What does cooking mean?
Cooking is the practice of preparing food for eating, typically by applying heat but also encompassing the selection, combination, and seasoning of ingredients. It can refer to the skill or craft itself, as in 'she studied French cooking,' or to the concrete act underway, as in 'the cooking will take an hour.' The word often appears attributively, describing tools and materials — cooking oil, cooking apples, a cooking pot. Universally familiar and largely positive in connotation, cooking evokes home, nourishment, care, and creativity, though it is also a serious professional discipline with its own techniques, traditions, and vocabulary. British English sometimes uses the near-synonym 'cookery,' while American English overwhelmingly prefers 'cooking.' Beyond its everyday role, cooking holds deep cultural and even evolutionary significance: it transforms raw ingredients into safe, digestible, flavorful meals, and many scientists believe the controlled use of fire for cooking played a crucial part in human development.
nounThe practice or skill of preparing food by combining, heating, and seasoning ingredients to make it edible and palatable; also, the activity of preparing food generally.
- The practice or skill of preparing food by heating and combining ingredients
- The activity or process of preparing a particular meal or dish ('the cooking takes about an hour')
- Attributive use describing things used in or relating to cooking ('cooking oil', 'cooking pot')
"She took a weekend cooking class to finally master her grandmother's risotto."
"Good cooking depends less on fancy equipment than on attention and patience."
"The cooking was finished well before the guests arrived."
Humans are the only species that cooks — and some scientists argue cooking itself made our big brains possible.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Etymology of cooking
Cooking derives from the verb cook, which entered English from Old North French 'coquer', ultimately from the Latin verb 'coquere', meaning 'to cook or prepare food'. Latin coquere itself traces back to the Indo-European root *pekw-, meaning 'to cook or bake'. The same Latin root gave rise to related words including cuisine (via French), concoction, and the adjective precocious (originally referring to fruit ripening early). The noun form cooking emerged naturally from the verb's gerund and has been used in English for centuries.
Related word forms
How cooking is actually used
Cooking is a gerund functioning as a noun; it carries warm, domestic connotations and is neutral-to-positive in register, used equally in everyday and culinary-professional contexts. In British English, 'cookery' is a common synonym, especially in formal contexts such as school subjects ('cookery classes'), whereas American English strongly prefers 'cooking.'
Easily confused with cooking
As a gerund it names the ongoing action ('He is cooking dinner'), while as a noun it names the practice or skill as a whole.
When cooking modifies another noun ('cooking oil,' 'cooking apples'), it functions attributively rather than naming the activity itself.