Do you find recipes necessary?

timmyc

timmyc

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[Mod.Edit: Post moved to form new thread]

Do you find a recipe is not necessary unless you are baking?

I find i just make up things on the fly, have a good idea of what will work and what won't, or is this just something i have developed over years of cooking daily.

Do you find following a recipe useful for you, if so why or why not?
 
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I almost always follow a recipe even for dishes that I've been cooking for 30 odd years. Even for these recipes I may need to revert to my computer for quantities.

Why? Because I'm old and forgetful.
 
Rarely, I follow a recipe. For baking yes, although pastry & basic breads I know by heart so no need. Usually I only use a recipe to try a dish out, if its a new type of cuisine to me. In that case its useful because (if I'm using a trusted source) it will give me a starting point to judge how it should look and taste.

I sometimes use parts of recipes from modernist style dishes (such as some of those posted on Great British Chefs) simply because I wouldn't know how to do them otherwise. In the case of some modernist cooking, its important to follow a recipe because they are techniques as much as recipes and have to be learned and often precise quantities are crucial. Once I've learned and understood the concept I'll then adapt it - for example, I learned to make foams from a recipe on that website and now make foams to my own recipes.

Sometimes too, I'll make a recipe that a member has posted here - in which case I'll generally follow it. There wouldn't be much point otherwise! I do try to give feedback if I do that.
 
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I use recipes all the time because, like @Yorky, I can never trivial things like ingredients, quantities, and oven temperatures :laugh:
I'm forever wondering what to cook and how to use up food from my veg boxes, so a good variety of recipes is a must, even if I change them considerably.
All my favourite recipes (and my own versions of them) are saved in OneNote along with recipes I want to try out so I can access them from my phone when I'm in the kitchen or at someone else's house.
 
If it's a dish I make often, I don't need to follow a recipe. If it's something I'm trying to copy/replicate, I come up with my own. I'll usually follow a recipe when making a new dish, particularly if it's complicated or an unfamiliar cuisine. I've never really tried to come up with something totally new for some reason.
 
Oh absolutely follow a recipe, I don't have an inventive/artistic bone in my body.

However, I will 'twiddle' with a recipe having cooked it once to try and improve it (to my liking).
 
I always follow a recipe; last time I didn't, and unintentionally forgot something, it looked like something had set in a concrete mixer, and might need a jackhammer to get it out.
 
It depends entirely on who I'm cooking for and to some extent what I'm cooking. And like @Wyshiepoo I'll often cook a recipe once, more or less to what it states and then adapt it to our tastes.
But with family favourites, generally recipes that have made it in to tbe BBB (big blue book), recipes are known off by heart so I don't need to follow them.
 
I do use recipes. Sometimes I go off script. If I follow the recipe I find that when eating the food I think I could have added this or next time I won’t use this or this amount
 
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