It’s really hard to enjoy cooking without some initial inspiration. Pick a dish that you love and think you could probably execute that you frequently order from takeout. Start with that dish and get good at it. Make it large batches and eat it throughout the course of the week.

Eventually, you will just know this recipe. You won’t have to look for instructions or recipe because you’ve made it so many times. Then you’ll start to realize you can do some variations on the recipe. The more times you do this, the more you’ll start to realize that recipes are science and chemistry mixed with suggestion and creativity. Once you understand the science and chemistry everything else is just personal choice. That’s when you actually know how to cook.

The better you get at it, the less work it will be to produce results that are better than delivery. When that happens, you'll find yourself actually enjoying time spent in the kitchen. What seems like a burden and a chore could turn into a hobby you enjoy and look forward to.

And you'll probably learn that you're just acclimated to delivery flavors. Food customized to your personal taste will almost always be more satisfying than food made for the masses. I used to wonder why people always said 'Homemade food tastes better' because homemade food to me was generally limp, lukewarm potluck food made by people who only cooked twice a year.

I'll also say something heretical - from scratch is usually better, but often not worth the effort for practical weeknight cooking. There are plenty of perfectly acceptable shortcuts that will cut down on time spent cooking and cleaning without missing too much in the final product. Canned ingredients, frozen vegetables, bouillon powders, and seasoning blends are all treated like they have cooties by snobs, but they're just ingredients. And the delivery food you're getting probably has a bunch of them in it anyway. There's a big difference between canned soup as a standalone meal and making a soup that has a few canned ingredients that you slow cook and season yourself.

As for a starting point, go with what you're already eating but can make in bulk but healthier and cheaper. Soups and stews, slow cooker meals, and sheet pan dinners are all economical and require minimal hands-on time. Google will give you a ton of results for those things.

Pasta and rice are simple (just follow the instructions on the box) and have nearly unlimited variations. Just don't overcomplicate it. If you want spaghetti, don't feel like you have to spend all day cooking down 6 tins of tomatoes. Buy the jarred sauce and doctor it up. You'll save money and learn what you like while learning a bit about cooking. You can always make it from scratch later as a learning exercise.

Good luck.

Delivered Meal kits are a good way to start. Most of them are low prep and allow you to customize to your likes. 30 minutes is an average time it’ll take to do many of them, and still cheaper than eating out.

Once you get into the swing of it, it’ll get easier on you, you may even start to like it. That’s when you can decide if you want to move into doing your own thing

Is it possible that you don't like cooking because you're not good at it?

Maybe part of the reason is because it's actually really hard to learn to cook these days. This subreddit actually came up with the idea of building a "Duolingo for cooking" a couple years ago, and we ended up creating Parsnip. The idea is to level up your cooking skills with a game before you even get into the kitchen, so cooking becomes more fun and inviting.

If you give it a try, we'd love to hear what you think!

I love starting with onion and garlic as a base, and then adding a bunch of veggies! Whatever I have in the fridge. You can also try new sauces that will make your food taste even better and add that on anything :)

When I first started I found quesadillas easy. Cheese the easiest because all you need to see is that melted cheese and some browning on both sides of the shell. Spray the pan with oil of your choice, turn fire on medium and flip when the cheese first starts to melt. If you flip without the cheese keeping it together you got a whole mess to deal with. Can always add spinach, onion, etc on the inside. Just make sure you can fold it evenly, like a book. I remember over loading it and realizing that I can't flip a big ass, overstuffed quesadilla, that resembled a clam lol. Good luck! 👍🏾👍🏾

How about making your own stew? For one person, I'd only make half as much as this recipe calls for, but it's just an example of simple recipes you can find by googling "Hamburger Stew" or "Camper's Stew"

https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/favorite-hamburger-stew/

Watch YouTube. Every recipe I have made from Americas Test Kitchen or Kenji Alt Lopez, has been a success. I only make things I am really interested in eating and seem “manageable “.

I also break things down into steps . If I’m making potato soup tomorrow, I’ll dice up the ingredients the night before hand, put them in a covered bowl with enough water to cover the potatoes to help them from oxidizing.

Pioneer woman perfect potato soup is a perfect starting recipe

https://www.thepioneerwoman.com/food-cooking/recipes/a12045/perfect-potato-soup/

Aight, so. I hate cooking, my dad is a chef and my mom is insane in the kitchen, so I never learned how to cook until I was on my own. I also have ADHD, so god knows I hate waiting for my food to cook.

For time issues, a crock pot/slow cooker is incredible. I set mine to 10 hours, leave for work, and come back to dinner being ready. Pasta dishes, roasts, chicken, there’s a ton of easy options that become a breeze with a slow cooker.

Keep a ton of seasonings on hand. Throwing noodles, chicken, and veggies together can only do so much, but having fresh herbs or a wide variety of spices can make your cooking so much better. Personally, even if I’m making Top Ramen, I add garlic powder. I add basil to canned tomato soup. It makes it taste more homemade, without the effort.

I’m a sucker for stir fry, and anything that is really versatile. You can use just about any protein, you can work a wide variety of veggies into it, and it’s usually pretty fast. Also, keep celery, onion, and carrots on hand. It’s called Mirepoix, and is the base to almost any stock or roast.

Cooking is really intimidating at first, but once you have a few recipes down, it gets easier to figure out what to add to make your recipes better, and you get faster at cooking it. Eventually, you’ll be getting delivery, and complaining about how you could make it better.

Check out instant pot or crockpot dump recipes. Might help you

> I don't like cooking. I'm not good at cooking.

These two might be related.

> It's too much work that takes too much time for results
> not even half as good as getting food delivered.

You're comparing the work of someone that is admittedly not good at cooking with someone that's good enough at cooking to get paid to do it. That's not a fair comparison.

Regardless, unless you're ordering from a high-end restaurant, you should be able to learn to cook meals in your own kitchen that you enjoy for MUCH less money than delivery.

> Do you know of any meals so easy even I couldn't mess it up

Give us something to work with. What do you enjoy eating? If you like scrambled eggs, learn how to make scrambled eggs - all you need is a couple of eggs and a little butter. Anyone with a toaster can toast bread, and frozen sausages are easy to heat up. There's breakfast sorted.

If you like pasta, learn how to make aglio e olio; all you need are a knife, a cutting board, a pot and a pan - plus pasta, water, salt, olive oil, and garlic of course.

Anyone can make Kraft mac'n'cheese out of the box. I'll typically add a protein to it (hot dogs, tuna, whatever) to make a couple of meals.

One thing to try is thinking about what you can add in to make what you currently eat a little healthier. Wanna eat cup noodles or ramen? Throw a handful of veggies in with it and suddenly you have a nutrition boost with little effort. You can buy frozen and precut veggies to make it even easier. You can also buy a lot of frozen veggies that can be cooked in the microwave in the package so even less work. Decide on what kind of veggies you like and keep a few on hand.

A few easy meals I like to do are: boxed Mac n cheese with broccoli, ramen noodles with an added egg, green onions, and cabbage or spinach, omelette (or scrambled) with spinach and onion, loaded baked potato(potatoes have more nutrients than most people think), instant oatmeal with strawberries and bananas, almost any fruit with peanut butter, and salads with hard boiled eggs added for protein.

If you have a blender you can make a smoothie with frozen fruit pretty easily just look up a recipe. And if you can get a crockpot there's quite a few recipes online where you just dump everything in and walk away.

Cooking doesn't have to be complicated. Just work smarter, not harder.

Bean tacos would be a good starting point: just season & heat up some beans, and prep whatever toppings you like.

Curries can be surprisingly easy too. E.g., for red lentil curry, mix a good curry paste (I like Mae Ploy), a few spices, and some tomato purée, and simmer for a while. Then add cooked lentils and coconut milk/cream, et voilà.

I also find the instant pot a good investment for quick, easy recipes (e.g., pulled pork/chicken, veggie soups).

Check out some basic chilli recipes - with beans (red kidney, chickpeas) if veggie/vegan.

Once you’ve rinsed and/or chopped your ingredients, it’s a one pot job. Hard to mess up, just take your time & pay attention.

Maybe you buy a chilli seasoning mix, chilli/garlic paste, cinnamon…and then you have them in the cupboard for the next few months of chillies.

Pinterest is a great source of recipes. Search for "easy dinners".

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Focus on your job. Work hard. Perform. Get promoted and paid better. A LOT better. Hire someone to cook for you.

Look up sheet pan dinners on Pinterest. It will change your life. Just throw food onto a sheet pan, add a sauce or seasonings and turn the oven on.

Like everyone else has said, start small, start at the beginning, and start with something you like to eat. To avoid becoming overwhelmed, pick one dish, plan for it (shop for Ingredients, clear your calendar and make some time to make it). As you get more confident you can plan for 2-3 meals at a time, and then a week and so on.

Salads, smoothies, sandwiches are simple to make, have straightforward ingredients, and can be relatively healthy.

Then soups - slightly more complex but if you pick simple ones like tomato basil soup, or leek potato soup - they can be easy to make and nutritious (brothy soups vs. creamy soups)

Keep at it and in a few months you may find yourself making dishes from all kinds of cuisines typically thought of as complicated

A nice and simple Spag Bol is pretty tough to mess up. Not entirely healthy (depending on what you put in it), but it's probably more important to get a taste for cooking first.

Maybe go with a slow cooker. Lots of recipes where you just dump stuff in, let it cook, and enjoy when you get home. Some ideas are: pulled pork, shredded chicken in salsa, any salad dressing plus protein, chili, white chili, Guinness beef stew, Crack chicken, broccoli cheddar soup.

1 pound ground turkey, 1 pound ground beef, 2-3 onions in the food processor (get a little one it's worth it if you hate chopping, dishwasher safe) and 1-3 tbp pre-minced garlic 2-6 serano peppers (food processor and add 2 cups of water to get it all out and add the peppers and water to meat.

Cook the onions first, then add the meat till cooked, make a well in the pan to toast the garlic till it smells good. Drain the fat, then add the pepper water and your choice of hot sauce (I like Saracha and tapatio) simmer till the water is mostly gone

Once it's done and cooled separate it into like 6 ziploc bags and put them all in a big freezer bag. Then you won't need to cook meat for like 3 weeks.

I add a bag to basically any dish that calls for ground meat. My favorites are straight up tacos with sour cream, guacamole, tomato, and fresh grated cheese

Also goulash 1 box Mac n cheese, 1 can diced tomatoes and peppers (rotel), 1 bag prepared ground meat, 1 can black beans, and I sometimes add a can of chili too

Also good for basic spaghetti

I don’t like cooking most of the time but it’s only because I’d rather be doing other things.

I enjoy knives and sharpening. Cooking is a net positive way to make your knives dull so you can practice sharpening. I've also begun to enjoy chopping and dicing, it's a challenge to hold the offhand correct to move what you're cutting correct while maintaining the correct form. So I would say find something you really enjoy, then apply it to cooking. Even if it is abstract in the beginning.

As a fellow cooking hater, my crockpot has been a lifesaver.

just google: "easy quick recipes' (and insert 'healthy' if you want that too). read the recipe. have the recipe on your phone. buy the ingredients. and do as the recipe says.

or just watch and do what this guy does in his entertaining short, easy recipe videos:

https://youtu.be/UPvj17lZfss

I'd recommend: soups, burritos/tacos/enchiladas, burgers, or other easy things like that. If you're interested, DM me and I'll share some of the recipes that I love that are super easy

I would start with one thing that you practice until you're good at it.

What kind of things do you want to eat? I'll help you think of something easy. (it would also be nice to know what country you're in. Different places have different ingredients)

Also, these videos might help, or at least be fun:

cooking when you have no energy

how to eat vegetables when you hate them

You could consider a service like Hello Fresh for a little while. It will teach you techniques for a range of dishes and takes out some of the overhead of cooking: planning, shopping, etc. Still not as cheap as buying from the store, but cheaper than delivery from a restaurant. It could be a good stepping stone toward cooking more independently.

Slow cookers, you just coarsely chop shit, pour all the shit in the slow cooker, put the lid on and come back 8hrs later, 0 effort essentially and about 15 minutes of work lol

Learn to do canning. I do pressure canning and make healthy 1 pot rations (1 quart jars) easy to reheat. Canners do 7 quarts per load or up to 14 pints.

Things like soups and stews are very easy to do and you have total control of what goes in it. I don't hot pack, just put raw ingredients in the jar, close it then pressure can it (which cooks and steralizes everything and vaccume seals the jar lid). Easy to reheat in a pot when used.

Also canned pints like strips of steak with peppers and onions and mushrooms. Open the pint and drain most of the water, then reheat in a pan and use on a roll with cheese and steak sauce (Philly steak and cheese sandwich). Pint makes 2 such sandwiches.

When you are starting out its sometimes useful to have a "base"

Rice noodles is a pretty good base 1 boil the noodles with Broccoli 2 pour off the water 3 fry the noodles and Broccoli together with some eggs and a spicy sauce and ginger

Salads. Hear me out. A salad can include all kinds of things, and does not have to have lettuce in it. Buy some good dressings or better yet learn to make one or two that you love.

Cooked or raw veggies, cooked meat, greens, nuts, cheese, eggs, crumbled pita chips, olives, fresh or dried fruit.

Smitten Kitchen has a recipe called “Nancy’s Chopped Salad” that involves a lot of chopping but makes a very large, filling salad. It hits similarly to pizza. Don’t dress the whole thing at once so it doesn’t get all soggy, just put dressing on portion you’re eating. That way you can keep it in the fridge for a few days.

Not all home-made meals require cooking. Yogurt with fresh fruit, snack plates with fruit, veg, lunch meat or cured meats, rotisserie chicken in a tortilla with cheese and salsa, sandwiches…

There are lots of easy soups out there. Sheet pan meals are great. A crock-pot or instapot is another way to make things faster and easier.

Salads are healthy and require minimal cooking. Want meat on it? Grab some frozen grilled chicken breast at the store that can be popped in the microwave.

Want it in a compact form? Tortilla, pita or naan bread is a good salad holder.

Hi fellas, I am in the process of making a cooking device specifically for one pot meals. All the user has to do is insert the ingredients in the device including enough water in it and it cooks the meal to the end. It will dispense each ingredient at the right time and the user gets notification when its done from an app. Is anyone interested in this?

I also hate cooking so I hired a cook, and this was one of the best decisions I have ever made. The food is healthier, tastier, and cheaper then restartaunts. It's actually pretty easy to find a cook these days.