Several finalists urge home cooks to learn a basic knowledge of knife skills. "I think learning proper knife skills, although it sounds boring, will make [cooking] more enjoyable," explains Addie. For Blake, the skill is a practical one. "There’s a specific way to cut [an onion] that will take you, like, five seconds, as opposed to just slicing it and trying to cut it a million times over and over," he says. "And then also, it’ll save you a lot of money if you know how to fabricate foods. So if you know how to buy a larger piece of meat and then cut it down into specific cuts and then save it, that’ll save you a lot of money as well." Rusty agrees with that thinking, and he adds, "Once you do that, don’t be so scared of food."