So you're sitting around eating take-out food or a microwaved meal for the seventh night in a row and you think, "Man, it would be nice to have a home cooked meal!" Well, what's wrong with your own two hands? It's like my mom always said, if you can read, and I assume you can since you're reading this, you can cook. Seriously, why not give it a shot? With these helpful tips, anyone can learn to cook some really tasty stuff. Home cooking means you can choose your recipes according to your own tastes, have better control of the amount of fat and calories you eat, save a TON of money and you can really impress your dates! Here are the modern woman's tips for first-time chefs.

Buy or browse a recipe book at the bookstore with foods in it that appeal to you. Do you like meat, meat, and more meat? They have a book for that! Do you like huge pasta dishes? They have a book for that! Are you trying to eat healthier? They have a book for that! Think about what dishes you would normally order at a restaurant or something your mom always made for you when you were younger. Then, look for a recipe for it. If you see a recipe you think you might like to try, do a search online for it. There are so many free recipes available, it's almost silly to buy a book if you're only interested in one of its recipes.

Once you've found a dish you think you want to try, read the list of ingredients and make sure you have everything listed there. Then, buy what you need. Have no idea what some of those spices are? Ask an employee at the supermarket to help you find what you're looking for or ask a friend who cooks often to come shopping with you.

Buy a meat thermometer. This one kitchen gadget can save you, and any guests you might serve, from severe gastrointestinal distress and possible hospital bills. There are some really cool thermometers that are connected (some even wirelessly!) to a digital temperature display. The display usually sits on the counter but if you get one of those cool wireless digital thermometers, you can also stick the display component on your belt so you're free to move around the house which is especially handy if you're entertaining guests. The thermometer is inserted into the center of the steak or pork chops or whatever meat you're cooking and you leave it in the meat. The best part of these thermometers if that you can set an alarm to go off when your meat reaches the specified temperature. You won't ever have to be concerned about poisoning yourself or a guest with undercooked meat. Even better, you will never have to wonder whether your steak is rare or well done again!

Buy one decent chopping knife. It doesn't have to be really, really expensive, it just has to be really sharp; although I do think you get what you pay for when buying knives. Many people assume that a sharp knife is more dangerous than a dull one but actually a dull knife will cause you to have to push down very hard in order to cut your vegetables and will often slip around before grabbing hold of whatever it is you're trying to cut. When it does slip and you hit your finger, you have a ton of your weight behind it and you'll get a huge gash. A sharp knife, on the other hand, will bite into what it's cutting immediately and will cut without your exerting much pressure. If you slip while using a sharp knife, yes, you can get a really deep cut but, it will be a clean cut and you won't have the bruise to go with it. Just take it really slow and very careful with your shiny, new, very sharp knife and everything will be just fine. Cooking is much more pleasant when you don't need to fight with your tools.

Once you're in the kitchen and are ready to cook, stop! Don't do anything until you have read the entire recipe, and I do mean the entire thing. Oftentimes a recipe will ask you to put a whole bunch of ingredients in at one time that it expects you to have chopped or otherwise prepared ahead of time, or it could assume you know what certain cooking terms mean, like mincing vs. dicing or searing vs. braising, and you would need to look those culinary terms up to see what they mean for you to do. The key to calm, collected cooking is reading the whole recipe, making certain you understand all of the techniques involved, and preparing everything (i.e. chopping, washing, grating or other prep work) before you even put heat to pan. That way there are no surprises that will cause you to overcook anything you already have cooking on the stove or in the oven.

Don't try to change a recipe. Not yet anyway. Cooking is like a chemistry experiment in that if you do exactly as they say, you will end up with the intended results: yummy food. You can try making substitutions or try techniques different from what it says to do in the recipe once you've successfully made it a few times. Recipes, when they come from a reliable source, are written down because they work. Once you've got it down pat, then you can try grilling the meat instead of sautéing it or using more chili powder and less pepper or whatever it is you think will make it more appealing to your own tastes. Until then, just follow the directions and you can't go wrong.

Now all you have to do is try it! Personally, I get a lot of satisfaction from cooking my own meals. Not only that, but as you get better at cooking you might want to start sharing some of your tried and tested meals with friends and family. Nothing says love like a wonderfully prepared homemade meal! It really is impressive, in these days of convenience food, to whip up something homemade and have it come out tasting just as good, or better, than something you could buy. It's not magic, just good recipes, and you are capable of making good food from good recipes!

Bon appétit!