How did you learn to cook?

[pammy]

My mom worked, so we 4 kids kinda did 'dinner', if you can call it that. Box spaghetti or frozen foods in the oven type of thing. My dad has the ability to walk into a bare kitchen and prepare something wonderful, but as he worked a lot as well I didn't get to see that too often. So I self taught. I remember at around 15 years old I decided I wanted to try making homemade cinammon rolls from scratch. Turned out awesome!! My sisters praised, my mom was shocked, dad enjoyed, lol. I've always been dabbling in the kitchen. I made up my own candy as a kid, it was hard candy that tasted like coffee. LOVE to experiment!! LOVE cooking for a big group of people. LOVE having the kitchen to myself and just.... ahhh! Heaven!

[oheoh's momma]

my mom god love her was awful cook. She mastered a few dishes fried chicken, corn bread, soup bean (pinto), salmon patty's, fudge and peanut butter candy, Pot or mac salad, cole slaw.
But her spaghetti tasted just like chef boy ar dee in the can,neck bones and taters grease would run off them.
Boy I miss her what would I give for her to cook us some of that awful spaghetti.
I learned out of self preservation from the cookbooks at the checkout line. betty crocker and pilsbury.lol
yes I am a fabulous cook.

[Starlight9803]

I taught myself when I was a teenager. My grandmother (who raised me) never cooked anything from scratch. Everything was either a box mix or some kind of frozen dinner. I finally got to the point where eating anything highly processed, especially meat (premade chicken patties, nuggets, formed Salisbury steaks, etc) would make me very sick to my stomach, so I guess I learned as self preservation lol. I don't cook much from recipes, though I use them as a base to start out with. I'm one of those "little of this" "little of that" type of cooks, who is always changing what goes in something depending on what I have on hand. I guess I'm an ok cook, DH hasn't starved yet lol.