How (not) to cook pasta.

[Pat "5mph"]

I won't tell you about our first attempts to cook couscous in our student halls in France.

...oh well okay, I will. We had eaten it and seen Algerian and Tunisian students cooking it so we got some and boiled it with water, which turned it into wallpaper paste. After several failed attempts somebody explained that you needed to pre-cook it very hot with a little oil before adding a small amount of water. Nowadays couscous comes pre-cooked anyway so you can just boil it up.

Very interesting, I didn't know that , thanks for sharing.
I can cook very well, but got introduced to cous cous only about 25 years ago, guess by then it didn't need to be pre-cooked anymore.

 

[Profpointy]

I've heard of somebody who tried to make fried rice using uncooked rice.

Oi, I resemble that remark !

In my defense most recipes are as per description, so for 99% of dishes going by the headline is fine

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

Hope this link works. Three 20 year old exchange students decide to make a spag bol......but have no idea. They throw the spag in a dry pan and heat it, then they have to call the fire brigade when the spag catches fire.
Three of them
Age 20
And NONE OF THEM know it needs water

https://www.unilad.co.uk/grub/ameri...aly-start-fire-by-cooking-pasta-without-water

After all these years I never suspected that pasta could catch fire.

 

[classic33]

Used to use the industrial paint ovens to keep food warm, placed on the outside, or cook, placing it inside, at work.

Worked fine until one lad put tins in without removing the lid. The mess took a day to clean up.