Reading Recipes

One of the first things they teach in a basic cooking class is to read the recipe all the way through before you start, make sure you have the ingredients and make sure you understand how to do it. Do we listen? Ahhhh…. No.

How do I know we don’t always read recipes first? Because I speak from experience. I don’t know how many times I have started a recipe, assuming I know how to do it and discovered half way through that I have done it totally wrong.

How do I know all of you have the same problem? Because 2-3 times a week I answer a question from one of you who asks, “Do we cook this first?” Then, when I look at the recipe, I find the answer to the reader’s question right in the middle of the instructions (and sometimes on the first line).

 

Then there are the times I’m mixing and stirring, assuming I have cinnamon on hand because I always keep cinnamon in my pantry, only to find out that I don’t have enough.

How do I know all of you do the same thing? Because of all the new recipes that get invented when people have to improvise (which is a good thing sometimes)! I read reviews that say, “This was a great recipe but I changed it a little because I didn’t have cinnamon so I used nutmeg,” or “I didn’t have eggs so I left those out,” or “I used water instead of milk… but is sure was good.” 🙂 🙂

Read the recipe. I have 3 fingers pointing back at myself as I say this.

I sometimes find myself just glancing at a recipe, seeing a long list of ingredients or instructions and thinking, “This is too hard.” I have often found that if I take the time to really look at the recipes and read the directions, they are often very easy. The writer just needed to go into detail to explain a certain step which, once you know how to do it, goes very quickly.

We all need to slow down and read the recipe (myself included). It really can save you time and headache in the long run. I don’t know how often I put those egg whites in a small bowl when the instructions said a large bowl only to find them expanding and expanding and, 3 dirty bowls later, boy did I have a mess!

Or how often have you spent 5-10 minutes writing an e mail with a question when the answer was right in the recipe?

Last but not least READ the RECIPE. Maybe now I will remember it! Ya think???? 🙂 🙂

      -Jill

Photo By: normanack