I would have to list the essentials as: a good chef's knife (the rest of the set can wait till later, but buy an expensive henkels or wustof for the chef's knife, will serve you well), a cast iron wok (i do almost everything in mine, even non-asian), a set of cast iron pans (little bit of work to season, but three skillets for $15 is hard to beat and they last forever), and a rice cooker (if you get a decent one you can make rice or steam vegis in it). Other than that, just start teaching yourself to cook interesting things; if you want some italian, middle eastern, or asian recipes to impress a girl drop me an email (
kingmm@purdue.edu )
