Reddit mentions of Student's Cookbook: An Illustrated Guide To Everyday Essentials

Basic cooking is craftsmanship. A pro only needs a hunting knife and a kettle but I recommend you to buy a book, it's easier to work with in the beginning than scrolling through a website while the cooking water overflows. Here is an example. The book has step-by-step pictures for every recipe

Anyways, here is an easy recipe for a basic tomato sauce:

1 onion

1 garlic glove

2 red chili

2 tomatoes (optional)

1 tbsp (tablespoon) olive oil

3 tbsp tomato mark

2 tbsp balsamic vinegar

2 cans of tomato

1/2 cup instant broth

2 pinches of sugar

1 pound spaghetti

parmigiano

(basic stuff you'll need for many recipes and it's easily stored)

1. Take a sharp knife and cut the chili lengthwise in thin slices. The green stuff and the seeds are not needed. Give them to your cat or throw them away but don't touch your eyes. It will hurt.
   
   
2. Dice the onions and the garlic glove. I hope you don't need an explanation for that, but if you do take a look here: http://youtu.be/WW4r5GW-e7M
   
   
3. Take a pot or pan and heat up the oil over a middle flame. When you feel the heat (or use a droplet of water: when it crackles you're good to go), throw in the chili, garlic and the onion. Go to the next step when the onion turned translucent (it looks like glass then, - but it's not a brownish glass yet).
   
   
4. Stir in the tomato mark until every spot in the pot knows what's coming to it and deglaze the mixture with 2 tbsp balsamic vinegar (basically you just throw it in to lower the temperatur real quick but deglazing sounds cooler)
   
   
5. You've almost made it. Pour in the content tomato cans, the broth and the sugar and make sure it doesn't boil to much. 5 bubbles every 1/2 minutes are enough. Season the sauce the salt and pepper. Start with half a spoon and add another pinch until you're satisfied.
   
   
6. Cook the noodles
   
   
7. (optional) Cut the 2 tomatoes into small dices (cut in half and scoop out the giblet)