3 mistakes beginner cooks make

Cooking is like rocket science to those who are
not conversant with it when in fact it is an art
form where you explore flavours and blend
them to get the richness of each. More often
than not, to cook takes a gut feeling and that
can be difficult to the least experienced cooks.
Welcome to the world of cuisine, young cook
so lets’s try and help you make sense of it.
These are three things you must watch out for
when cooking.
Underseasoning
In as much as you are trying to be careful not
to go overboard, learn to be liberal. Don’t be
miserly with the seasoning and one thing is
that if you are cooking a meal where you might
have to add another food item without any
seasoning, the sauce should be a bit
overspiced so that by the time you add it, it
will taste just right. A typical example is jollof
rice. Since you boiled the rice without
seasoning, overseason the sauce so that when
you mix everything it tastes perfect.
Overseasoning
Yeah, I know I just mentioned going all out but
cooking is more or less about knowing how to
balance the flavours and how different foods
‘behave’ while cooking. One thing you must
understand is that certain foods marinate even
when on fire. For example, vegetable soup
(‘efo’) should not be overseasoned, because by
the time it cooks, the natural flavour of the
vegetables come out, making it salty. Learn to
let your food simmer for a while before
deciding if you need to add more seasoning.
Overcooking
Nigerians hate ‘raw’ food. We believe the
longer it is on fire, the more cooked it is. While
it is true that if you leave food on fire, it
absorbs more spices but not all foods should
‘sleep’ on fire because the nutrients can get
destroyed or it loses it crunchy quality e.g
green vegetables and carrots.