People Break Down Which Common Cooking Tips Are Actually Completely Wrong

Golden Brown

"Cookies: 'bake until golden brown' "

"Your cookies will be overdone if you do that. The cookie sheet will stay hot after it leaves the oven and keep baking the cookies for a minute or so."

"If you want soft cookies, it's better to take them out when only the edges look golden brown and let them keep cooking outside of the oven."

- Celestaria

"I used to bake my cookies until they were golden brown, and the bottoms would always end up burnt."

"I started removing the cookies from the oven when the edges begin to turn golden brown, and they usually come out perfect most times."

- Gunner_4224

High Heat

"Myth: high heat is like fast-forward for cooking. It is not. Still working to get my dad to understand this one."

- EatLard

"Mine is opposite. Every time I use high heat to sear he thinks I'm about to burn the house down. Same goes for entrapped water/moisture that makes a lot of sizzling noises when it comes into contact with a hot pan."

"The noise makes him freak out a bit, even though I know exactly what I'm doing."

"Bonus points when he complains about lack of crispiness of his food after demanding do turn down the heat."

- LoopyPro

"If I'm supposed to bake something at 150°C for 20 min, I can also bake it at 600°C for 5 min. That's just basic math."

"I'm being sarcastic, please don't try this."

- Berserker-Hamster

Onion & Garlic

"Starting to saute onion and garlic at the same time. So many recipes treat onion and garlic like they're conjoined twins and you should just do everything together with them."

"Onion takes a lot longer to cook and adding the garlic too early can burn it which can ruin the entire flavour of the dish. So many recipes tell you to do this and I just don't get it!"

- hbwd

"Yes! Just figured this out."

"It’s odd because I’d learned early on, add the veggies that take the longest to cook to the pan first - but because I’d been ingrained to cook garlic and onion at the same time for so long, I didn’t even think how garlic takes like 30 seconds to cook whereas onion takes on the order of minutes to cook."

- kgriff112

Clumping

"Adding oil to your pasta water to prevent it from clumping."

"Oil floats in water - as in it's above the pasta and doing exactly nothing."

"Just stir it."

- dancingbanana123

"BIG pot of water is what will prevent clumping the best, with mild stirring to separate everything initially. The roiling motion of the water will then keep the pasta from clumping as long as the pasta has the space to move."

- GreenLurka

"On top of that, you get oil on the noodles as you drain them, which will reduce any sauces ability to stick to your pasta."

- EndoShota

" 'May your marinara sauce never stick to your pasta!' - Sophia, Golden Girls"

- LadyBug_0570

Spreading Salmonella

"Rinsing off chicken."

"I know you don't want to get salmonella, but rinsing off chicken just spreads it. Cooking it solves the problem automatically."

- CreepyAssociation173

"I think this is more commonplace where/when the meat wasn't cleaned prior to sale. If your meat has feathers, dirt or rocks on it, you would need to wash it."

"But commercially produced meat is clean (in this way, at least) so the fewer surfaces your raw meat touches the better!"

- mcoon2837

"The first time I heard someone doing this, I thought they were insane. I’ve seen people use bleach to do this…"

"Ensuring your chicken reaches 165F is going to clean it of all dangerous bacteria. Washing it is going to do absolutely nothing but spread bacteria around and poison people if you're using bleach to do it."

- P0ster_Nutbag

Grated Butter

"When making pie crust: rubbing the butter into the flour or using a fork/knife/pasty blender to achieve 'pea-sized' crumbles."

"Pretty much every recipe will describe it this way, but the expanding water from the butter drives that beautiful flakiness. This method isn't the best way to get it."

"Instead, get a cheese grater with moderately large holes. Use very cold butter, and handle the butter lightly so that it doesn't melt into your hands."

"Grate it and toss it into the flour about 1/3 of the butter at a time, tossing it to coat it with flour. Then make your dough."

"It will be light and flaky and heading in the direction of puff pastry. Also works great for biscuits."

"Seriously, I use the same dough recipe I always used and the results are just staggeringly better because of this technique."

- Terpsichorean_Wombat

Oven Pizza

"I have spent years, years I tell you trying to perfect home-made pizza."

"Most recipes I've seen so far say 'bake at 350 degrees F' which is utter nonsense."

"Pizza ovens bake the pizza at around 800 to 900 F. So I finally found out I could get a decent result at home by putting the oven on the highest temp - 500F, and put the pizza on the oven's lowest rack (my broiler is located in the bottom.)"

"Then when the bottom crust is done I put the pizza in the broiler rack below and cook it about 3 mins to get the top done."

- mistmanners

Microwaved Nutrients

" 'Microwaving food will destroy nutrient molecules' ”

"Microwaves are far too long-waved to cause any molecular changes. All they do is make molecules vibrate faster. They don’t directly break up molecules."

"To actually split chemical bonds you need much shorter wavelengths. UV light at least. It is true that Microwaves can INDIRECTLY cause chemical reactions because they will increase the temperature of the food. But that is no different to any other heat source."

"Likely, microwaves preserve nutrients BETTER than boiling/steaming because the heat is delivered faster and the food spends less time in a high temperature state."

- antistitute

Salty

" 'Salt your pasta water always.' "

"Sometimes, the sauce is plenty salty and no need to add even more salt to the food."

"It's ok to salt pasta water if your sauce (or lack of sauce) doesn't add sodium. But tomato sauce has so much sodium as is, lightly salt the water at best."

"Your Pepe e cacio or Pasta a olio, sure salt away... But not tomato sauce dishes."

"And definitely never your water 'as salty as the ocean.' How the f*ck people eat that much salt is beyond me. At this point, don't make pasta, just eat salt."

- GuardianOfTriangles

Grill Marks

"Grill marks."

"Watch just about any cooking show, they go on and on about turning the meat exactly 90 degrees, once only per side to get that lattice pattern."

"Yes, it looks pretty. But the grill marks are flavor because of the maillard reaction. More marks = more flavor. Why are you trying to minimize the flavor just to get perfect stripes?"

"I get we eat with our eyes to an extent, but I'd much rather have haphazard and excessive grill marks vs the 'perfect' look."

"Think about it - we cook steaks in cast iron pans to get the entire outside sizzling and crispy and flavorful. Would you want them to put chopsticks or something under most of the steak so only tiny strips get turned dark brown?"

"I know this is more unpopular opinion than 'completely wrong,' but I stand by it. Grill marks are flavor, and more flavor is almost always good. 'Perfect' grill marks just make me sad for missed flavor."

- jtclimb

No Need To Oil up

"Coating your protein with olive oil before you season it. Most seasonings will not become soluble in oil. So you are basically adding a barrier between the meat and the seasoning. Blocking the flavors from the meat. Grilling done properly requires no extra oil."

"Pan searing a steak might benefit from a bit of oil or butter added to the pan if you don't have enough fat layer on the meat to render off some of that right at the beginning."

"Add seasoning of your choice in liberal amounts to a steak at least 6 hrs prior to cooking to give the flavors time to permeate the meat. Adding seasoning a hour or less before cooking won't do much to add flavor and most of it burns away during grilling."

- slowbike

Propper Rice Etiquette

"Add rice to the boiling water... No, no, no, no .. it's a bad way to cook rice."

"For the past 30 years I have been cooking rice like this: Put the desired amount of rice in the pot. Rinse them thoroughly with cold water to remove as much 'rice dust' as possible."

"Then add cold water toothed rice, so they are covered by approximately 2,5cm/ 1 inch of cold water."

"Add salt and put on a lid. Put the pot on the stove at medium heat. Let it come to a boil while stirring every now and then."

"When all the water has been sacked up by the rice, turn of the heat and let the pot sit for 10 minutes with the lid on."

"It only takes 20 minutes to cook rice this way instead of 25-30 minutes, and they come out perfectly cooked every single time!!"

"Oh yeah... bad tip nr. 2 I've learned to no longer follow... 'make the sauce/ gravy' as the very last part of the meal."

"No, no, no, no .... for the past 4 years I've learned to ALWAYS start cooking the whole meal with the onions and other veggies or herbs for the sauce/ gravy. It takes a long time to get that deep flavor to bind everything together, and a good sauce can lift a meal from 'plain everyday quick meal' to 'restaurant quality home cooking'."

- Tuznelda75

Alcohol Stays

" 'Any alcohol you cook with will go away during the cooking'. The only way the alcohol content leaves your dish is if it's burned up (like in flambe)."

- GCIATG44

"If you are cooking at a high enough temperature, long enough, alcohol will boil/steam out of the dish; just like if you were to reduce a sauce(basically boil the water out). Alcohol has a lower boiling point than water therefore many dishes will be hot enough to lose at least some of the alcohol content put into the dish."

- YetiThyme

"I know but it depends on the alcohol, cooking type and time, etc. But I was always hearing 'if you cook it, the alcohol goes away' and they were not cooking long enough for that to be the case!"

- GCIATG44.

"For sure, usually not the case."

- YetiThyme

No Peeling Necessary

"Not necessarily wrong but odd is peeling potatoes. Potato skins are actually very nutritious and filled with vitamins. A lot of potatoes actually taste much better with the skins on as well."

- Gringoboi17

"And carrots. I'm always slightly confused when people waste time peeling carrots. Like, it's effort that you just don't need to put in."

- NarrativeScorpion

Seeds Or No Seeds

"That chillies contain most of the heat in the seeds and you just remove the seeds if you don't like it that spicy."

"Completely wrong. Seeds don't contain most of the heat. I see semi-professional chefs parrot this.'

"Also the whole heaty/ cooly foods and that if you drink cold beer with "heaty" food, you might die. For example beer with durian."

- Ya-Dikobraz

Its Not Ikea

"Not a cooking tip perse but almost everyone I know uses the time stamps in recipes exactly. Now I know these are most of the time farely accurate but they are not like rules or something."

"I've always been taught that if you really don't know how long to cook that specific item use the recipes timestamp as a reference but judge it yourself."

"Cooking is not like a simple ikea clauset build with step by step instructions, they are guide lines. Use them as a reference but judge with your own sight and smell if something is done yes or no. Then and only then you will actually learn and be able to cook."

- BroodjeSpekMetKak

"Awesome advice."

- Foolishly_Sane

Don't Just Watch

“ 'A watched pot never boils' - a damned lie. I stared at a pot like a hawk once in middle school, and though I was bored, it totally boiled eventually."

- High_Tops_Kitty

"I've had experience with that before and I believe it's just a psychological thing. Disclaimer I'm not a psychologist."

- Laser20145

"It's more an idiom than a truism, effectively meaning "leave it alone, you staring at it isn't going to make it happen faster". In reality, it's as you said, purely a psychological thing. Time will pass quicker when you're doing something active than it will just staring at a pot."

- Nomulite

The Chicken Will Tell You

"You need to grease the bbq grill. This is false and I see it all the time. Food like chicken will come loose from a hot grill when it’s ready to turn. You should never have to use anything more than a fork to bbq chicken."

- mikeyhol

"If yo chicken is stickin, ain't no time fo flippin"

- green-ember

Milk Does Not Fluff

"- Milk does NOT make eggs fluffier.

"Use low heat instead. Keep in mind, the egg continues to cook after you turn off the stove, plate it, and serve it. Passive cooking can ruin a LOT of foods that require timing (which, in itself, is another tip)."

"I believe fluffy eggs is just eggs uncooked, barely cooked, or layers of both (this is an educated guess)."

- zengalan07

Alright Redditors, it's your turn to get in on this food fight.

What's a food myth you really need people to let go of?

See you in the comments!