My best advice to you is to pick a dish that you really like that you could eat regularly. Try not to worry about particular cuisines or anything like that, just something that you know that you could eat almost any day of the week.

Then find a good recipe (probably the second hardest part of the process), figure out all of the techniques and the info that is either implied or completely omitted from the recipe that simply assumed to be common knowledge (probably the hardest part of the process), and hone your craft on that one dish. Try to space it out so you’re only making it about once a week because you don’t want to burn yourself out on it.

The next trick is to see if you can find or come up with your own variations on that dish. Then move on to the your next “could eat it once a week for the rest of my life” dish and tackle that.

I think noodles are a good idea but my only hesitation would be that some noodles aren’t very forgiving and that noodles can range from a very simple ramen right up to something that’s quite fiddly and which demands quite a few skills in the kitchen such as Singapore noodles.

Aside from following your passion and your palate, the first thing I would advise a newbie cook to do would be to learn how to make a simple soup. Not a consommé or a French onion soup but something easy like cauliflower soup or minestrone.

Why? Because simple soups are extremely forgiving.

Didn’t fry your onions long enough? No big deal, they’re going to simmer for a while so they’ll cook through.

Pan too hot and your onions are burning? Throw some broth in and move on to the next stage.

Too concentrated? Add water or milk.

Not flavourful enough? Add more herbs or spices or tomato.

Overcooked? Lol it’s a soup, overcooking it is practically a virtue in this situation.

Not confident with managing the temperature of the pot or with stirring? Eh, it’s mostly liquid so you don’t need to stress about it.