Hey there, dinner SOS listeners, and welcome to our very first Back to Basics week.

So what does that mean exactly?

Every day, today through Friday, we'll be publishing an episode that's meant to help you feel like a more confident, empowered home cook.

And maybe you'll come away with a new favorite idea or technique to try.

Today, I'm joined by my frequent co-host, Senior Test Kitchen Editor Shilpa Skokovic.

Hi, Shilpa.

Hi, Chris.

Shilpa. As you know, every week, listeners are sending us emails and phone calls. And we get lots of smaller questions that have big impact

and not necessarily the fastest responses, you know, but are ultimately about simple things, like

how to cook a chicken breast, that's not sad, how to make a perfect pot of rice, there's

usually not a lot of room to address them. So we sat down to figure out how to do just that

and ended up with this. One week, five episodes,

going back to basics. It's an attempt to help listeners level up the very simple things in

home cooking. Shilpa, do you think we can do this? Of course. Christopher, have some faith.

It's us.

Yes, absolutely.

Over the course of this week, we're going to have some episodes around animal proteins,

grains, and rice, how to make better sauces and dressings,

and then some of the more intangibles of cooking, like how to read a recipe

and how to get yourself in the right headspace to be the best home cook you can be.

Not always easy to articulate or understand, so I'm glad we're talking about it.

So, Shilpa, let's get into it. I thought we could start by talking about how people should be

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