I actually toyed with the idea of making a YouTube channel dedicated to recreating food from other channels and only showing the clean-up. Like “thanks for the tip Babish now I get to scrape off sticky eldritch bullshit from a ridiculously tiny whisk AGAIN” and “we’re going to soak these plates for at least an hour because we fell asleep as soon as the guests left and the sauce hardened into concrete”.
Any YouTube money would’ve gone into a dishwasher fund. I would’ve reviewed the dishwasher after buying it and that would’ve been the last video on the channel.
This is the kind of idea that works and actually makes your chanel relatively popular.
DO THAT
I’d watch it
I’d watch that religiously.
last video on the channel
Why kill a perfectly good cash cow?
I mean, there’s only so many ways to do dishes in an entertaining fashion lol
I’m sure you can figure something out. One can always take the Casually Explained release cycle for videos.
Some people just enjoy watching messes disappear. That’s the entertainment.
Throw in effective cleaning tips for the worst stuck-on crud, and I’m there. Acids, abrasives, bleach, ammonia, detergents, brillo, scotch-brite, magic erasers, scrapers, heat, cold1, steam… they all have their place but a lot of people aren’t aware of the best tool for the job. Plus there’s already people watching power washing, lawn mowing, and snow removal on youtube - the audience is already there for a clean sink.
I would’ve reviewed the dishwasher after buying it and that would’ve been the last video on the channel.
That’s begging for a collab with Technology Connections.
1 - throw bacon grease into a ceramic coffee mug and refrigerate; other materials may not handle the temperature shock and break. After it’s set it’s easily used as a cooking fat. Also, it’s now solid enough to sit in the kitchen garbage without leaking everywhere.
Slow cookers have entered the chat.
90% of slow cooker recipes:
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Ingredients
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Put in slow cooker
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Cook for 4-8 hours
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Eat for a week
Clean out the slow cooker crock and maybe a cutting board. God-tier appliance and cooking method.
Agreed. The real slow-cooker superpower is where it cooks dinner for you while you’re away at work, letting you come home to a hot meal.
I love throwing food into a slow cooker, doing something else, and then tada! Food! The best.
Instant pot does this but in 30 minutes tops.
Except you can’t have raw meat sitting for 7 hours until an insta pot turns on 1hr before you get home.
Most of them also have a slow cook feature as well.
I use my slow cooker here and there for convenience, but I feel like no matter what I put in it, it just tastes like slow cooker. Not that it’s bad, but strangely similar even when I use completely different ingredients.
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one of the main reasons why I hate cooking :P
That’s why baking wins every time
When my partner bakes, there’s fucking flour everywhere. And I mean everywhere. I’d rather have post meal mess.
By baking, I simply mean I of in the cold food of out hot eat the food, not the entire process before it.
For example, bake pork chop. Put tinfoil on the tray, put the pork chop on, add some salt, put another tinfoil to cover it. You don’t even need to wash the tray.
Cook some rice with a rice cooker to go with the pork chop and you’re done.
If they can write a 7 paragraph story about their dying grandmas old family recipes, they can show us the mess.
This is why we have mise-en-place.
Isn’t that the opposite? Makes it easier to get the timing right, but at the cost of dirtying loads more little bowls? Whereas if i dice my carrots while my onions are sweating etc, I can keep the production line going and only use one pot…
Depends on how you look at it, I guess. Assuming you have a dishwasher, you can just put the containers in there as you use ingredients and be left with a clean counter. Definitely a trade-off involved, though!
What mess? Never heard about cleaning your station while cooking? There is more than enough time to put things away and dishes in the dishwasher while dinner is cooking. Knifes are cleaned immediately after use. No mess.
A ha ha ha ha ha hah.
For some things you do have to multitask and keep the plates spinning, so to speak. For example making sure something doesn’t burn while you’re cleaning the last mess.
And that is something that a lot of people need to acclimate to I think. If anyone reading this is one of those people then I’d suggest focusing on reducing the mess as much as possible while you’re cooking, even if you aren’t perfect. Then try to take care of whatever’s left after you finish cooking but before you actually eat. One or two dirty implements is a lot less daunting to take care of than a sink full of stuff.
Another thing I’d suggest is trying to reduce the amount of stuff you dirty in the first place by focusing on single pot recipes or modifying a recipe to be single pot. Frying meat and onions in the bottom of a soup pot before deglazing and adding the rest of the ingredients, for example. This isn’t always possible to do of course, especially if you’re doing something big and fancy, but you should save those kinds of recipes for times when you have all day to dedicate to them.
Depends on how many things you are making at the same time and the volume of mess.per item.
Cleaning as you go is the best, but sometimes you can’t stop stirring or chopping or peeling to do it.
Do all your prep first.
Sometimes there isn’t time to prep before starting, or room to do all the prep, or a ton of other reasons for not doing all the prep ahead of time. Sometimes prepping the other thing you are making while the first thing is cooking is the better use of time. Cleaning isn’t always the best use of time.
That’s why I said depends.
Within the context of the original post: if what you’re cooking leaves a huge mess and this is a significant enough problem to complain on the internet about it there was a failure of preparation at several points.
Of course, when you are doing a stir-fry you cannot clean while cooking. But you can clean up your station between prep and actual cooking.
This is the way.
When am I going to find time to clean while cooking? I’m too busy cooking!
Clean as you go… i should follow what I preach… but its hard
with new recipes it’s not always clear because you’re not sure what you need to reuse or the timing …
I’ve been leaning heavily on my dishwasher in the past year. It’s been such a relief.
One of the things I consider when choosing a new recipe is how many different pots and bowls are involved, and how many things have to come together at the end; I like to minimize them to keep the amount of work and cleaning low. My wife has a knack for choosing ones that maximize those things, and there’s always so much more to do. I love a one-pot meal.
This is why the one who does the cooking should do the dishes.
When I am done cooking?
The only dishes are the plates we eat off of, and the utensils.
It is not difficult to clean as you go .
My wife somehow uses every single pot, pan, cutting board, and cooking utensil we own. Like good damn it was just a grilled cheese. What happened
So the rule should be that whoever cooks also cleans everything that can be cleaned before serving. The other person cleans up after you’re done eating.
I personally find that cleaning up afterwards is much harder even if there are fewer dishes, so it feels like a fair deal.
We have the opposite rule. I’d someone cook they are not on the hook for any cleaning. Obviously, you should be cleaning some stuff as you go, but if you make the effort to cook something more special, you shouldn’t be punished for it with more chores.
this is okay until you have a partner that cooks every single thing in the house in a manic state over the course of a day and expects you to clean up the aftermath.
if ever i acquire another partner in the future who feels the need to do much cooking, they can clean up afterwards!
For many people, who dont like cooking, having a partner that is happy to cook something special for them every day is heaven.
CAYG
Clean As You Go
Yup. Or just fill the sink with soapy water and toss stuff in to rinse off after you eat (or if you forgot you needed it for a later step).
…and that’s the exact moment I need the sink to pour out my noodle water or fill my water filter.
Single sinks are a bummer…
Recipes should actually be tested before being published.
Half of them I get half way through and realize that it’s half backwards or uses twice as many dishes or utensils than it needs to.
Just make a sandwich, problem solved.
Unironically though, stuff like pre-made potato salad is why i never cook. Why would i cook if there’s delicious pre-made stuff out there? It feels like a waste of time, especially considering i’d be cooking for 1 person only. That’s so wasteful.
If you mean, like, stuff made from fresh ingredients at the grocery store, I’ll agree, it’s the same stuff that you’d end up making. If it’s containerized, there’s the whole addition of ingredients for the sake of preservation, and some of that might be worth avoiding.
And so all things equal in the meal, just cost. Buying potato salad is probably more expensive than buying it’s parts, although then it’s probably not more expensive than starting new versus always having mayo in the fridge, that kinda thing.
I love potatoes but I honestly don’t love potato salad.
Lukewarm take: if you don’t make some effort to clean up to have less of a mess as you cook, you’re not competent to enough to be in the kitchen.
~Just my opinion; don’t burn me at the stake.~
Agreed, came here to say this. Clean as you cook. Not always super easy or possible, but if you’re waiting for something to finish/warm up/cool down/whatever, you can probably wash a cutting board or some spoons or something
It’s really just an amortization, or perhaps, an atomization of effort; sadly many don’t really value the benefits of that behavior.
Or do what I do and wash things as you cook only to realize that you’re going to need them again to finish whatever you’re making. You get to do 3x the cleaning per 1x cooking.
I am not a smart person.
Yup, this and fill the sink up with hot water feeling all smug to then realise I didn’t rinse the rice.
Well…you’re not wrong, but it’s not like we get a choice at the end of the day.
People lucky enough to not need a kitchen are few and far between.
Did you reply to the wrong comment?
I’m sure it’s respone to this take
you’re not competent enough to be in the kitchen.
A lot of people are not in the kitchen for passion or profession, but for necessity so it’s only natural you’ll get sentiments similar to the OP.
You have to spend time in the kitchen to develop competence.
Very true, but I submit that the wisdom of “clean as you cook” is obvious on day 2.
For real—add a cleanup difficulty rating next to the recipe 😂
