Writing my first book

By Prasenjeet
April 17, 2014
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When I started writing my first book, I had an idea in my mind that I should write a book for an audience which does not know how to cook at all. So the sub-title of my book had to be “Even If You Have Never Boiled An Egg Before”.

I was already running a blog www.cookinginajiffy.com discussing my mom’s recipes. A few interactions on Facebook made me realize that some group members were actually just starting out in the kitchen, and didn’t know how to even make tea or set up a basic kitchen.

This reminded me of my own College days in University College London when I was forced to cook because the Hall of Residence, that I was living in, did not serve any meals during the weekends. So, I had a first-hand knowledge of the problems faced by beginners in this field.

I researched further on the internet. I also checked on Amazon and “looked inside” (a great feature on Amazon that allows you to read about 10% of Kindle versions) a few student cookbooks. I realised that most of the student cookbooks assumed that you knew a little cooking and jumped straight to recipes such as sweet n’ sour Chinese chicken. This could be a problem for someone who does not even know how to boil an egg, let alone make sweet n’ sour chicken.

So I started writing my outline in that background. Here is a sample of the first rough outline that I wrote:

Cover Page

What People Say

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Who is this book for?
My Story—why I had to learn how to boil an egg and do much more?
Why should you learn cooking?
How NOT to turn cooking into a chore?
How only home-style cooking can ensure putting nutritious food on your table?
What if things go wrong in the kitchen?

Lesson 1: Setting up your kitchen: What equipment to start with?

Lesson 2: What spices and other ingredients you need to stock and experiment with?

Lesson 3: How to make tea or Coffee?

Lesson 4: How to toast bread and graduate to:

· Making bread crumbs

· Making a Garlic toast

· Making a cheese garlic toast

Lesson 5: How to boil and peel an egg flawlessly and graduate to?

· Making an Egg sandwich

· Making an Egg grilled sandwich

· Making an Egg poach or Egg Benedict

· Making an Egg fry

· Making an Omelette

· Making a Cheese or Spanish Omelette

· Making a Scrambled egg

· Making a French Toast

Lesson 6: How to cook your vegetables?

Sauté peas
Grill tomatoes
Sauté spinach
Roast Baby Potatoes
Sauté mushrooms
Sauté mixed vegetables
Sauté anything and everything
Learn to make a white sauce
Steaming vegetables- the Jiffy way
Make Vegetables au gratin
Make Aubergines au gratin
Grill cottage cheese

Lesson 7: How to handle chicken?

What should you buy whole or cut into pieces?
How to boil a chicken?
What to do with a boiled chicken?
Make a delicious chicken sandwich
Make a grilled chicken sandwich
Make a cold chicken
Make a breaded chicken for dinner

How to grill a chicken

Lesson 8: What to do with fish and seafood?

How to grill trout.
Make a simple Indian fish curry
Graduate to making fish in a Yoghurt and mustard paste

Lesson 9: How about some soups for your soul?

Making Pumpkin soup
Making Tomato carrot soup
Making the classic Chicken soup
Graduate to making the Chicken Sweet Corn Soup: Chinese style

Lesson 10: Making a full meal in 30 minutes: with proper sequencing & parallel processing

The concept of Foundation Meals and parallel processing
Making a Foundation Breakfast
Making a Foundation Indian Lunch or Dinner
Making a Foundation Western Lunch or Dinner

Parting Tips

Make Cooking a pleasurable experience by involving your friends and family members
Don’t shy away from tweaking, adapting and experimenting with any cooking idea you come across, including from this book.

About the Author

I am sure you would have got a pretty good idea by now of why and how you should write an outline. I have always written an outline for all of my book

Nothing can help organize your thoughts better.

What is your favourite way of preparing a book structure? Would like to hear your views.

Prasenjeet