Tuesday, July 8, 2008

The thing about recipes

I hate recipes. I hardly ever use measuring cups or spoons when I'm cooking. One of my VERY favorite blogs is Last Night's Dinner - she has no specific recipes, just what goes in a dish and how. I feel like I can always replicate the dishes she posts, maybe not as beautifully, but they'll always taste good. I tend to look at several recipes for a dish, mix them all together and come up with something tasty. I guess you could say I'm and improvisor - I know what I like and what I don't like.

What's the problem, you ask? Well, I have a goal. I want to submit my blog to the FoodBlogSearch.com folks. These are the qualifications:

  • Written in English (yup)
  • Subject is about food and cooking (uh huh)
  • Provides a substantial number of recipes, most original or adapted and not just copied word for word from other sites (now what exactly do they mean by "recipes"??)
  • Includes accompanying stories or notes (check)
  • Offers attractive original photos or illustrations (I can do attractive-ish)
  • Follows classic scratch-cooking methods with whole food ingredients (my favorite type of cooking!)
  • Presented in a blog format, including comments (no prob)
  • Is at least a month old, with at least 20 entries (getting there!)
  • Is a current, active blog, with at least 2 entries a month (will do)
  • Includes an "About" section with information about the blog author(s) (I'll expand on mine)

Truthfully, I don't want to write recipes but I'll happily give instructions. If Last Night's Dinner and the incredible Jennifer Hess can make it to the Food Blog Search darn it I can too - recipes or not!

I mean do you really need them folks? Now if I'm baking or if something is super complex or calls for a ton of ingredients (like AB's rib rub) of course I'll include recipes. But otherwise, I think I'll skip them. I'll leave them up to the real culinarians. We'll talk "dashes" and "spoonfuls" and "splashes" here - okay? My tastes are different than yours, maybe you don't like to add way too much cumin to every other night's dinner like I do - then leave it out, substitute something else! Don't like cilantro, add flat leaf parsley. Allergic to honey (mom), add some brown sugar or corn syrup. But if you have questions about quantities or anything else please just ask!

Oh and by the way Food Blog Search is seriously awesome - I'm on it several times a day. I still love the epicurious and food network searches but this is completely different. Check it out right over there on the right hand side of my blog.

4 comments:

Alicia said...

re: your comment on Smitten Kitchen about butter cream frosting, have you checked out Joy the Baker's recipe? I see you have a link to her blog and she posted about it a while back.

eatingoodinthehood@gmail.com said...

I just looked up Joy's recipes. I'm new to the baking thing and haven't made any of her recipes yet - only drooled over them! She has a chocolate buttercream (with Ovaltine!) and a swiss meringue buttercream that look delicious. I guess it's more of a fear of the unknown. I'll try to make some soon and see what happens. Thanks Alicia!

Alicia said...

America's Test Kitchen has free content on butter cream frostings for another option. You could try the chocolate or vanilla to start. The vanilla calls for a vanilla bean. I have these in my "to try" pile. You only need to register with an email address to get the recipes. There are cupcake recipes to go with them somewhere.

www.americastestkitchen.com

search for buttercream

eatingoodinthehood@gmail.com said...

Oh I love the nerdiness of America's Test Kitchen. I'll look into those recipes too. The taste of vanilla beans and all of those little vanilla bean specks are so great - I spent $10 on some beauties the other day but they got lost in transit and never made it to the pantry! Bummer, huh? Thanks again. Wish me luck!