All students should know how to cook - it's a key skill in life and all students have the ability to cook. Things don't need to be too fancy, you don't need to save lots of money and you can maintain a healthy diet. If cooking is a bit of a mystery to you and you've never done any before because you're parents have always cooked for you it might be slightly scary thinking about how you'll feed yourself. The most fundamental aspect of cooking as a student is to understand that it's all trial and error. Don't be afraid that it will turn out wrong - just give it a go and if it doesn't work you'll know for next time and will be able to learn from your previous mistakes. As soon as you've got this mentality you'll find cooking as a student easy - you now have the freedom to eat what you want and when you want it.

Don't be too ambitious from the start - try a couple of dishes and try to perfect one. It's easy to start with pasta and sauces first so that you can start to see how long you should cook pasta for before it gets to soft, and how you can make an easy pasta sauce with chopped tomatoes, onions and some seasoning (which will be cheaper than buying a sauce). From this you'll then be able to go on to make other sauces, together with things such as Spaghetti Bolognese.

Always speak with other students you live with about how to cook different dishes - the chances are that everyone will have a dish that they know how to cook well. We've got some quick and easy student recipes which should also help to get you started.