Learning how to cook and bake at home has always been—and continues to be—an essential skill. Just like knowing how to do chores at home, file your taxes, and use the internet, cooking is a core part of what it means to be a functioning human being. That being said, in this day and age, it’s much easier to outsource all of that effort to someone else.
Though, to be fair, the food you order can, quite often, miss the mark, and you feel like you could do much better yourself. It’s not just a feeling—it’s a fact. Today, we’re looking at a popular Reddit thread where various internet chefs shared the dishes that they believe taste far better cooked at home than dining out or ordering in. Scroll down to read what they had to say about the topic.
We reached out to famous pie artist and author Jessica Leigh Clark-Bojin for her thoughts on learning to embrace cooking and baking at home. You’ll find the awesome advice she shared with Bored Panda as you scroll down.
#1
Stew over mashed potatoes (my Nana used to make me mashed potato volcanoes with stew inside). I still do this for myself when I’m feeling down at 36, and it still does the trick.
Image source: anon, natthaphong
#2
Grilled cheese sandwiches. There’s nothing like stretchy cheese straight from the pan.
Image source: TXQuiltr, Julia Bogdanova
#3
Almost everything. I prefer to do my own cooking 95% of the time. Tastes better, is healthier, and saves me money.
Image source: anon
#4
Chocolate chip cookies. The soft kind.
Image source: lama004, Thomas Franke
#5
Lasagne. Never tastes good outside. Maybe because I like to eat the whole tray.
Image source: Apprehensive-Rice371, Karolina Kołodziejczak
#6
Beef stew and pot roasts.
Image source: anon
#7
Chili.
Image source: MiekerBeaker, stephanie monfette
#8
Not cooked but, guacamole is always better home made.
Image source: Dicanomi420, Travis
#9
Burgers. I’ve had a few spectacular burgers when eating out. But if given the choice, I’d take a home grilled burger on a cheap bun with American “cheese” any day. Charcoal, smoked, or cast iron. None of that propane s**t. Sorry Hank.
Image source: hammerjam
#10
Bacon. It’s rare to find a restaurant that cooks it right. It usually comes out rubbery or undercooked.
Image source: JarescoJr, Michelle @Shelly Captures It
#11
Mac and cheese and not from the box.
Image source: WorryVegetable6804, Getty Images
#12
Rice Krispy squares. The packaged ones are gross.
Image source: bread_makes_u_fatt, EyeEm
#13
Meatloaf.
Image source: Befuddled_GenXer, chandlervid85
#14
Rouladen mit Rotkohl und Klößen.
Roulades with red cabbage and potato dumplings.
Image source: starvald_demelain
#15
Thanksgiving dinner.
Image source: Ok-Camera-1979, Karolina Grabowska
#16
A BLT sandwich.
Image source: anon
#17
If one is a good cook, then most everything tastes better home-cooked. While other children were so excited to go out to eat at restaurants, my boys would rather stay home to have my home-cooked meals. If you have a someone in your family who loves to cook, you are blessed.
Image source: Debra (Debbie) G.
#18
Steak. I make it the exactly the way I like.
Image source: Active-Strawberry-37, Pablo Merchán Montes
#19
Eggs have to be the answer.
They are the most impossible food that takes any preparation at all to f**k up.
But, every second they cool, they lose taste.
Image source: 2020IsANightmare, Hasan Almasi
#20
I don’t know about “always” but there are certainly quite a few dishes that restaurants cannot master easily. When they do master them it is at great cost.
One favorite example is the Italian rice dish called risotto. I’ve had risotto all over the world, including all across Italy many times in my life. I would say that about 80% of the time it sucked. But when I make it at home it’s flawless every time. And it is a joy to make.
Another dish, also Italian, the restaurants just can’t seem to master, or even be bothered to make correctly, is the classic carbonara. Listen, I get it. If your timing is off by just a minute or two you end up serving pasta with scrambled eggs instead of pasta with a lush rich silky sauce made from egg yolks. I can execute this dish at home flawlessly every time, but I don’t work in a commercial kitchen. So what the restaurants do instead is load it up with tons of cream and extra cheese, and they call it carbonara. But it’s not carbonara.
Image source: Frederick Wright, Dolores Preciado
#21
Scalloped potatoes.
Image source: Peridotzebra
#22
Shepards pie.
Image source: Just_Merv_Around_it
#23
Mashed potatoes. Most restaurants give you potato soup.
Image source: jimvv36
#24
Nachos. Restaurant nachos always skimp on the good s**t and are usually missing at least one core ingredient. I want guac, sour cream, AND salsa. I want meat, cheese onion, jalapenos and beans. And I want LARGE f*****g helpings.
Ive no s**t been served tomatoey chips with a dollop of cheese as ‘nachos’ before. Granted it was in an English pub so I dont know wtf I was expecting…the locals seemed to love it.
Image source: anon, Coffeefy Workafe
#25
I was going to say full English breakfast but in my sixty years on this planet, I have established that a full English is always better when cooked by someone else.
The theory is that your hunger diminishes if you are involved in the cooking with the fumes etc.
Image source: AveragelyBrilliant, Ajeet Panesar
#26
Honestly.. a sandwich. Like just a plain jane sandwich. Deli sandwiches taste amazing dont get me wrong but sum about making a sandwich at home with all the fixings just hits.
Image source: OneOfManny
#27
Beef stew.
Image source: sengir0
#28
Pea soup, in a slow cooker. The secret ingredient? Celery leaves, chopped, at least a cup for 6 quarts of soup. Makes all the difference.
Image source: NickDanger3di, Karolina Grabowska
#29
Roast dinner.
Image source: tjjwaddo
#30
For me it’s coffee. I just have it so much (daily) that when we’re overnight somewhere and I get it anywhere else, it’s never as good as my home brewed hazelnut Folgers, lol.
Image source: speedball811, Fahmi Fakhrudin
#31
Pudding, you get to lick the bowl clean.
Image source: anon
#32
Vegetables are less oily and hygienic when cooked at home. They are fresh and healthier.
Homemade chapatti is made from wholewheat flour. Eateries add maida because of its increased shelf life. So, the homemade one is tastier and healthier.
Desserts prepared with milk are good to consume within a day. So, homemade sweets are preferable.
For making salads, vegetables/fruits are properly washed and freshly cut at home. Who knows when did the hotel cut the vegetables/fruits?
As a general rule, I prefer homemade food prepared with love. I can adjust the ingredients too.
Image source: Kalyani Mohapatra(କଲ୍ୟାଣୀ)
#33
Everything. A good home cook can absolutely destroy anything you can eat out.
One exception might be sushi.
Image source: neolobe, Joseph Hsing
#34
Nachos so loaded you need a fork, not where I can count the pieces of toppings, have to search for cheese and wonder what the hell I’m paying $20 for.
Image source: Annual_Version_6250
#35
15 bean soup! (In the crockpot with diced ham).
Image source: throwCaregiver
#36
Sugar cookies. Especially when they are hot out of the oven.
Image source: bobs143
#37
Oxtail. Everywhere I’ve tried it at a restaurant has been a rubbery disgusting mess. But when my buddy gave me some his own it was literally the best thing I’ve ever eaten in my life and now I make it myself and it’s literally the best thing ive ever made or eaten in my life.
Image source: Strain128
#38
I rarely get really good french fries in restaurants and cafes. Seems like they just dip it into the oil just long enough to get hot. I like my fries nice and tan.
Image source: Mjarf88
#39
Left overs.
Image source: elleryh
#40
Definitely home cooked food there’s something about food made at home from scratch, it’s got to be the love that is added while cooking, plus good seasoning that sometimes is missing from restaurants food items (like scrambled eggs I can never seem to get them from a restaurant with the salt & pepper cooked right into the egg)not to mention you can prepare the food just the way you want it to taste where at a restaurant you would have to do some special ordering and it never seems to turn out right or taste just right. It is definitely home cooked meals for me.
Image source: Healthy Food – Healthy Cuisine – Best Restaurants
#41
I would add soups, stews and a few sauces to this answer for several reasons.
They can be very labor or time intensive. (Remember that scene in some mafioso movie where the guy is slicing garlic with a razor blade? or Who hasn’t wished for an Italian Grandmother?)
They seem to be better the 2nd day like some of the other dishes mentioned. The flavors have time to meld (same with the Calzones we made the other night, add those)
They can be custom made to your taste.
They can even use some ingredients difficult to source (like your garden)
For example, I have never had French Onion Soup at a restaurant, even in France, better than my own. I take a lot of care in caramelizing the onions. It was made to my son’s taste and uses a suspended crouton with a lot of Kaltbach (Cold river cave aged) Swiss Gruyere, a cheese very difficult to find at a restaurant.
Not to mention the homey comfort food factor…
Image source: Walter Garff
#42
Eggs! Diners cook them fast which is why they often aren’t fluffy, and at a high heat so that they have that brown tinge. same for bagel stores, delis etc. (Granting you go to these places for convenience, but the question asks about better home cooked food not speed or ease). If you cook your eggs at a low heat, and slower, they come out much better. it comes with my seal of approval which is worth millions.
Image source: Jim Dicap
#43
It depends on the ingredients and the cook, of course, but in general, basically everything tastes better when it is homemade.
Image source: Ninni
#44
At the most basic level, jacket potatoes which are rubbish when not cooked at home in an oven.
Image source: PeggyNoNotThatOne
#45
Spaghetti.
Image source: firefoxtune1, Christine Sandu
#46
Chilli. At least in the UK, restaurant chilli is almost ALWAYS way too watery, flavourless & tomatoey.
Image source: anon
#47
Collard greens.
Image source: _theblackwed
#48
Granola.
Image source: Dandelion_Man
#49
Oatmeal.
Image source: Bento_Fox
#50
”chitranna” is better taste food for south Indians.. Bcoz its tempering cooked with traditional ingredients like Mustard,dals,nd pea nuts, perking it up with onions and coconuts and flavoring it with lemon juice.the crunch of peanuts and coconut ensures a good balanced of texture and taste.you will surely enjoy this easy and convenient recepie.And it having other name called as yellow rice. It takes only 15 minutes for cooking by using ingredients…. By taking of 3 cups of cooked rice, 2 tbsp oil, 1/2 tsbp of mustard seeds,2 tsbp of urad Dal,3 tsbp of raw peanuts, 2 whole dry red chillies,4 to 5 curry leaves,1/4cup of chopped onions,1/4 tsbp of hinguva, 1/4 cup of grated coconut,1/2tbsp of lemon juice… Coming to preparation it’s very easy to prepare firstly we should head the oil in a deep pan, add the mustard seeds, urad dal,chana dal and raw peanuts ND saute it for 2 minutes, add the chillies ND onions and saute for 1 minute,nd add turmeric powder,hinguva ND coconut ND saute again for 1 minute ND finally add the cooked rice and mixed it gently ND again mix curry leaves for garnish….nd then finally it got a better taste by cooked on home.
Image source: Gayathri Panda
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