food

Many of us head into the kitchen with the best of intentions, only to come out with something burnt, bland, undercooked, overcooked, or mysteriously both at once. And while it’s easy to blame the recipe, the oven, the pan, the planets (or that one Pinterest creator who swore it would be “super easy!!”), often the problem is simply the habits we don’t even realize we’ve picked up.

A recent Reddit thread asked professional chefs and bakers to share the most common mistakes they see home cooks make. What came back was a surprisingly wholesome mix of tough love, clever tips, and a lot of “oh wow, I totally do that” moments.

Here were some of the most helpful (and funniest) insights they shared.

1. Knife neglect + bad cutting habits

Chopping fresh herbs and veggies for a meal.Photo credit: Canva

This is a huge one, and lots of chefs mentioned it. Dull knives + poor knife skills = misery, apparently.

“The last time my brother and I were both back home for the holidays we gathered every knife in the house and took them all to a professional knife sharpener. We’re talking about doing it again this year because trying to cut an onion on my last visit was an abomination.”

“I grew up in a household where 20-year-old, never sharpened, Ginsu steak knives were used to cut literally everything in the kitchen. Once I moved out and started experimenting with proper knives, I was inspired to buy my mom a chef’s knife for Christmas one year.”

“Learn how to cut things safely and properly.”

2. Not preparing before you start (mise en place)

Colorful toppings ready for cooking. Photo credit: Canva

Kitchen chaos does not make for tasty food.

“Get your shit ready so you’re not panicking trying to find/chop whatever, and cleaning as you go, for largely the same reasons. Clean mind, clean bench, clean food.”

“Organize your area before doing anything else, if your area is cluttered you're gonna have a hard time. Clean as you go.”

3.Skimping on simple flavor enhancers

Kitchen essentials: salt and spices.Photo credit: Canva

Many referenced the book Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat to note that these four elements in generous, yet balanced amounts are crucial to good tasting food, no matter the dish.

“Add an acid when you feel like the salt isn't helping. You are probably missing acidity. Citrus, vinegar, tomato sauce, etc.”

“I’m a pastry chef and I even salt and acid pastry dishes, a lot of people think you don’t need to but you do. Vinegar in a sorbet can help make the flavour shine”

“You need to salt a dish at every stage of its cooking, not just all at once at the end.”

“Most of the time you need a lot more herbs and spices than you think.”

“ALLLLLLL THE BUTTER!!!”

4. Heat control problems

A sizzling stir-fry in progress with fresh veggies.Photo credit: Canva

People mess this up constantly. And it’s understandable, considering that even these chefs couldn’t agree whether or not people used too much heat or not enough. Different foods call for different procedures.

“Most of the people use too high heat, and end up burning food or cooking too quickly (hard dry chicken breast for example)”

“Either not preheating pans or going the other way and getting pans too hot, people seem to be obsessed with cranking the heat up to the max in the belief it will cook faster.”

“You're not cooking hot enough. Your pan is too cold and the food is too crowded in the pan. So instead of nice browning and searing, you're steaming your food and cooking it throughout too uniformly (think steak).”

“Low and slow always beats high and fast.”

5. Treating baking like cooking (it’s not)

A baker's hands dusted in flour.Photo credit: Canva

Generally speaking, baking is more science-driven and precise than general cooking, and requires you to follow instructions exactly. That said, one does need to develop an intuition for certain things, such as knowing what temperature works best for their individual oven versus what it says on the recipe, for example.

“When it says beat your sugar and butter together, it means it. If you want the best results you can get BEAT IT. And I mean like, changing to a whole different colour. It should be white and fluffy. Don't be shy, don't be scared, keep going.”

“If a recipe says 350 for 20 minutes. Do 350 and start your timer at 10 minutes. You can always give the recipe more time, but you can't take it away.”

“FOLLOW THE RECIPE/INSTRUCTIONS. Baking is a science, if it asks for 250g of sugar, give it 250g sugar. Don't hold some back because you don't want it to ‘be too sweet.’ You do that, the whole recipe is out of whack.”

“If a recipe asks for frozen berries, or frozen anything. Make sure they're still frozen when you add them to your recipe. If you let them defrost, you are adding extra liquid into your recipe and it likely won't turn out the way you hope.”

“Every oven is different, every time you use that oven is different, etc. Timers are useful for reminding you that you have something in the oven, but beyond that you have to know what done looks/feels like. Probe thermometers are your friend.”

“Sometimes recipes are wrong about things, even from otherwise solid bakers. Baking intuition takes time to develop, but if something seems wrong, it very well might be. It's okay to throw in an extra handful of flour or a couple tablespoons of water if it seems like you need it.”

“Home bakers (and particularly Americans) are so terrified of overbaking things that they wildly, tragically underbake them. Some things (brownies, snicker doodles) are best if you just barely bake them, but a lot of things (particularly breads, viennoiserie, some cookies, etc) need to get properly, richly browned. Color is flavor! Raw flour doesn't taste good! Gelatinize your starches, caramelize some sugars, and crisp up that crust, people!”

“Not using a kitchen scale for baking is asking for trouble.”

“My friends always ask for recipes when I bake, and I will give it to them but STRESS how important timing, temp, and accurate measurements are to get the same result. Inevitably, I end up receiving texts about how it didn't come out right, and have to tease out of them that they used cold butter from the fridge when it said softened, or white sugar when it called for brown, put something in without preheating the oven to temp, or whisked everything for five minutes on high when it called for slowly adding and folding in by hand... There are so many people out there who just do not believe baking is a science requiring attention to detail!”

“Dear Lord, it is SO much about just following the instructions. There is usually a specific reason for why someone says to do a thing a specific way. If something is unclear, Google it to clear it up. Baking is incredibly unforgiving if you decide to go rogue.”

6. Overcomplicating food (or blindly following recipes)

Holiday baker following a recipe on a tablet in a festive kitchen.Photo credit: Canva

These are two sides of the same coin because they both point to a lack of confidence—whether that means adding too many contradicting spices in hopes of adding flavor, or not developing one’s own sense of taste by rigidly obeying the rules.

“Expensive ingredients are [not] necessary. Start with the cheapest ingredients and work your way up. I used incredibly cheap cream cheese and expensive butter. Play around and find your brands.”

“Simple recipes are ninjas. I have a four ingredient biscuit recipe that could carry a breakfast menu. My grilled cheese sandwiches can increase soup sales. Life is celebrated with big meals. However, life is lived between the day to day meals.”

“Recipes are your starting point as a home cook, but over time they should help you develop techniques and intuitions so that you're adaptable and no longer need a recipe to cook anymore or find ways to improve a recipe to your liking.”

“Not tasting a dish as you go and developing a sense of taste to help drive your dishes and help build intuition for what's missing. Too many people want clean measurements for adding salt, spices, or peppers but everyone's taste is different and you need to get comfortable with your own sense of taste to know what and how much of a thing a dish is missing.”

“The biggest mistake in following Pinterest recipes…They almost ALWAYS need adjusting. The famous one in our household was this Pinterest recipe my wife wanted to try out with the low key name of ‘World’s Best Chicken’ or something similar. It was this very mid honey mustard-ish chicken. We were both so disappointed. I looked at her and asked her to make it again tomorrow … but make one change. Peanut butter … like maybe half a tablespoon…Had it again the next day with the change and it WAS the best chicken we’d ever had.”

7. Using too many gadgets

A wide array of kitchen appliances.Photo credit: Canva

Tools can be great, but chefs agree they can also overcomplicate things, two exceptions being the rice cooker and immersion blender.

“My two unitask gadgets - a rice cooker and an immersion blender. I honestly can't stress how much better my cooking game got with an immersion blender.”

“I think Alton Brown said the only single-use kitchen item everyone should own is a fire extinguisher.”

8. Letting past failures keep you from practicing

A not-so joyful cooking moment in the kitchenPhoto credit: Canva

This was a big one. Not only a lesson for the kitchen, but life in general.

“Life happens, and food doesn't always listen to our expectations. Pick one recipe and do it a hundred times…We practice and explore with curiosity. Play and explore with one recipe.”

“Failure is your teacher and not your enemy. You will mess up seasoning a dish, over or under cooking a dish, or some other technical matter but too many people let those experiences dissuade them from experimenting or getting outside their comfort zone in the future to try more difficult dishes and improve. When you fail, ask yourself what worked and what didn't work in the thing you made; those lessons will help improve your cooking going forward.”

…and a few honorable mentions, either because they were helpful or just funny.

Chef pup ready to serve some pawsome treats! 🍽️🐶Photo credit: Canva

“Thinking they can caramelize onions in 10 minutes. Yo that shit takes forever to do properly and if it doesn't, you didn't actually caramelize the onions.”

“Trying a dish for the first time when entertaining…Trial it with your family or neighbours before you attempt to make souffles for the first time for 30 guests.”

“Try to mix textures. If your dish is soft, try to add something with a crunchy texture to give the whole dish a more pleasing composition.”

“A lot of people dress up their dog in a chef costume and try to teach it to act as an assistant chef, walk on hind legs, etc. Rarely work. The dogs eat everything.”

Underneath it all was one reassuring message: good cooking, like any art form really, isn’t about perfection—it’s about practice, persistence, and mastering a few game-changing basics. No need to avoid mistakes entirely. Just learn from them.