To ask how you learned to cook?

[MotivationSuchAnAggrivation]

I really want to learn how to cook. Classes are not a realistic option at this point.

Anyone here taught themselves to be a really good cook? If so, how?

I would say if you are making a beef stew or similar, or a curry, brown the onions so they are brown at the edges (a bit of black won't matter but brown is better) that way it makes the dish more savoury.

I have gone back to the old recipe books I used in the 70s and 80s recently, to the extent of buying them online, especially for curries. As they are more tasty and less faffy than modern recipes which often need fresh herbs (I live rurally too) or a teasp of pesto so the rest often gets wasted before you need it. If you want to jazz them up you can always do some nice veg or salad.
So search for Marks and Spencer or Marguerite Pattens or even 1970s recipe books.

I learned basics from helping my Mum and my Grandma in the kitchen as a child.
I was pregnant at 18 and was living between my parents and my in-laws while our home was being renovated. I used that time to learn how to cook my favourite dishes, unlike DH who after we brought our newborn home told me to rest and he'd make me a bacon sandwich. After about 15 mins and much clattering in the kitchen he eventually came in sheepishly and asked me how to make a bacon sandwich!

Parents taught me (both of them) but it's very cultural. In the sense of kids need to know how to cook, it's important for survival etc.

I had an eating disorder when I was 16/17 and was absolutely consumed with calories and what I was putting in my mouth. I stopped eating meals prepared by my (single) mum (they were dire anyway, think vats of pasta and jar sauce and bland spag bol) and learnt how to season my meagre portions of whatever I was making to make it more satisfying. Learnt by trial and error how to make sauces etc. By 19 I was making full roasts and Christmas dinners for huge groups of friends at uni. I still had (and have) quite disordered eating but I really do think a key part of learning to cook is learning how to season and flavour things and what herbs and spices work with certain meats, veg etc. It's difficult to go wrong with a curry if you have the key ingredients. Same with chilli etc. I probably over-garlic a lot of my dishes due to the absolute blandness of my mum's cooking growing up 😂

I'm an experienced cook but I have just been watching Gordon Ramsey's Ultimate Cookery Course being repeated on one of the food channels in the afternoons. I was just thinking that this was good for a beginning - how to chop an onion, knife skills covered. And some good straightforward meals too. I've bought the book secondhand on Amazon.
Always put off by his macho persona but not like it at all in these programmes.

Mother and great aunt.
When I left home I had the Dairy Diary cook book which was had brilliant simple recipes.

More recently I have had a few recipe boxes and found that I have learned a lot through them.