I can’t get the cakes I make to look like the ones in my head.In there, there’s no effort. I sweep my hands across the counter a couple of times like a weird little frosting magician and there’s a cake. As soon as I try to make a cake in real life,...

Anyone can cook, the saying goes. The trouble is: not everyone knows where to start. Cooking can be, to say the least, very tedious. Recipes might call for ingredients you’ve never heard of or they might be three pages long. Ovens, food processors and...