Tiffy Learns How to Cook: An introduction

When I was in Japan last October/November, my boyfriend's mother taught me how to cook.

Yes, that's right--and she had every reason to. 

When I was on my vacation at their house the year before last, Nori and I were waiting for dinner when he nudged me to offer his mom help with the salad. I did, and she handed me a knife and a cucumber to cut. As I was slicing the cucumber, she glanced at what I was doing and went, 危ない！ (That's dangerous!) at what I was doing. My left hand was grabbing the cucumber and apparently, you should not do this. 

This is how you do it, noobz.

[Photo source: How to cut vegetables]

That very same night her mom handed me a persimmon and a knife to peel it. I was having such a hard time at it that she ended up peeling it for me. At this point, I should mention that his mom is a sweetheart so she didn't really give me a hard time about it. 

My boyfriend, of course, was shocked: how can you not know how to cut vegetables, or cook? Didn't you learn it in school?

Oh, we did have a class where we had to cook. It's just that, I was the one who washed the dishes. 

In my next two posts, I will show you two recipes that I learned. Until then, can you recommend dishes that would be awesome to learn? Or any sort of kitchen tips (like, how you're not supposed to throw the dishwashing sponge in the washing machine--oh yes I did)?

Don't forget to join our ongoing giveaway!