Voting for TSRs Ultimate Study Playlist is NOW OPEN >>

Cooking and kitchens at uni.

username81904

I am completely clueless about how to survive at uni as I have never really had to rely on my own cooking for longer than a week at a time. How does the whole kitchen thing work? Will I get a place to keep food and how do yous stop people nicking your stuff out of the fridge? Also what are the best food that I should be able to cook before arriving. When I am on my own for a while I always end up eating the same 3/4 dishes. Normally preprepared tesco pizza microwave meals maybe beans on toast and bacon and eggs :redface:

So rubbish I know. Recently I just bought a cook book called "Beyond Baked Beans" by Fiona Beckett and yet i find myself staring aimlessly at the raw food hoping its going to cook itself. Ohhh dear.

Reply 1

Lizj

Kitchen arrangements will vary from one uni to the next, but if it's any help to you, this is what has happened with me. There are 8 of us to a kitchen. Each one has two cupboards, one drawer, one fridge shelf and one freezer drawer. We share two kettles, two toasters and two microwaves. There is no problem with stealing, I am very lucky in that way.
Four of the flatmates pool their shopping and food and cook all together because they get on well, have similar tastes and want to eat at the same times. The other 4 cook what they want when they want, and eat alone. This suits us all fine. Once in a while, for a special occasion, we will all chip in and have a whole flat meal, where two people cook for all eight.
You will just have to get brave and try things out! It's amazing what you can do when Mummy is not there to do it for you! Start practising now and by October you should have a small repertoire of cheap and easy dishes.

Reply 2

Marianne

Bin that book. I bought that book, eagerly anticipating the culinary delights I would be creating- it didn't happen. Here's my advice...

1: Get a George Foreman. You can cook any meat and some veg in these.

2: Copy mum. You'll find out that a lot of her foods are actually quite easy to recreate.

3: Stock up on jars of sauce. bolognaise, chicken tonight, pasta bake etc. Take loads of these when you leave and you'll have meals in a jar for ages. I took loads with me in september and they lasted until christmas holidays. Tins of stuff like sweetcorn are good too. This means you'll only have to buy fresh stuff like veggies and meat and bread.

4: NEVER underestimate the nutritional value of a cheese toastie. Never underestimate the varied diet of a cheese toastie lifestyle. Cheese and tuna, cheese and marmite, cheese and pickle, cheese and orange cheese, cheese and bacon, cheese and sausage. Trust me. cheese and baked bean.

5: don't panic. Chances are you'll have at least one person in your halls who will be able to cook and more often than not they'll be willing to share and teach you.

6: Spag bol is the easiest dish you'll ever cook. Lasagne isn't much harder. Just add frozen veg to get up to your 5 a day!

7: Try to keep off the frozen ready meals- there's so much salt in them!

8: Get your mum to show you how to do it... She'll love the fact that her little baby is being all mature and proactive. You've got at least 6-7 months to go yet, so try for one dish perfected a month and thats a weeks worth of food. Vary this by sharing with your housemates and that is a hell of a lot of food to get through.

9: Cheese toasties. Trust me. George Foreman all the way...

Hope this helps!
Maz

Reply 3

username81904

Sounds like good advice. Time to whip out the naked chef apron and have a practice. :smile:

Reply 4

EKO

Every single person in my old flat had brought a George Foreman with them. I don't use it very often, but it's a necessity for some!

Reply 5

stevo23e

personally, i found there are to many people in my flat (12) to make the one small kithcen work, and so for a bit(probably till at least the easter) im trying the impossible, eating out but not spending to much money on it.

Reply 6

sheryl06

In my flat there are six of us. We buy bread together so whenever any of us go shopping we will get a loaf and all of us will use it, same happens with everyone that drunks semi-skimmed milk. We kind of have cupboards that we use and we also have a shelf in the fridge but to be honest I have never had anything stolen of my food. However, I do keep quite a lto of stuff in my room because I have a mini fridge. Plus we all get on very well which I think makes a massive difference. Also, I got my mum to write out some recipes for me which helped a lot. I would reccommend starting to practice cooking before you go to uni.

Reply 7

EskimoJo

My mum doesn't have true recipes, she doesn't measure things really, just throws her ingredients together and it's pretty much perfect everytime! I know I'm going to be looking forward to coming home every now and then, no matter how good my cooking skills get.

Reply 8

happydinosaur

Our kitchen gets a bit crowded at busy times. 13 people. One hob with 4 rings. One oven. One oven/grill. One microwave. One toaster. One kettle. There are two fridges. Some have a whole shelf. I have half a shelf but we are now at the just put stuff anywhere point as everyone knows what they have bought. Freezer gets really packed because some people do pointless things like freeze bread so they can buy in bulk which really annoys me. Sometimes we cook together in little groups.. Sometimes we don't. All depends on what people are doing/what they feel like eating. Some people cook really fancy meals. Some only ever eat pizza, oven chips and other frozen things from the freezer.

Reply 9

foxiroxi

This is how my kitchin works:

8 people

each have:

2 cuboards each and a draw, a shelf in the fridge each, a draw in the freezer.

we have two cookers, 1 microwave and one kettle (plus a toaster we brough ourselves!)

We all buy/eat/prepare our own food, sometimes cooking at the same time and eating while we are all in the kitchin.

I've never had anything stolen nor used without permission (although other day I left my wok in the sink and when I got in from work I couldn't find it! flatmate had washed it, used it, washed his mess from it and put it away! LOL)

We have two George Formans which are in constant use for sausage, burgers, bacon, eggs etc! Beats a frying pan...doesn't set fire alarm off!!!!

Only thing I had stolen was over christmas, my tub of hot chocolate went but also my flatmates did aswell :confused:

You will soon pick up on how to cook. one of my flatmates only used the microwave in the first couple of weeks, by christmas he was cooking full meals! :eek:

Reply 10

EskimoJo

Wow foxiroxi, that's a really good deal for 8 people. What uni is that?

Reply 11

Danny the Geezer

Although I was only there for 10 days, the whole kitchen set-up seemed fine. I had my own cupboard and nobody seemed to nick food. (What an abhorrent thing that is to do anyway.)

But I was only there for 10 days.