Thanks for the Kitchen Mistake!

No matter how enthusiastically you bake, grill, roast and stew, something regularly goes wrong in the kitchen. Here are 7 major blunders and small mistakes you’ll never make again.

1. Cooking with extra virgin olive oil
The most expensive bottle on the shelf isn’t always the best. The temperature to which you can heat extra virgin olive oil is relatively low at 180 degrees. Regular olive oil can be heated to as much as 210 degrees and is therefore more suitable for serious baking and roasting. What’s more, extra virgin olive oil loses its flavour when heated. Such a shame.

2. Cold steak in a hot pan
Oh no, one for the blunders category. Because you don’t want that delicious steak to go wrong. Always let your meat come to room temperature first. That way, it browns evenly and you won’t end up with the problem of your steak already being black on the outside while it’s still not as well done on the inside as you’d like.

3. Wet vegetables
You take the trouble to wash your vegetables but are too lazy to dry them? Big mistake. Even if you put all your freshly cut vegetables in a wok, the large amount of moisture means you won’t be stir-frying but steaming. Tip: use a salad spinner. It looks old-fashioned, but it will save your stir-fry.

4. Garlic over high heat
Cooking over high heat? Go for it! But only add the finely chopped garlic at the end. Unless you want black, burnt crumbs in your food.

5. Overcrowding
Very hungry? Then of course one little beef bird isn’t enough. But don’t overfill the pan either. A little extra space ensures that the heat in the pan is distributed evenly and everything browns nicely and evenly. Such as these pancetta, chicken and sausage rolls, for example. Still want more? Then fry them in batches.

6. Water without salt
Even a divine sauce can no longer save the dish if you forget the salt. Always add a little salt to the boiling water. It transforms your spaghetti from tasteless strands into pasta with bite and flavour. How much salt? One and a half teaspoons per 500 grams is enough.

7. Always non-stick
A non-stick coating, as the name suggests, ensures that nothing sticks to the pan. Fantastic! Never again will a pancake tear into pieces. Never again will your omelette be ruined because it was stuck to the pan. But what is paella without the crispy, stuck-on layer at the bottom? Or a chicken leg without a crust? Exactly. So don’t always use the non-stick pan for everything.