These are excerpts from the author’s book “Deep,” which contains eight of his small books published in the form of Wisdom Literature covering different aspects of life: Facing troublemakers, dealing with pain, personal financial issues, gastronomy, reading, criticizing, inspiring, and feeling always good to go.

Series 3: Pocket – Your Personal Economy.

Week 57: Progressing in the Kitchen

• Cooking is a talent; excellent training and continuous practice only reveal the talented chef. However, even if you lack innate talent, you can become a good chef if you are determined. Solid will and intense focus compensate for the lack of talent.

• Your previous mistakes are your guidelines for your next try; pay attention to them, and try not to make new ones. This, of course, requires you to focus heavily on the first trial in order to extract the maximum possible lessons.

• Cooking is an integrated process and not necessarily complicated in all cases. The taste is the most important in the end, but remember that the texture, the smell, and even the way of serving affect others’ judgment of the dish, and these factors may sometimes cover up some minor taste slips.

• Do not use a shortage of ingredients or poor materials as an excuse. A good chef will effectively wield his or her ingredients and control his or her materials, whatever they are, as soon as he or she decides to start working.

• Low heat is essential for preparing a delicious dish. Cooking depends mainly on patience.

• Pay attention to fine details. Sometimes the details have a fundamental role in the cooking process and important results on the served dish. If you leave the edges of the dough or pasta on the edge of the tray, they will burn. If you place the saucepan slightly to the side of a burner instead of in the middle, you will not have an even distribution of heat. If you add crushed rather than whole spices or nuts (or vice versa), the taste and texture of your dish will change.

• The longer you work in kitchens, the more dishes you will learn to prepare, but even if you only learn a few dishes, the most important thing is that your experience should greatly increase your confidence and make you proud of the dishes you prepare.

• A good chef never stops learning from everyone around him or her, not just from those who have more experience in the field. Even the chef’s own mistakes should be a constant source of learning and inspiration for him or her.

• The best way to advance your cooking skills is to make sure that you learn at least one new piece of information or cooking idea every day.

• Sometimes you are disconnected from the kitchen or cooking certain dishes for a long time and feel you have forgotten everything. Don’t worry. You will be able to fully restore your skills and more once you return to the kitchen and cook old dishes a few times.

• Progress in the kitchen is not necessarily a matter of time; it is the result of passion and hard work.

• Culinary secrets reveal themselves automatically when you sincerely and passionately embrace learning.

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