Creativity- cooking/baking (experience)

01/10/23

Pasta with tomato sauce



















I decided to start off my cooking journey by cooking pasta with tomato sauce as it's a simple yet delicious thing to make. At first, I was going to make "fusilli" pasta but I decided to change it to spaghetti as that's what my brother and his friend preferred. I used my mom's recipe and the whole process took me about 25 minutes. When making the sauce, at first I put the temperature too high so the olive oil started sizzling and spraying, so next time I will make sure to look out for that. However, the pasta ended up being very tasty. Next time I will attempt to make a more difficult dish to expand my cooking skills.


21/10/23

Eggplant 'alla parmigiana'















I spread a bit of olive oil on the eggplant slices to make them softer.


Here, I salted the eggplants and added pepper.



I put them in the oven at 180 degrees C for about 20 minutes.













I put the almost-ready dish in the oven again at 180 degrees for 20 minutes.



I decided to make this Italian dish using my mum's recipe to gradually advance my cooking skills. This took me a lot more time than my previous dish and required more manual skills (e.g.cutting eggplant pieces equally). What I found difficult was being able to identify the exact amount of salt and pepper needed, as I didn't want to put too much or too little, and it was easy to overdose. In the beginning, I also struggled a bit in making the eggplant slices equal, but as I continued I improved. Overall, I had fun cooking this dish and it ended up tasting very good. My goal is to continue cooking/baking more dishes, potentially from different countries, gradually making them more difficult, until I feel confident in doing this hobby.


18/11/23

Brownies













I used an online recipe to make these brownies and overall, it was quite easy and they were very tasty. The whole process (including baking time) took me about an hour and a half in total. However, the batter was a bit too thick so to improve upon this I will use larger eggs next time. I will also use two separate trays to bake the brownie as putting all the batter in one tray made the baking time longer and each slice ended up being a bit too thick. I also struggled a bit with measuring everything out equally, especially the butter. Overall, I liked the texture as they were slightly fudgy and were not dry.

Approval questions:
  • I chose this project as I enjoy cooking/baking and it will be useful when I move out and go to university.
  • This will help me be reflective as I think of ways to improve, and balanced.
  • I will not need a supervisor as I rely on whether my meals have been getting more sophisticated/tastier.
  • I hope to learn to make new dishes (maybe different cultures) and become more confident/quicker when cooking.
  • I am doing this experience at home.
  • I will be trying to do this at least once a month.
Learning outcomes/reflection
This experience has been very entertaining for me and allowed my cooking skills/efficiency to improve. However, I still feel I need to learn to cook more dishes and more frequently and try more challenging things. It made me a risk-taker and reflective as I accepted challenges though I struggled at times (for example I could not tell wether one of my dishes was fully cooked or if I should leave it longer in the oven) and reflected on how to improve (keeping an exact time of when I put my dish in the oven to know when it's fully cooked).  Working on my own has sometimes been challenging as I had to rely on myself, however, I managed to work things out when it was difficult. An ethical concern with cooking would be that plastic packaging creates a lot of waste and certain ingredients are transported from other countries, increasing carbon emissions. Moreover, meat is also used and this raises ethical concerns about whether it is right or not to kill an animal for food. 

Cooking is a fun way to engage with different cultures and is important for when people go live on their own, for example students leaving for university. Through cooking, it is also possible to socialise with others as relatives can be invited for a meal for example. 

Comments

  1. Ms. Ula23 October 2023 at 06:15

    Lovely! a great dish to start with and it will be interesting to read about your progress.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ms. Ula22 January 2024 at 04:19

    Great - how are things going in terms of your goals e.g becoming quicker and more confident, or feeling you will have somethin you can cook for yourself in future?

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

CAS Claudia

 1) The qualities I admire in other people are loyalty, kindness, patience, empathy, thoughtfulness/consideration, respect, and supportiveness. I believe these are the qualities that make someone a good person. 2) Through CAS I hope to develop balance because this is especially important in IB since when there is a lot of work to do it is easy to absorb all your energy into studying, however, having a break and doing things you love is also very important for the mind. I would also like to develop risk-taking as this is what helps you push yourself over your limits in order to constantly improve, and not to remain in your comfort zone. Another important factor I would like to achieve is being a good communicator since I often like working on my own and don't always feel comfortable talking to others. This skill is very important, however, as working in a group can often help you achieve a lot more and learn new things. Furthermore, most jobs will require you to communicate with oth...
Read more

Creativity/Service- Wesoła District Design Workshop

Image
Oct-Feb The Wesola District is a piece of territory with several old hospital buildings which has been bought by the city. It has a design pharmacy in which artists and architects meet. However, it still has not been decided what the space will be used for as the buildings cannot be destroyed or changed. For now, the green area is used for various festivals and events. Hence, the aim of the workshop is to come up with ideas for what the district can be utilized for in the future. During the first meeting, we were taken on a tour of the district and asked to think of ideas for what the district could be utilized for, without removing what is already present. We also discussed the advances in technology that can be seen and how this knowledge can be used to design the space.  Approval questions I chose to participate in this project because I like creative thinking and I would like to help in designing the Wesola District into a meaningful place in the future.  This project make...
Read more

Activity- dance

Image
  14/09/23 21/09/23                     28/09/23 05/10/23 12/10/23 19/10/23 20/10/23 This is my second year dancing, the dance genre is called 'commercial' and it's a mix of jazz and hip hop. My classes are at Egurrola Dance Studio. We used to have 2 hours per week but now we just started having an extra hour on Fridays. I like it a lot as it's a fun way to stay in shape. Last year, me and my group went to a competition and got second place, this year we will likely attend more competitions. I think working as a group helps us all motivate and help each other but at times if I feel behind with a certain choreography I find it slightly stressful. A difficulty I noticed I have is that I keep my moves quite restricted when I should be always using my full body for every dance move, using as much energy as possible, so this is something I will be working to improve upon. Another goal I want to achieve is to become more 'smooth' when I d...
Read more