Nonk.Cook

One of the best decisions that I have made this year is to cook.

Every time I cook, I feel much at ease, I'd just focus on what I am making: a good meal for myself and sometimes for my housemate, Vincent. When the dish turns out to be really good, the sense of satisfaction is amazing.

Vincent had never cooked before this. I have cooked a bit during university time, but only simple dishes. Maybe occasionally when I was staying at Jurong East and then Telok Blangah.

But during this COVID-19 situation and the Singapore Circuit Breaker when we were forced to stay at home and work from home, it had spurred a renewed, more intense passion for cooking in me.

Throughout the whole of Circuit Breaker, I cooked my all meals (except for cereal and milk for most of breakfasts) and for Vincent every day. If I have meetings and no time to cook, Vincent will cover the cooking. There was some exception for maybe two or three times where we decided to order pizzas.

During this period when I was still close with Venny, she shared a lot of recipes and taught me a few tricks and recipes for which I'm quite grateful. Venny seemed to have cooked a lot and quite proficient. Too bad, she doesn't do much cutting, otherwise, she would have had my full admiration on this.

Overall my skills have definitely improved and I have been cooking more complicated dishes. And in terms of technical difficulty and taste, I'm quite confident that my cooking is better than Vincent's. I do feel a bit irked every time any friend associates my cooking as Vincent's and/or implying that we are at the same level. We are not, and if you can cook I'm sure you will be able to tell. 

In any case, I decided that that sense of irking (or jealousy due to him obtaining the same admiration with less effort) is not important at all. What's more important is to keep challenging myself, and cook more complicated, intriguing dishes.

I've gotten quite good so far to the point that I began teaching my mom some new dishes (earlier she was teaching me). I have let 7ko tried my Banh Mi, Char Kway Teow, and Duck Vermicelli and managed to even impress her. 

Recently, I have even started selling Duck Vermicelli for fun. Kudos to my friends especially Esther for the encouragement and Jess and Anthony Tjong as my first and second customers respectively. I have also let Esther tried my cooking twice, to which generally she was quite impressed. 

I may want to try to audition for the Master Chef (Singapore) show, cause' why not, right?

Who knows if I may become a Michelin rated Chef one day.