Cooking Videos You Like?

6 years ago

last modified: 6 years ago

Once upon a time, I watched a lot of cooking TV shows. Everything from Good Eats to Iron Chef. They were fun, I learned a lot, and I spent a lot on cable TV.

I dropped cable years ago, and with it my cooking show habit. There’s always YouTube, you say? Well yes, but there are so many distractions on YouTube. Small Boats in Heavy Weather! Adorbs Puppies Meeting Adorbs Kittens! World War 2 In Color! How To Replace A Water Heater! Unlike TV where there was a shortage of anything to watch on those 200 channels, on YouTube I get waylaid before ever getting to the cooking.

So, help me out. What are your favorite YouTube channels for cooking?

I’m watching J. Kenji Lopez-Alt’s channel now. He’s got a fantastic website in Serious Eats, has written The Food Lab, is a food guru in my eyes. And I love that his videos are shot in his tiny, messy, cluttered, not over clean apartment kitchen in South San Francisco, with GoPro cameras on selfie sticks attached to his wok handle. So low budget, so unpretentious.

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John Liu
Original Author

6 years ago

Wait, I watched his “Egg Fried Rice” video and I Am In Disagreement.

He puts the beaten egg in first, gets it mostly set up, then adds the cooked and dried rice. When he’s done, the rice is still white. It’s not really fried rice in my book. Its more like scrambled egg with reheated rice.

I fry the rice first, until it is a lightly browned and a little crusty, then add the egg. It takes longer, but you get that soccarat sort of effect that you otherwise have to cook a whole paella for.

Okay, off to watch his “Extra Crispy Baked Chicken Wings”.

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Comments (19)

amylou321
6 years ago
I like Simply Sara. She makes food that perhaps some people would be horrified by,but I find her entertaining. And i have cooked some of her recipes with success.

I also turn to YouTube to find old nigella lawson episodes and some Jamie Oliver stuff too.
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annie1992
6 years ago
I get a tremendous charge out maaangchi and her amazing tolerance for hot peppers, and I've found some old Julia Child and Jacques Pepin on YouTube, but truthfully, I just don't think about it most of the time.

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Lars
6 years ago
I like Brad Leone's recipes on Youtube, but I don't care for the others that are on Bon Appétit. Most of them are annoying and/or boring, but Brad has an interesting personality, and I've made several of his recipes - all of which I have liked. I especially like his sauerkraut and mustard, and I make these recipes frequently.
sleevendog (5a NY 6aNYC NL CA)
6 years ago
last modified: 6 years ago
Way too much to list. Most old content from years past is on Utube.

BonApetite test kitchen blew up a few months ago in a scandal so it may be no more unless properly restructured. I liked all of them and always learned as well as entertained.

I need to learn something. I don't really get that anymore from the network shows. Like Sarah, Ina, Lydia, but do get tips from Patty. Did not care for DinersDDives, but the recent few years are visiting really good kitchens. So many tricks and information. I miss my tiny TV I had in the kitchen. Always on during kitchen time/prep. Sound off but would pause if I saw something like Growing a Greener World, Patty, Jacque, etc.

The covid cooking at home has been great. As long as the audio is good. Kenji, 😂, what a slob. I have a small efficient kitchen but his is hilarious. Crap all over everywhere. The go-pro on the forehead is a bit dizzying but for the most part lots of education to be had. Watched the tour through his restaurant this morning. Always learn something. Killer steam ovens. His diet is just so different than ours. Technicals, science, methods, reactions....good stuff. Always explains the 'why'.

I like Alex the French Guy and Refika. Both have been doing the covid cooking at home.
carolb_w_fl_coastal_9/10
6 years ago
How To Cook That and Tasting History are my current YouTube faves. I've watched all the previous content and now have to wait for new uploads.

I also really enjoyed The Victorian Way from English Heritage and watched all of those, but I don't think they're making any new ones now.

And it's not really cooking, but Disney Food Blog is pretty fun and like a virtual Disney visit with a big focus on the food at the parks and resorts - most of which is way too over the top for my tastes, but still a fun escape. There is actually at least one video where they recreate some Disney treats at home.

Lots of Jacques Pepin videos are on YouTube as well...
sleevendog (5a NY 6aNYC NL CA)
6 years ago
Erin McDowell. So good. I don't bake sweets but she covers savory breads and biscuits, etc.

I've always said there are three personalities in our world. 1-The entertainers that thrive in front of a camera and need an audience. 2-Those that thrive on being entertained. (sports, concerts, museums, movies, etc). 3-And those self-entertained. (artists, writers, etc). perfectly content in their own world in a studio alone or office for days/months. Generalization, but overall a basic formula.

She is so full of information, and an entertainer. (slight distraction by the t-shirt,😂)....yet comfortable in her own skin.

Biscuit making with her dad during lock-down is adorable.

Her kitchen tour is hilarious.

Great teacher...
l pinkmountain
6 years ago
last modified: 6 years ago
I used to enjoy "Manjula's Kitchen" https://www.manjulaskitchen.com/ for vegetarian Indian, but in my neck of the rural woods right now, Indian cooking is just too much trouble to track down and have all the ingredients on hand plus the utensils, and I don't like it that much so wouldn't be eating it every day. My other favorite is "Great Depression Era Cooking With Clara" (The late great Clara Cannucciari as filmed by her grandson Chris) which is the closest thing I can get to going back in the kitchen with one of my late grandmothers.https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRKls2LLMqU-uK2csT6FOKw I'm going to have to check out Kenji, because I have been toying with doing my own cooking series for kids, but I'm afraid it is maybe going to be too boring with just old me in the kitchen . . .

I often find great individual gems when I google for a video on how to make a certain dish . . . like chalupas for example . . . But I had to stop tuning in to the cooking channel, I ended up spending way too much time in the kitchen, and I have to balance out my time with other project, so trying to simplify most everyday cooking . . .
ediej1209 AL Zn 7
6 years ago
I watch the PBS Saturday lineup when I've nothing else going on. At least they give recipes. The commercial cooking channels are just entertainment fluff from what I've seen.
carolb_w_fl_coastal_9/10
6 years ago
I found Clara through YouTube's recommendations, and enjoyed her videos very much! Her kitchen reminded me so much of my grandmother's in WI.
artemis_ma
6 years ago
Maangchi - Korean.

Chinese Cooking Demystified.

Tasting History.

Kenji's channel.

I found Brad Leone to be hideously annoying as a personality, too much grandstanding.
Sooz
6 years ago
I don't really watch cooking videos on but will have to give some of these y'all mentioned a try. One YouTube video that I enjoyed recently was "Uncle Roger HATE Jamie Oliver Egg Fried Rice." Hilarious! I haven't seen any other Uncle Roger videos so I don't much more about it.
plllog
6 years ago
I usually find things when I'm looking for recipes rather than watching a particular YouTube channel or following one person.

I love it when they show a trick, like the circle in a Chinese green pea cookie was just a dent made with a funnel. I still haven't gotten around to making them yet, but this video stays open on my browser for the day, but it's just a recipe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyUi-GZzriM&ab_channel=MyKitchen101en
plllog
6 years ago
Sooz, Uncle Roger is adorable! Did you see his take on Gordon Ramsay's fried rice?

S, the under 30's I know are fab too. They're not trying to be anyone but themselves.
Gooster
6 years ago
I remember the Uncle Roger commenting on the viral Hersha's BBC fried rice video, so it's great to see the Jamie Oliver followup (and the Gordon Ramsey one). My favorite line -- "you hear rice sizzling, I hear my ancestors crying".

My favorite youtube video channel is the one for the French program,"Les Carnets de Julie" (Julie's postcard's). It's combination food show and food travel documentary. Unfortunately, it is not subtitled (I thought it used to be).
sleevendog (5a NY 6aNYC NL CA)
6 years ago
Just watched 2 hours of Kenji. (we are up early, 4.15). I've missed lots of his content. His restaurant tour, some pasta dishes, his fried rice comparison, (using an outside wok set-up I have been shopping for). His purging of kitchen pots and pans. Something I recently did. His passion for vintage cast iron, and his whirly pop love. And something I've been meaning to make but forgot...may make a couple three today. I have some hardwood.

On amazon they are called 'earlywood spatula'. Not expensive.
artemis_ma
6 years ago
I ran into a couple of the Uncle Roger videos this past weekend. He's funny.

Turns out Hersha, whom he panned her rice making, didn't get upset or if she did, it didn't last. She turned it around into her own humor and fun, and made friends with the guy who does the Uncle Roger act. Jamie Oliver remains silent...

While I won't be making Oliver's egg fried rice, I did make his shepherd's pie in the past and it was GOOD. At least he knew to use lamb.

I came back because last night I discovered a new channel: View from the Road. The woman who does this cooks mostly authentic Mexican, with some Tex Mex and some Korean-Mexican recipes (her children are Korean-Mexican), and a few other things. She seems worth following.

And I forgot to mention "My Name Is Andong" - a YouTuber in Germany who tries a variety of foods and explains their "whys".
l pinkmountain
6 years ago
last modified: 6 years ago
So wondering if I created a personality "Auntie Pinkmountain" if my videos might appeal more to the kiddies . . . or Gramma Pinkmountain, since I am a step grandmother. I wanted to use Mama Pinkmountain but I don't have kids, although Mom Nature has billions of kids.
sleevendog (5a NY 6aNYC NL CA)
6 years ago
The beauty of Ytube is doing a quick search for something I'm making that day. Arancini tonight using mushroom risotto we had last night. GordonRamsey to the rescue with a simple one minute video. I've made them dozens of times. Nice to see a different approach. I'm impatient when videos are long and boring and drawn out when I don't need that.

After posting the UncleRoger a couple weeks ago I searched some proper methods and made stir fried rice a few days later.

Cooking Videos You Like?

John Liu
Original Author

Comments (19)

amylou321

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Cooking Videos You Like?

John LiuOriginal Author

Comments (19)

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John Liu
Original Author