Ok I might get downvoted to oblivion but I use MSG. It enhances the flavors so much that I have stopped going to restaurants.

Edit- I did my research and found no credible source that says MSG is harmful.

Edit2- If you go to a restaurant or order KFC chances are they use MSG as well

Don't be afraid of spices. Use more than you think is necessary. Onion and garlic can make a meal 100x better.

Biggest hack? Realizing that humans have been cooking for millennia, and that it's in the best interest of big business to convince you that it's difficult/expensive/extremely complicated.

You don't NEED the fancy equipment every company out there is trying to sell you.

Not everything needs to be gorgeous on the plate, or a whole production to make.

The poorest people in the world cook delicious food every day.

For instance, you don't need NEED a +$150 Japanese chef knife to cook at home. What you need is something that can hold an edge through general maintenance, a whet stone, a kitchen towel to dry off your blade immediately after you hand wash it, and a little bit of patience.

IKEA sells some surprisingly great single construction (steel blade, steel handle) knives, and their single body chef knife is like $25. Just get an honing rod for use before you start slicing, and a whet stone for periodic sharpening (there's TONS of YouTube videos of all the different ways of sharpening your knife), and remember to wash and hand-dry after you're finished. My chef knife cost me barely anything, and I've used it for years and years, and it still slices through a tomato without a problem. Also, I only cook for myself, so I can absolutely 100% guarantee my whet stone will "outlive" me.

Mandolines are not you friend. They thirst for blood.

Seriously if you get one get a safety mandoline like the once for all brand.

Replace everything plastic with glass.

1. Nothing goes on a plate without being tasted
2. If it's too sour, add sugar
3. if it's sweet and you haven't added acid, add a splash of vinegar.
4. if it's too hot, add fat
5. if you burn it, throw it out.
6. IF you taste it early, it should taste weak. If it's fantastic when when it starts to simmer, it'll be too harsh once it's reduced.
7. Taste it and it tastes empty or boring? Smell it. Smell all your herbs/spices on hand, which ever one it smells the closest to, add a healthy pinch and salt if it doesn't taste salty already.
8. know your oils and use the right ones. Olive oil can handle some heat and is great for savory, grapeseed is almost flavorless. Canola has a distinct flavor that doesn't go with everything.
9. season your meat before you cook it.

Bake bacon on cookie sheets at 375 for about 20 minutes. You can make a ton of bacon very quickly, with almost no mess, and all the bacon is perfectly flat. We have a double oven and we can make about 4 pounds of bacon in about 30 minutes this way. :)

chicken (or vegetable) broth in lieu of water to cook rice.

You can make a delicious, calorie dense chicken noodle soup on an extreme budget with canned chicken, chicken broth, and ramen noodle packages. That meal kept me from going hungry on multiple occasions during college.

If you cook by using a cooking recipe you can be creative (within reason). If you BAKE by following a baking recipe stick to the letter!

Ah, the alchemy of the kitchen! A dash of efficiency, a sprinkle of passion, and a dollop of savviness. First off, mise en place - French for 'put in place.' Prepare your ingredients ahead of time, it can help remove a loot of stress.

Secondly, invest in a sharp knife - it's the Excalibur of the culinary world, turning the toughest veggies into paper.

Lastly, experiment! Like any good inventor, a chef isn't afraid of a few mishaps; it happens to the best of us! You'll surprise yourself with some of things you may come up with 😉

There are still people who don't user probe thermometers. This is the single best cooking tip I can give:

• Get a probe thermometer (preferably a fast reading one).
• Use it.
• Know your temps.

Taste as you go and taste everything! Understanding how the components of your meal taste is a great way to make yummy things. It also helps you learn how ingredients manifest in the end result and will help you expand your cooking versatility

This one is a little bit of a hot take, but bottled lemon or lime juice is good for consistency. While fresh will most certainly be better, you may inadvertently juice a bad lemon/lime and potentially ruin a dish. Bottled juices can last a bit longer in the fridge.

pay attention. stay with what you are cooking as you are cooking it. don't let yourself become distracted. taste as you go. take notes. use unsalted butter. know your equipment and its pros/cons. shop at different stores for the best ingredients. fresh herbs are waaay better if you can swing it.

If you're making rice without using a rice cooker, the amount of water you need is not quite a direct ratio like the package suggests. You need a 1:1 ratio of rice to water plus an additional quarter to half cup of water depending how firm you like your rice.

When slow cooking a roast lay it on a bed of potatoes or whatever other sides you want, fill the water to the top of the veggies (or taters) then soak the roast in your sauce of choice. Gravity and heat will help the sauce work into the veggies giving them a nice flavor. The roast pretty much always comes out perfectly moist and you get amazing veggies out of the deal.

Always keep canned tomatoes in the pantry. Particularly tomato paste. It's a great ingredient that can add a depth of flavor to a variety of dishes.

Whole spices really do make a big difference and it's worth knowing how to use them even if you don't make them part of your everyday cooking. When its time to make a special dish, using whole spicessl that you grind fresh will be worth it.

Use acid in your cooking. Citrus, viniger, wine, yogurt, etc will often upgrade a dish.

Parchment paper/aluminum foil is your friend. Minimize your time scrubbing dishes by minimizing the mess you make when baking food.

By far my favorite is to have a squirt bottle of water next to my stove. It's great to have throughout the cooking process, especially if you've moved on from Teflon bullshit and are using a pan you pre-heat. To start, you put the pan on the heat and squirt a little water in it. When the water evaporates, the pan is usually in the 350F-400F range. Then when the pan is dry and heated a little more, you can squirt a few more drops in to see if the Leidenfrost effect has taken, uhhh, effect. The way you tell is that the water just dances around on the pan instead of behaving like water normally does, and it's how you know your food won't stick, it is at this point that you add the oil.

Moving on to the actual cooking, let's say you've thrown some chicken thighs in the pan and you've built up a lot of fond (the brown bits that form in the bottom of the pan) and the chicken is almost done, but you're not planning on making a sauce. Deglaze the pan with little squirts of water targeted directly at the fond and rub the chicken thighs over the area where the water is deglazing and suddenly that fond is sticking to your chicken thighs, resulting in a better crust and a cleaner pan.

Speaking of cleaner pan, once you're done cooking and plating and you have a hot dirty pan, squirt enough water in to cover the bottom of the pan and then go eat. When you come back to the kitchen to clean up, the water will have broken down the shit on the bottom of the pan and will steam the sides of the pan, so the pan will wipe clean as easy if all you did was fry an egg.

Finally, I stopped putting milk (of any variety) in my coffee, but I wanna be able to drink my coffee right away and it's too hot when it's made fresh, but I've got a bottle full of room temperature water (all the filtered water in my house comes out ice cold) sitting right there so I can cool it down that way (I brew my coffee pretty strong so watering it down isn't a big deal).

To actually cook things enough. I wasn't cooking them to unsafe levels before, and please don't cook my steak above medium rare, but some foods just taste better cooked more. Almost no one cooks ground meats enough, who the hell wants grey beef, get some color on that bitch. Also if you cook sausage meat enough it gains color and the flat renders out a little it tastes better. Get some colour on those roast veggies and no one likes a pale insipid fry. A change in color is flavor, use it to your advantage. And yes sometimes you want your veggies firm and for the love of god don't overcook your garlic.

Grilled cheese hack: assemble the sandwich open-faced on a baking sheet and place under the broiler for a few minutes until the cheese is melted and bubbling and slightly browned, then close it up and cook it like normal in a covered skillet on medium heat with butter. The cheese will be completely melted and (more importantly) it will stay melted while you're actually eating the sandwich, and the browning on the cheese adds a big flavor component.

I used to make them the normal way just in a skillet, and even if the cheese was just barely melted it would cool off and re-solidify before I started eating it. And often I would burn the crust just trying to get the cheese melted.

If you need to cool your pot down now pour running cold tap water on the outside of the pot. Not something you need when everything goes smoothly, but trying new recipies sometimes things go a little bit wrong and cooling the pot down quickly can save your dinner.

Running cold water will cool a pot to room temperature in seconds. Just beware if your pot is really hot cooling it down that fast could damage it. Should be fine at sensible cooking temperatures though.

deglazing. it's when you use an acid to pull all the glaze off the bottom of a pan. it flavors the dish and makes cleaning your pan easier.

rice vinegar and red or white wines are favorites

Always salt your pasta water to the equivalent of sea water salty. It'll make your pasta taste much better.

Boil spaghetti in a small amount of water in a frying pan. You won't need to push the pasta down and you'll have lovely starchy water to finish off your sauce — perfect for something like a carbonara!

When I have to use parchment paper, I crumple the paper ip into a little ball first, then press it out flat into the cooking vessel (sheet pan or loaf pan or whatnot) and it lays flatter/conforms to the pan better without rolling up all over the place rather than trying to just use a pristine sheet of parchment. It really works great.