The recipe is both the saviour and enemy of the cook. They serve a very valid purpose, but they also hinder progress. It's far too easy (and comfortable) to obsess about the details of a recipe.
"A recipe has no soul. You as the cook must bring soul to the recipe." Thomas Keller.
For anyone learning and experimenting with new techniques and flavour profiles, especially from different cultures to their own, a good recipe book is the essential first step on the path to enlightenment. You get to use someone else's expertise to guide you, to use their experiences and opinions to help you to form your own views. It's a much more efficient (and cheaper!) alternative to doing the rural food tour of the area of the world you're interested in. Most of us can't afford to spend 3 months in rural Thailand on the hunt for the "soul" of the cuisine.
This is an identical process whether you're the domestic foodie or a chef working in a new kitchen where you need to align with how they create and deliver dishes. As a cook, both professional and amateur, you will train, learn from and mimic for years as you develop your own voice, your own style, your own mantra. A chef understands the journey they need to take, learn how to manage mistakes, evolve and develop skills. And, the environment they're in protects the unskilled from having too much responsibility for their level.
"A recipe has no soul. You as the cook must bring soul to the recipe." Thomas Keller.
For anyone learning and experimenting with new techniques and flavour profiles, especially from different cultures to their own, a good recipe book is the essential first step on the path to enlightenment. You get to use someone else's expertise to guide you, to use their experiences and opinions to help you to form your own views. It's a much more efficient (and cheaper!) alternative to doing the rural food tour of the area of the world you're interested in. Most of us can't afford to spend 3 months in rural Thailand on the hunt for the "soul" of the cuisine.
This is an identical process whether you're the domestic foodie or a chef working in a new kitchen where you need to align with how they create and deliver dishes. As a cook, both professional and amateur, you will train, learn from and mimic for years as you develop your own voice, your own style, your own mantra. A chef understands the journey they need to take, learn how to manage mistakes, evolve and develop skills. And, the environment they're in protects the unskilled from having too much responsibility for their level.
This isn't always translated out to the masses in the best way. You're left alone to try, fail, and live with the consequences of the burnt or undercooked dinner experiment.
The issue I have with almost all recipe books/cooking shows/video blogs et al, is the simple fact that at no point is it really explained that the recipe you're reading is simply the writer's preferred version. Whether it's the celebrity cook book that's all over daytime TV, or an ancient book of 'The Classics' by one of the godfathers of modern cuisine. Of course, if you've been a professional for 30+ years and you write something down, it's probably got more validity than the part time blogger, or a domestic amateur right? Naturally, they have more experience and have refined the recipe over the years; Tested and trialled them, selling them in their restaurants and tweaking and updating them as culture shifts and technology changes? Right?
The issue I have with almost all recipe books/cooking shows/video blogs et al, is the simple fact that at no point is it really explained that the recipe you're reading is simply the writer's preferred version. Whether it's the celebrity cook book that's all over daytime TV, or an ancient book of 'The Classics' by one of the godfathers of modern cuisine. Of course, if you've been a professional for 30+ years and you write something down, it's probably got more validity than the part time blogger, or a domestic amateur right? Naturally, they have more experience and have refined the recipe over the years; Tested and trialled them, selling them in their restaurants and tweaking and updating them as culture shifts and technology changes? Right?
Well, that's a very valid argument. But what about the viewpoint of someone who has cooked for their family for decades? "What is correct" and "what is correct for this situation" are often, in the domestic realm, one and the same.
For the creative and ambitious amateur cook it can become all to easy to lose your creativity and bravery to risk it all for an idea that may or may not work. Falling into the mindset that the writer of your favourite book(s) knows all and that all others are pretenders to the throne. And by extension, that you are not worthy of trying something new as the last time you tried it went badly. At some point I'll write another post about cooking confidence and the issues domestic cooks often feel without realising why.
A recipe provides the comfort of security, the knowledge that it's been tested time and time again (albeit not in your own kitchen with your own equipment). It doesn't usually also provide the broader knowledge of a cuisine style needed to really enable growth, especially since most people don't actually read the rest of the text in a recipe book. Knowing a recipe and understanding a recipe are very different things.
A recipe provides the comfort of security, the knowledge that it's been tested time and time again (albeit not in your own kitchen with your own equipment). It doesn't usually also provide the broader knowledge of a cuisine style needed to really enable growth, especially since most people don't actually read the rest of the text in a recipe book. Knowing a recipe and understanding a recipe are very different things.
A recipe is nothing without the correct environment and the correct audience. Don't get caught up in the need to follow them to the letter, if the letter doesn't suit your audience. Use them to support your creativity and as sources of references to enhance your skills as you level up.
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