And once you start to memorize those recipes and know what staples to keep in stock, you too will be able to look at random shit in your fridge and make a meal from them.

Idk, is this how artists feel when I tell them that I can't draw because I can't do what has taken them years to learn?

Sometimes following a recipe can be good actually, at least until you know what you're doing and what can be subtracted, added, or substituted. Which you can best understand if you know why it's in the recipe in the first place.

And then she's like, instead of making the sauce let's just pour in a can of coconut milk.
Now I'm trying to figure out how much more seasoning I need so that all the extra liquid doesn't make this a bland mess.

And that's not to say that you absolutely HAVE to follow a recipe perfectly every time. But it can be difficult to cook when I'm thinking, oh this is going to be tossed with a sauce so I shouldn't add too much extra seasoning or it'll be overpowering.

It's so frustrating trying to cook with my mom because she'll tell me that there's a recipe, and we'll start cooking based on the recipe, but then she changes and adds so many things without thinking about if they actually make sense for what we're doing and so now I have to "save" the meal.

(I'm always stocking up on coconut milk if I see it on sale so I'm ready to make curries). Or techniques to keep in mind when making specific meals (like cooking my curry paste with coconut cream and a bit of oil when starting curry... can you tell I love curry).

It taught me which seasonings go with which types of food (cumin can be found in Hispanic recipes, Indian recipes, Thai recipes, and regular old "American" ones) It taught me what staples I needed to keep in my fridge if I want to be ready to make certain recipes...

Recipes helped me to understand how to cook certain types of meats (I will never forget that 3-4 chicken breasts in the oven at 325 F for an hour is long enough to completely cook the driest ass chicken... but hey, no salmonella, keep in mind that I learned this at 14).

Which brings me to my next point: many people think they can't cook because they don't want to or can't focus on using a recipe.
Many recipes I know, even the non-basic ones, I learned by constantly following recipes— whether they were literally dictated by my parents or read off a piece of paper.

I'm a cook, even though I'm not at a high chef level. I use cookbooks and enjoy looking up new recipes and yet I can cook. There's only a few meals I know without using a recipe at all, and they are really basic meals- pasta (red sauce or pesto), pizza bagels, stir fry, eggs and bacon, etc, etc.

And I feel like this is because many people watch contestants and chefs do this on the Food Network and think that's the only way to call yourself a cook. They don't understand that being a cook has different skill levels just like anything else.

I feel like a lot of people think they can't cook because they can't look at a set of random ingredients and make something that tastes good and edible from it without looking for a recipe.

Also didn’t realize how early Hughes died or how we’re already finding out King Bradley had the tattoo. Like damn it’s only season 2…. So much is happening way earlier than I’d expected.