What would you want to see in an educational cooking channel?

I’ve been having this idea pretty much ever since I started culinairy school but haven’t been able to flush out how I want to do this.

My idea is to start a cooking channel on YouTube (yeah I know there’s already thousands of those, it’d be for my own education and enjoyment mostly) but don’t do your basic recipe videos. I want to go into basics, explain cooking techniques and their origin. A bit of a mix between Binging With Babish and Tasting History but try to be more “like an actual culinairy school”, if you know what I mean by that. I’m already writing a few script ideas, about produce/equipment knowledge or one about techniques you’ll find in almost all recipes for example. still thought I’d come and ask the lovely folks here about what they’d want to see.

So, I’m wondering: Let’s say you have little to no cooking experience. Maybe frying an egg seems like a challenge to you already. What would you want to see on a youtube channel to help you start cooking. What knowledge do you feel you’re missing to start preparing meals and understand what you’re doing?

I’m not expecting a lot of responses, but if I can find out what people who pretty much never cook feel is holding them back, then that would be an amazing starting point for me.

Edit: i wouldn’t mind ideas for a channel name either. :)

ReallyKinda,

Advice on difficult to judge things like how to sauté onions correctly without burning them; how to deal with yeast (what does it mean when your bread is hollow? What about when it’s hard? Doesn’t rise?); how to make a cheese sauce that isn’t too thick, thin, or chunky; techniques for timing stuff to be ready at the right time (ie ‘cook the eggs last’); balancing things with lemon juice (in general the stuff about balancing acids); seasoning soups so they’re not bland.

TheActualDevil,

Your mentioning fried eggs reminds me of a time I had a coworker who was telling me about the breakfast he made for his kid every weekend: fried pork roll slices and scrambled eggs. I asked why not fried eggs since it would probably be better with that meal. He said he could never get through frying an egg without it breaking and just turning into scrambled eggs anyway so he’d given up years ago. So I gave him some tips I learned in culinary school. Make sure the oil is already hot, Crack the egg into a separate bowl ahead of time, and either use a small pan or tilt the pan to the egg and oil are in one “corner.” He came back the next day and he said it worked wonders for him and he’d been able to fry an egg for the first time in his life.

So maybe that sort of thing? Like, focus a lot on those tiny little tricks that aren’t necessarily in recipes or even required but make the job so much easier.

sevan,

I really liked Alton Brown’s show Good Eats. I thought he did a nice job explaining the science behind cooking methods and ingredients in an easy to understand way.

infyrin,
@infyrin@lemmy.world avatar

I want to see realism. Like, the thing that takes me away from watching cooking channels and videos is that everything seems to be perfect. A little too perfect. Everyone has all of the ingredients at the ready, everyone has all of the right sizes of pans, pots .etc

Not to say I want to see people struggle while cooking, but I’d like to watch people go through the steps it takes to cook whatever it is and with helpful information along the way. Not just some person going “a tad of this” or “a sprinkle of that” “now throw it in the oven for 10 minutes and it’ll be perfect!” kind of ways.

XYZinferno,

Pretty much this. I tend to see a lot of those videos with studio kitchen setups that look extraordinarily decorated, unlike any normal kitchen, which opt to take cinematic shots of sauteing instead of actually presenting the cooking process as it would naturally occur. Maybe it’s fine for entertainment but it’s not what I would want to learn from either.

One of my favorite tutorials for any food I’ve made is one that I go to for falafels (Rafika’s Kitchen, I think the channel was called). I know the recipe by heart now, but I always remember how she spoke about how practical it was to make, offering viable substitutes, hacks, and advice that would suit the average viewer. Tips she gives like re-using oil for frying are rarely covered, but are the backbone of cooking practically at home.

Fredselfish,
@Fredselfish@lemmy.world avatar

Yes what I want I true step by step that any layman can follow and make great dishes.

raptorattacks,

Adam Ragusea on YouTube might be the vibe you’re looking for. His video style varies a bit, but he often tries to show the whole cooking process (speeding up boring stuff like dicing a bunch of onions, but not cutting it out) because he thinks it gives a better idea of how much work the average home cook will actually need to do. His philosophy is to make food that’s approachable for amateurs and also discuss why he’s making the choices he’s making, because what works for him might not work for you. As far as ingredients go, I often see him spooning flour directly out of the bag while he cooks, but the video quality is still pretty good so it’s pleasant to watch.

Alternatively, if you like comedy in your cooking shows, check out You Suck At Cooking. Also very unpretentious, but maybe not a great how-to channel.

mtchristo,

The the secret to making …

Like certain types of bread , cake, kiche.

The secret to breads or bakes not flattening after taking them out of the oven… That sort of stuff

baked_tea,

This is a solid way

SloppyPuppy,

I really want to see no bullshit science based cooking. With percise measurmene. Like whats the exact temperature and time to cook a salmon staek medium rare. I really need exact measurements based on science and experiments.

Fantomas,

TIL salmon can be medium rare.

NPC,

Boy lemme tell you about tuna steaks then… XD

Fantomas,

Yeah I’ve had those. Delicious. I just never heard of salmon being medium or rare.

kakes,

Sushi?

Fantomas,

Well that would be raw

kakes,

The ultimate rare.

(disclaimer: not a cook)

SloppyPuppy,

Dont know if this is the right term. Its at a phase where its clearly cooked but its juicy and very very sofr that it melts in your mouth. I think its at around 70c core temp. Not sure.

Fantomas,

…so cooked properly?

moody,

You can sous-vide salmon to about 45 degrees Celsius, which is lower than you’re likely to pan-fry or bake it. I’d definitely equate that to medium-rare. It’s not quite cooked, but still falls apart.

MyDogLovesMe,

“Chef At Home” was a stellar Canadian cooking show! It was on the Food network. He did another couple of shows, one online too. However, CAH was, IMHO the best of the best.

Very relaxed and educational.

It was Hosted by Chef Michael Smith from PEI.

I could cook well enough before watching him. I cook WAY better now, with thanks to him for teaching me how to THINK in the kitchen, and not just “do”.

Also, once and a while? I’d like to see an episode on ‘mistakes & failures’. We ALL have them, and watching an experienced chef “fuck it up” once and a while is inspiring in that it teaches you to learn, and move on from your fails. “If HE/SHE can fail, then I should not be discouraged!

Xariphon,

I would love to see more technique and theory videos. There's piles of recipes and such, but, like, what does it mean to dice something as opposed to julienne it? How the hell do you chop things so fast without losing a finger or leaving a hand-span of un-chopped stuff behind? Why does it matter if my pots are "heavy bottomed" or not and what even is that?

Etc ad nauseam.

Fantomas,

Heavy bottomed pans you make the cookin world go round.

mill,

My biggest pet peeve is when videos are like “I have a cooking show! Discover me, riches and fame!”

Which is to say, so many of them that I rarely even try to watch a cooking video today.

NPC,

That’s fair, but how would you imagine a channel you would watch to be like? What information in what kind of form would you like to see?

mill,

I remember liking ones from Europe, even if I didn’t understand the language at all, because someone would point the camera at their aunt or grandmother who would just go ahead and make the food in a straightforward fashion.

Beyond that, what would I want? It might be nice to hear about the experiences of having tried deviating from steps in the recipe, since many people authoritatively repeat what they heard from some authority somewhere. Or “X Y Z has been held up as so important, but I have been doing A B C and it seems fine to me.” I’m not really managing to think of much here. I suppose it would be nice to have a way to communicate with the makers of videos and the viewers without having a Google account (since I don’t).

OurTragicUniverse,
@OurTragicUniverse@kbin.social avatar

More content like the Chinese Cooking Demystified channel, and the Food 52 stuff with chef Lucas Sin.

I like to watch stuff where I'm getting some of the history and geography of the techniques, ingredients and dishes being presented; while also being talked through the various chemical reactions going on at every stage and why they're important to the desired outcome of the dish.

Plant based content would very much be appreciated too.

Halafax,

I would love to see a show about how to adapt traditional meals to vegetarian or reduced meat dishes, but absolutely not presented by a vegetarian or vegan. Existing presenters can't seem to stop talking about vegetarianism/veganism. I would appreciate the information, but I can only abide their purity spiral attitudes briefly.

NPC,

I was a vegetarian for environmental reasons for almost 11 years. I started eating meat again when I started my studies, although still very little. I feel I’d be the perfect candidate for this.

Halafax,

I think there are a lot of "meat is an accent, not the whole dish" recipes out there, from all over the world. Adapting flavors to a more western palette is going to be tricky, but it can be done. So long as they are presented as good recipes instead of "here is a half step step to vegetarianism", I think people would dig it.

Without putting too much emphasis on it, showing people how to find fresh veg/fruit/herbs outside of a grocery would be useful, as would some tips on how to buy ethically raised meat/dairy. Having to make trips to different places seems like a chore (and certainly can be), but showing how it can be a pleasant social experience would help a lot to build a larger community of like-minded foodies. Spend local, reduce waste, encourage a local market for superior produce, network with like-minded people, etc..

Artichuth,

Recipes that are attainable for a home chef.

My biggest pet peeves are when I see a channel insist that I buy a brand new piece of equipment or an ingredient that can only be found in a specialty shop. I love Babish, but it annoys me when he says, “Go to your local Mexican grocery store,” or something of that nature. I do not have one, and if I do, it’s more catered towards a white American and not the immigrants looking for their countries ingredients. I had to stop watching Joshua Weissman because he would constantly say I needed a certain piece of equipment that was $100+ or a fresh ingredient and there was no way I would ever be able to get it fresh.

The cooking channel I love the most is Internet Shaquillle. He never says you have to buy a certain product. He’ll straight up show you things you can buy at Kroger for $2. And he’ll give alternatives if you don’t have certain equipment. Ethan Chlebowski is another fantastic one.

ddtfrog,

Adam Ragusea is the solution to your problems.

over_clox,

I’d think something like have each episode demonstrating not only how to cook a particular meal, but also go over all the vast myriad of cooking utensils, pots, pans, bowls, dishes, etc, and how to properly use them.

Hereforpron2,

America’s Test Kitchen does some really great stuff for both beginner and experienced cooks, namely presenting one method/recipe after testing a number of alternatives, and including the reasons why they prefer the method/recipe they settled on. “Many people also do it this way, and here’s how that turns out and why I prefer the method shown.” Or “Here’s what happens if you add more butter, and this is what it looks like if you add more eggs/use an egg substitute etc.” They get into the chemistry/science of why the chosen method is best or why an easier method can work as well as a more traditional one, and you feel like you learn both the how of cooking something and the why behind a specific recipe, which makes it a lot easier to understand and follow. A final benefit is that it can make a lot of recipes more approachable for a home cool with things like “in professional kitchens, they will use XYZ in order to ZYX. If you don’t have access to XYZ, YYY ingredient has a similar effect and is more common in home kitchens…”

NPC,

Yeah, I think you might have pointed out a downfall for me and many other who would want to do a similar thing as me. For example, I use agar agar (a certain thickening agent) on an almost daily basis at work. It’s great but I should recognise that most people do not have access to this kind of stuff. Like, it’s easy to see people won’t have a sous vide or vacume machine at home, but there will be stuff I take for granded that far out of reach for most people.

Hereforpron2,

Exactly, it’s definitely a shortcoming of a lot of recipes and cooking shows. Like just in case I do have agar agar, I’d love to hear how to use it in the given recipe, but many more people probably want to hear that and then their other more common options, as well as how those compare to the more professional technique/ingredients. They do the same thing with materials, too. Like “traditionally this is made in a round bottom wok, but we get great results with this type of pan that you’re more likely to have/know how to use.” Sending huge luck for ya, and looking forward to checking out your videos when you start!

joe,
@joe@lemmy.world avatar

I would probably watch a youtube channel that focused more on how to improvise in cooking than how to follow a recipe, along with pointing out various useful techniques and pitfalls to avoid.

Hell, this might actually already exist. I confess I’ve never really looked.

NPC,

I’ve looked and haven’t found anything to my satisfaction. I found that pretty much all channels either give you too much details in way too much of a robotic way or they don’t go deep enough into a subject. I’m not gonna say I’m gonna have a easy time finding the middle ground myself, but I do feel there’s still a place for that on YouTube and at least I feel I have the required knowledge for that.

joe,
@joe@lemmy.world avatar

Well feel free to drop a DM to me directly when you get it up and running and I’ll give it a look, for sure.

NPC,

I will do. Currently writing, editing and such will be a whole new and different beast. Don’t expect anything soon haha

ddtfrog,

Adam Ragusea is good for that.

NPC,

Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love Adam and he’s done a great job at demystifying a lot of what cooking is. I still do feel his channel is still leaning a bit too heavily on the assumption people have some cooking knowledge. When he goes into a topic he does thst super well, but he doesn’t offer the basic and broad knowledge I seek to offer.

reversebananimals,

What about Kenji Lopez-Alt?

I think he gives a lot of great detail on techniques like braising, deglazing, etc. but in an approachable way. Maybe you see some things you think you could improve on, but his channel seems like a great place to use as a reference for the kind of content you’re aiming for.

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