What’s missing from a recipe
January 14th, 2012 § 3 Comments
Last week I made pistachio gelato (post coming soon), a type of recipe I had not tried before. It frustrated me because it included guidance to remove from the heat ”when the mixture approaches a simmer”, but no explanation of why this specific heat was needed, nor what would happen if you let it actually simmer. I like to know why I am doing what I’m doing, and in this case, the information was missing.
This is a subject that has been occupying me for some time. The current standard format for recipes was developed during the 19th Century by domestic cookery writers like Eliza Acton and Isabella Beeton. They were the first to write a separate list of ingredients, followed by the method. Before that, the instructions would be very brief, intended as a reminder for those who had already learnt about cooking from their mother or as an apprentice to a cook.
So Hannah Glasse, writing The Art of Cookery, Made Plain and Easy in 1774, could write this recipe for tart pastry:
One pound of flour, three quarters of a pound of butter; mix up together and beat well with a rolling pin.
Recipes like this were never intended to be a replacement for the teaching of cookery. They are still a very limited format. However, they are a popular one, and virtually standardised over the past 100 years, so that most people recognise a recipe layout if they see one, and know what to expect. They also work fairly well as a compromise – something that can be reproduced easily in many different media, and something that strikes a balance between too much and too little information.
However, as a teaching tool for learning to cook they definitely err on the side of too little information. Worse, because they form the main body of most cookbooks, it would be natural for those learning to cook from a book that everything you need to know would be contained in them. This is very far from the case.
It is hard to find information on which parts of the recipe are important, and which are more flexible. Where is it safe to deviate and where is it not? To compound the problem, few experienced cooks know which parts of a recipe are most important to follow. If you always follow recipes, how would you know what happens if you don’t? Or how to fix it if the recipe turns out to be wrong?
What is missing from most recipes is the context-sensitive techniques that allow you to exert your own judgement about the recipe. The understanding you need to decide if something is done, if it has gone wrong or if you should add more or less of something. By implying that the recipe contains everything, we remove people’s capability to make the adaptations that are always necessary, because the circumstances in which we cook are always unique.
In the next few posts, I am going to try and pick out the parts of a recipe that are missing, the bits to pay attention to, and those you can be more relaxed about. Hopefully, this sort of information can then be applied to any similar recipe you come across, rather than being specific to the one you’re looking at. And that sort of knowledge should be more enduring.
Food magazines
March 7th, 2011 § Leave a Comment
You wait all month and then three come along at once.
My food magazines all turned up together this month. I try not to overindulge in these things – too often they are full of recipes I don’t want to make, and concerns I don’t care about – feeding children, losing weight. Not that there’s anything wrong with those, they’re just not my concern. But sometimes I get a lot out of them, and more so when I mark up the interesting things so I can go back later when I need inspiration. So here are the things I’ve marked to try and make sometime soon.
Bon Appetit, March 2011
I subscribe to Bon Appetit, so it’s delivered to me from the US – otherwise it is pretty hard to find in the UK. It’s not as good as the discontinued Gourmet was, but I still enjoy hearing about things on the other side of the Atlantic, and it has a good mix of columns and recipes.
- Clotilde Dusoulier (of Paris blog Chocolate and Zucchini) has a ‘snob-free’ guide to Paris in this issue. I’m planning a trip there soon – it’s been ages since I last went and it’s just 2 and a half hours away from the centre of London. It takes longer to get to Yorkshire.
- Lemongrass bars with coconut shortbread crust sound like an interesting twist on classic lemon bars.
- In a Baked pasta special, the best sounding is ‘Rigatoni with eggplant and pine nut crunch’. Roasted vegetables are mixed with pasta and tomato sauce, topped with a rough pesto and lots of cheese, and baked. Yum.
- Sticky Toffee Banana pudding, in a section on desserts from the pantry. I’ve been thinking about warm desserts that you could freeze in individual portions and reheat, and this would fit the bill.
Waitrose Kitchen, March 2011
What used to be Waitrose Food Illustrated has become Waitrose Kitchen. Unfortunately, this has reduced the number of longer articles and more complicated recipes, with more ’30 minute meals’ content in there instead. Still, it’s a cut above most in-store magazines, and free if you have a John Lewis credit card.
- Tamasin Day-Lewis, author of one of my favourite books, The Art Of The Tart
, has a lovely looking meal of gammon, borlotti beans, potato cake and cabbage with Cashel Blue cheese. Although I probably won’t recreate the whole thing, the potato cake and beans may get used as side dishes.
- Lamb, aubergine and tomato gratin – one of a pair of dishes, this is the rainy day counterpart to a ‘sunny day’ lamb koftas (kebab) recipe. Sounds like a less heavy version of moussaka, with a crisp topping of breadcrumbs, parsley and lemon. Perfect when spring starts to appear, but hasn’t quite got here yet.
Delicious, April 2011
I don’t often buy Delicious, but when I’m in the mood for a food magazine that isn’t one of the above, it’s the preferred one. I saw @meemalee tweet about the cover article, a beautiful pyramid of marshmallows by @beas_bloomsbury, so thought this would be a good one, and it’s definitely the best of the bunch.
- Nigella’s weekend menu – Duck, potatoes and butternut squash salad – loved the look of this, and made something similar on Sunday, but followed Mark Bittman’s directions for crisp braised duck legs.
- A lovely looking Easter menu of rhubarb cocktails, salad of salmon, cucumber and avocado; slow-cooked shoulder of lamb with rice, salad; pavlova with passion fruit. Keen to try making the rhubarb syrup used for the cocktails, and trying to recreate the rhubarb gin and tonics they serve at the restaurant Bob Bob Ricard.
- There’s a good food blogging article, featuring such illustrious names as Edd Kimber, blogging at he eats and Pim Techamuanvivit of Chez Pim. Nice to see a bit of mainstream coverage.
- Amazing looking marshmallows in white, pink and green from Bea Vo of Bea’s of Bloomsbury tearooms. It’s not often that I encounter a recipe I’ve never seen before, but I had never come across a marshmallow recipe that didn’t feature egg whites. I am not a marshmallow-lover, but the description of these is tempting even me.
A few food-related links
October 29th, 2009 § Leave a Comment
The wonderful Shuna writes about the balance between Recipes and Intuition:
“I believe if one places the recipe before what one knows to be true, that’s where {some of the} trouble begins.
That’s when “Bad Things Happen.”"
http://eggbeater.typepad.com/shuna/2009/10/recipes-vs-intuition.html
Autumn recipes for crisps (= UK crumble)
Pear Crisp from The Pioneer Woman
Breakfast Granola Apple Crisp from Smitten Kitchen
(both are on the to-bake list)
A lovely banana bread recipe from Sophie Dahl in Waitrose Food Illustrated which I adapted slightly here.
Some lovely friends bought me a gift subscription from The Spicery for my birthday, and I’m already enjoying it so much that I’ve ordered a stack of extra things from them – including beautiful long Cinnamon quills and really fragrant garam masala. Check out the recipe kits.
