My two are:

Making sourdough. I personally always heard like this weird almost mysticism around making it. But I bought a $7 starter from a bakery store, and using just stuff in my kitchen and cheap bread flour I’ve been eating fresh sourdough every day and been super happy with it. Some loafs aren’t super consistent because I don’t have like temperature controlled box or anything. But they’ve all been tasty.

Drawing. I’m by no means an artist, but I always felt like people who were good at drawing were like on a different level. But I buckled down and every day for a month I tried drawing my favorite anime character following an online guide. So just 30 minutes every day. The first one was so bad I almost gave up, but I was in love with the last one and made me realize that like… yeah it really is just practice. Years and years of it to be good at drawing things consistently, quickly, and a variety of things. But I had fun and got something I enjoyed much faster than I expected. So if you want to learn to draw, I would recommend just trying to draw something you really like following a guide and just try it once a day until you are happy with the result.

  • SpaceNoodle@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    It’s the exact same phenomenon. Surely astroturf bullshit started by whomever is selling the useless tools.

    • Riven@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      3 months ago

      That and I think there’s a fair bit of elitism as well. Everyone is always trying to one up each other and since you can only go so expensive with the beans and equipment the next step is to be pretentious with the prep.

      • StereoTrespasser@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        There is a point of diminishing returns with coffee brewing, and you can quickly spend obscene amounts of money for infinitesimally small increases in quality of the brew.

        However, a few hundred dollars worth of investment in a grinder and basic equipment, and you’ll never again be able to choke down the sour, burnt tar they attempt to pass off as coffee in stores and restaurants.