Simplify your prep.
If you’re actually going to sit and cut everything, it’s OK to prep the night before. If you want to spend time on a few hours on a Saturday or Sunday prepping for the week, it’s totally fine to prep and freeze. And if you have a food processor, those chop up pretty nicely—it’s easy to use tools like those.
I know professional chefs and recipe developers always encourage people to do the mise en place, like, get all your ingredients ready in separate bowls. And people don’t like to do this because then they have to wash more dishes—and the mental notion of washing a lot of dishes is just off-putting. Just have the ingredients in front of you at the table in the kitchen and work with them.
“No one’s coming to your house to judge you. As long as it tastes good, it’s fine.”
It’s not about looks.
Instagram, Pinterest, and all these things are all responsible for this desire for everything to look perfect—and of course I’m partly responsible for it too, because I always have to take a good photograph or video to sell the product.
But you also have to keep it real. For me it’s a professional challenge. So I just tell people directly, don’t be ashamed of how it looks. Because first of all, no one’s coming to your house to judge you. As long as it tastes good, it’s fine.
Kosher salt is silly.
Another thing home cooks hear all the time is, “You have to use kosher salt—Morton or Diamond.” It’s nonsense, because that’s not going to make them a better cook. There’s nothing magical about it. And it’s infuriating to me because, first of all, the price of those salts are actually quite high compared to just regular sea salt.
Some chefs will say, “Oh, I can grab kosher salt better.” You can also grab fine sea salt better, unless your fingers are made of, like, stainless steel, right? And some chefs will say, ‘It dissolves really fast.’ But I did a time experiment side by side and there was no difference. Telling people to use something so specific, when it’s not going to make them a good or bad cook—it’s silly.
Don’t go overboard so you can actually enjoy the meal.
We do a lot of this to ourselves—we’re trying to replicate what’s online or what’s in a restaurant, and you don’t need that at home. You can just have a lovely meal, entertain your guests properly. When you’re entertaining or feeding your family, don’t go overboard, because at the end of the day, you actually want to enjoy the meal and spend time with them.