As a home cook, it sometimes feels like no matter how much you practice or how good you get, you just can’t manage to make meals as good as the ones in your favorite restaurant. Why is that? Are they doing some kind of special secret thing that the rest of us don’t know about? Well, not exactly.
Seasoning
First, restaurants pack on the flavor like you wouldn’t imagine. They would never create a meal with just a sprinkle of salt and pepper and leave it at that. Those chefs are using much more salt than you might expect, and plenty of other seasonings, aromatics, and flavor bombs to boot. So get friendly with your spice rack if you want to turn up the flavor.
Fat
Restaurants also don’t shy away from using fat. At home, you might be a bit more health-conscious, but restaurants’ number one priority is flavor, and if they have to use a whole stick of butter in their pasta sauce to make it as delicious as possible, they’ll do it. A lot of the time, if you’re wondering what makes a dish taste so good, it’s because it’s got a lot of butter (or cream or full-fat milk).
