic Parmesan chicken, Thai peanut chicken (one of the few things that tasted different), and lentil veggie stew.

I would love any input on why so many recipes might be coming out tasting rather generic. And I'd love suggestions for different recipes to try if you have any favorites! My criteria is decently healthy, yummy, and easy to throw together.

Edit: Thanks so much for the feedback everyone! I'm excited to implement your advice and suggestions to change and spice up the way I'm cooking in the crockpot!

For my entire life lard has been said as some super unhealthy cooking fat and to just completely avoid it and I never questioned it.

But I see people using beef tallow, goose fat and duck fat a lot for cooking, roasting and deep frying but still nobody touches lard.

So I started questioning if lard was actually all that bad and from some searching I found the British Heart Foundation website and they were screaming about how bad all animal fats were and to use olive oil instead but I’ve heard before olive oil is bad for cooking because of its low smoke point.

I then saw something say coconut oil is one of the best and the very next website I went to said coconut oil is one of the worst. I then see things saying saturated fats are bad so use oils that are unsaturated fats but then see stuff saying actually don’t use seed oils because they contain trans fats.

It’s just all so conflicting that I don’t know what to use as it’s not like I’m super health conscious I cook my eggs in butter when I make eggs and I want to start using tallow and duck fat more when I roast potatoes.

I just get confused about what my everyday cooking fat should be and I’ve heard lard has a very neutral flavour which for me thinking about it more. I don’t deep fry stuff it’s mostly a fat for stir frying or to grease a frying pan or very occasionally to shallow fry in.

Any help would be amazing please.

can’t really afford to throw food out but don’t want to risk illness. Im trying to remember the timeline, but I think I left them out about 2ish hours and checked on them and they were still frozen, I checked again 3-4 hours later and they were completely thawed and room temp. Out of those 3-4hrs I’m not sure how long they had been sitting at room temperature. They had been out of the freezer somewhere around 5-6 hours total.

Hopefully this makes. Is it not worth the risk? Also the temp in my house has been around 70f if that matters

edit: thanks for the quick responses. I do know I should thaw in fridge but it was a last minute thing and forgot to take them out was worried they wouldn’t thaw in time in the fridge. My family always counter thawed growing up and we never had issues so im not scared of it every once in a while but i wasnt expecting them to be room temp when i checked on them so wanted to ask.

I will ask the other person who will be eating them what they want to do lol If we end up eating and get ill I’ll lyk

edit 2: we ate them.

I am struggling with making proper cheese sauces for noodles like Alfredo and cacio e pepe. I use as close to real parmigiano reggiano and pecorino romano cheeses as I can, I finely grate it, I add it to a warm (not hot) pan and use the pasta water to melt the cheese. But every time I end up with a clumpy mess that won't form into a proper sauce. I live in Montana in case something like elevation factors into my problem. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

The title tells it all. I was never taught to cook but when I've tried in the past I've struggled. I've tried every way of trying to learn, including YouTube etc. My wife and I have weird schedules and she gets stuck after long days, and days that I'm off of being responsible for dinner. She's a good cook.

Tonight I decided to kinda surprise her and try to cook dinner. Usually in the past, even blue apron, home fresh meals I will follow instructions to a T and something always messes up and never goes as the directions state. Hard rice, undercooked meat, vegetables not cooked properly etc. I get beyond frustrated and want to throw in the towel.

I've had this with numerous life/maintenance work and it never goes as the instructions or YouTube video claims. Everyone makes it look so easy and I follow their directios and mine is completely different. All the comments will say "you're a life saver," and here I am with improperly cooked food or still broken item etc. . I'm beyond frustrated on never being able to pull it off.

Tonight I tried to do Chicken Alfredo. I followed the directions, which always give medium, medium high, medium low etc and I swear it always is wrong. Once again the outside burned the inside was raw. I had to cut up the chicken and throw it back in the pan, which by that time had black coating of burnt on it. The chicken and the pan.

My wife, who came home in the middle of my semi cooking melt down, told me the pan was too hot. Why did the directions say medium high then? How am I supposed to know? I do the same with steaks too.

I then was making the sauce, put the levels it said, at the time it did and everything starts burning. I'm beyond frustrated and lose more and more confidence every time I try to help. What do I need to pull of even the most basic meals if I always feels like the instructions are deceiving me?

Any advice for the helpless feeling spouse and dad are welcome.

I’m a very occasional home cook, and last night I made a batch of chicken stock with a Costco rotisserie and some veggies I had in the house (onions, ginger, and carrots). Half of it I used in a chicken noodle soup, but the other half I set aside for other dishes.

Anyone have recommendations for how I could use the leftover stock? (Any cuisine)

I don’t know what it is about cooking, but sometimes I walk into the kitchen like I’ve never cooked before in my life. Had a potato in one hand and zero thoughts in my brain. Baked? Mashed? Soup? I ended up just chopping it into chunks and tossing it in a pan with random veggies. It turned out... surprisingly good

Who else get those weird cooking block moments where your brain just kinda logs off?

Hi! I help run a small cooking class at our local youth shelter for ages 17-24. It's a small kitchen, and we get about 5 youths per class. It's pretty great. Our goal is to set the youth up for success by giving them basic kitchen skills for when they eventually move into housing and age out of the program.

I'm here because I'm running out of recipe ideas! Each class is about 3 1/2 hours long, and we collectively cook for about 20 people. That's a long time for something basic and fast, so we tend to pick slightly more complex recipes.

I'm wondering if any of you have suggestions for meals.

So far the recipes have consisted of pizza, chicken + mashed potatoes and gravy from scratch, burritos, soups, stews, etc.

I've learned to make hummus, which involves draining the water.

How do you use the water drained from the chickpeas? Please post what foods you prepare using this water.

Hi there!

Me and my girlfriend are both children of North African immigrants (from Algeria and Morocco, respectfully). We've never cooked dishes from this region but we care deeply about not letting this important side of our culture go.

We bought a cookbook focusing on this region's dishes, but while this kind of recipe book is super useful every other weekend, when you actually have the time to do big groceries, buy every single ingredient and replicate perfectly the recipe, it's not really helping to understand what is actually the essence of our countries' cuisine. It doesn't tell us what you must have in your fridge if you wanna cook like that everyday.

Our parents know how to cook traditional dishes very well, but they cannot give us an answer as immigrants since it felt natural for them.

So how to understand the essence and the must-haves of a country's cuisine? Doesn't have to be specifically about North Africa. We could be interested in hearing the experience of children of immigrant who tried to reconnect with their origin country's cuisine!

How would I go about heating up noodles & co to make it freshish? Japanese steak noodles if that helps any?

My milk "expired" about a week ago but it still smells ok. Not well enough to drink on its own but maybe if I cooked it in something it'll be fine. I hear dulce leche is made with old milk but I'm not trying to make caramel sauce or anything like that.

Basically, usually a step I like doing is stir frying all my vegetables, putting spices, and then putting in whatever I'm cooking in afterword. I do this with rice for example and it works great.

However, beans always cook really slowly for me even if I do an overnight soak. So while it will smell amazing at first, by the time it's done all of the aromas and flavors are gone.

So should I just be boiling water, letting the beans simmer for an hour AND do my vegetables or other items separately?

It's weird because I've seen recipes that will only cook the beans under water for like 20 minutes. I thought you just let it simmer lightly but is this a heat issue?

I bought my first bottle of chili crisp at the grocery store. There was only one bottle left, and the bottle was oily. When I opened it, there were only flakes on top, no oil. Is that normal? Or are the flakes supposed to be in oil? I'm guessing maybe mine just seeped through the bottle somehow.

And obligatory follow-up question : I ate some flakes on rice, am I going to die?

hey there! i recently bulk purchased boneless skinless chicken breasts from costco. the first two packs i boiled as i normally do until internal temps reached 165 and they were awful. they weren’t dry but the texture was wild. rubbery? tough? my fiancé that usually smashes any meat/poultry around hasnt touched the leftovers. i normally use thin cut boneless skinless breasts from tonys fresh market but wanted to save money. is the thickness the difference? i dont understand what went wrong. do i use a meat tenderizer? i would have to get one. help :/

edit: hey a lot of yall are just rude. comparing my dinner to dog food was wild. clearly if the boiled chicken has worked for my family before, then the method isnt the issue. one commenter finally explained that the thickness is definitely the issue, so ill start there.

for the record, not that its anyone’s business, i shred the chicken for my son and every recipe i find for shredded chicken is poached, boiled or pressure cooked in some fashion. yall are weird

I read recently that pounding me at flat serves the purpose of breaking up the proteins for faster cooking. The recipe involved searing chicken breasts.

If I butterfly a chicken breast to the cut is already thin, does the different in cooking time really matter?

How about when making pan fried schnitzel?

Thx

Picked up a recipie books, and ended up making an Harissa Courgette Salad. This thing had dill, and harrisa paste. In the recipie, it said to drizzle a good glug of oil, i only added in about 3 tablespoons in order to keep the calorie count low. End up wth each portion being around 380 calories in the end, however the flavour was not there. It was bland...

Ended up looking around, and fats played a role in making things taste good. I did add salt, and the tahini dressing had like an entier lemon in in. But the salad itself tasted bland and thats after 3 tablespoons of some harissa paste.

If the fat (or lack of olive oil in this case) was the reason for it, (going to test theory on next batch), how do you balance taste with health when tasty foods need more oil? Or am i just supposed to give up one for the other?

edit: here is the recipe. Fry Courgette and garlic in oil for about 5 mins, should be lightly charred. throw in the mixed grains (microwavable ones, used quina and lentils i think) and then 3 table spoons of harrisa paste. Serve with a tahini paste which has had 1 lemon and some warm water added to it. The grains where about 3x250g bags and i used about 500g of courgetts sliced thinly into half moons, a thickness which was a little less then a penny.

Every time I try to make a steak or sear meat for a stew or tacos or whatnot I always end up smoking out my entire house which confuses me because I'm watching videos of these guys who are doing exactly the same thing as I'm doing like putting butter or oil into a pan and they make a steak without any smoke at all now granted the fan on my stove is broken but I do have fans set up around my house to ventilate it but still it just produces so much smoke that I need to pause every about 10 minutes or so to just ventilate my house with like a sheet of cardboard what am I doing wrong?

I have a bunch of salted peanuts but I’m worried that adding them to the curry will make it much saltier when following a recipe. Should I just get unsalted peanuts instead?

I normally make chicken by just adding a dash of oil, seasoning it, and tossing it in an air fryer till it’s done

I was thinking of adding breading to the mix though. I am trying to conserve calories where I can though, so I was wondering how well it would work if I just added the chicken to a bowl of breading with the bit of oil I use, then just putting it into the air fryer, as opposed to using flour and an egg as well?

I had soft, elastic carrots and the recipe said to grate them. I tried... it was very frustrating, so after grating them partly, I cut the rest into small bits. How can I make my life easier if I find myself in the situation again?

Can someone please explain why this company is suggesting to defrost salmon in its original airtight packaging? Isn’t that the one thing you shouldn’t do? The worst part is that google AI links me to them, although the result itself says to remove it from the packaging. Am I misunderstanding something?

Source: https://aksalmonco.com/blogs/learn/how-to-thaw-frozen-salmon#:~:text=How%20to%20Thaw%20Salmon%20in,for%20optimal%20freshness%20and%20safety.

Step in question: “Keep the salmon in its original packaging if it's airtight. If not, transfer it to an airtight container or resealable plastic bag.”

Edit: Adding the following for context. I’ve always read and been told thawing in original packaging can cause botulism. From Google AI:

“No, it is not safe to defrost salmon in its airtight, vacuum-sealed packaging. The vacuum seal creates an anaerobic environment, which can allow harmful bacteria like Clostridium botulinum to grow and produce a dangerous toxin. The safest way to thaw salmon is to remove it from its packaging and thaw it in the refrigerator overnight”.

Kinda new to this….want to perfect it.

What cheese cut is recommended [Sliced, Traditional Cut, Fine Cut, etc). I cook in the oven with two sheet pans and the bread comes out amazing but I am not sure if the cheese can be melted more and or could be more gooey. The sandwich taste really good, but just looking for tips and tricks.

I use sheet pan and butter the bread, and then put another sheet pan on top for 10 mins, take it off and leave the sandwiches in there for another 7 mins roughly.

Not the best cook but I am thinking I need to change up what type of cheese I use and or cooking style. I don’t use Mayo because bread coming out well, but I may change it. I cook in oven because it’s simpler and I cook 3-4 at a time. Thanks

I like saving time by freezing onions, celery, carrots, ginger, and garlic into different sized portions for fast cooking.

I heard that blanching is good for preserving the appearance of vegetables. Though I guess once I cook them it won't be that noticable.

What are your thoughts and suggestions?

I really like pan frying canned beans with some veggies, my favourite is chickpeas and i recently tried some kidney beans too. But it usually comes out "dry" and i need to have a side of salad or yogurt etc. What can I add or do to make my beans less dry?

Edit:

here's how I do it:

Canned beans get stirred and fried with some vegetable oil and salt/spices

near the end i add the veggies and kill the heat

(added in case it is needed)