How good are you at writing down your recipes?

ElizabethB

ElizabethB

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I am TERRIBLE.

I rarely make anything exactly the same twice.

When asked for a recipe I have to sit down and really think it through - especially for seasoning. I am a "little of this and a little of that" "season to taste" kind of cook.

It must be genetic. My Mother is the same way.

At a recent family dinner she served a wonderful Broccoli casserole. The best she ever made. I tried to get her to recipe. It was very difficult. "Well, I added a little of this and a little of that and stirred in a little of this." How much did you use. "Well, whatever you want to use."

:hyper:

After much discussion I realized that she had made a Mornay sauce then tweaked it to accommodate her South Louisiana cooking style - added sautéed onions and garlic. She also oven roasted her Broccoli. Oven roasting veggies is relatively new to her repertoire. Mother learned to cook veggies to death. It took awhile to sell her on oven roasting.

There I go again - ramble, ramble, ramble.

:thankyou:all. You are teaching me to be more disciplined. I make notes. If I tweak a recipe the next time I make it - more notes with comments on the result.
 
Just as an idea I wonder if this might help. When stripping down parts of my old bikes I use a dicta-phone [I think some mobile phones will do the job now]. It's easy quick and allows for those little personal bits which mean something only to you [plus it's easier than messing around with a pen] - if it turns out ok just write it down later.
 
@sidevalve

:thankyou: for the reminder. I actually have an old cassette tape recorder stashed some where. Talk about dating myself.

I have 1" ring binders with recipes - some are down loads, some are old family recipes. They are in plastic sleeves. Easy to take out when cooking and easy to wipe off my splatters and drips from the sleeve.

My new discipline is to put the basic recipe in a Word document with room for notes, comments and changes then print it. I can add to it as I cook then edit and print the document for later use.
 
Great idea for a thread! Until relatively recently I was rubbish at writing down recipes. I did write them down but only in vague terms - not so any one else could follow them. Now its entirely different. Because I'm posting recipes here (and sometimes on other sites) I am meticulous about jotting everything down in a kind of shorthand as I make the recipe. Then (if the recipe is successful) I type it up on my computer.
 
We are a family of writers ( Published Ones ) and if we do not write it down, it is long forgotten ..

We are too busy to play guessing games especially about a jewel of a recipe or anything else for that matter ..
 
Francesca said:
We are a family of writers ( Published Ones ) and if we do not write it down, it is long forgotten ..

We are too busy to play guessing games especially about a jewel of a recipe or anything else for that matter ..
Click to expand...

Then, when I can I type the récipes on Word documents .. However, time is valuable as I am so busy, that sometimes I just put in a scap book in a fine plastic cover ..
 
My favourites are either recorded on my website or on Food.com website. Should I make something new or different to the norm (e.g. Boeuf Bouguignon), I type out the recipe on my laptop or desktop then adapt it to either my own tastes and/or to the ingredients that I have available. If I'm happy with the result, it is then transferred to the internet (but is retained on my computer).
 
I am terrible at writing things down, and always have been, but need to sort things as my memory does not seem to be as good as it was. Luckily, as far as food is concerned, I can usually remember for a few days at least.

I save recipes to Microsoft OneNote, which I can access from my laptop, my tablet and both phones. Recipes I then make are either deleted if they are awful and just don't work (and many, not on the internet but also in some seemingly surprisingly good cookery books/web sites don't seem to work at all). Ones I make and like are given one star, and ones that are my favourites or I have tweaked to suit my own taste are given two stars. I usually have my phone within reach when I cook; cookery books are usually placed in a large thick plastic bag to save from being splashed, and some of my books actually have a built in thick plastic sheet to put over the page.

As well as the phones and the cookery books, I also have folders of cuttings from magazines and newspapers, pages of recipes I typed out in the 1960s which I should really revisit, handwritten recipes given to me by friends and relatives, and scribblings of recipes including food I have had in restaurants or as takeaways either to look up or which are good enough in principle but require tweaking to make work properly. There are also hundreds of recipes stored on my computer which I saved before I discovered OneNote, and hundreds of links to cookery pages or collections of recipes, as well as Kindle, ePub and pdf files, which I am sorting through when time permits.
 
Well...My dad wrote some cooking books (mostly Apulian recipes), and he is very precise. My mom is the same.
By my side I'm very precise too when I write/explain/read a recipe but I have to admitt that sometimes it's very boring for me to read/write/explain details but I have to do, it's important expecially if is the first time I/someone make it. My problem is another thing: translation from Italiano to English. So I write a simple 10 mins recipe in half an hour (when I'm lucky!).
 
MypinchofItaly said:
Well...My dad wrote some cooking books (mostly Apulian recipes), and he is very precise. My mom is the same.
By my side I'm very precise too when I write/explain/read a recipe but I have to admitt that sometimes it's very boring for me to read/write/explain details but I have to do, it's important expecially if is the first time I/someone make it. My problem is another thing: translation from Italiano to English. So I write a simple 10 mins recipe in half an hour (when I'm lucky!).
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@MypinchofItaly

Definitely understand, as I have translated classics & traditional récipes of my family too from time to time however, I prefer to write in English directly as it is much less laborious !!

Hope all is well and have a lovely day .. Missed seeing you !!
 
Francesca said:
@MypinchofItaly

Definitely understand, as I have translated classics & traditional récipes of my family too from time to time however, I prefer to write in English directly as it is much less laborious !!

Hope all is well and have a lovely day .. Missed seeing you !!
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I always afraid to lose some piece, also because sometimes I ask myself " how can I say this in English in the best way?" thus I look in Italian, then translate in English, then Italian, then English .. is a hard work but somebody will have to do it :D
Yes my Dear @Francesca I'm fine, even if these are very intense working days..but I'm always around by these parts to take a peek :watching:
Hope you are fine too. I'm waiting for you for an Italian coffee in Milano, you know!:)
 
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MypinchofItaly said:
I always afraid to lose some pieces, also because sometimes I ask myself " how can I say this in English in the best way?" thus I look in Italian, then translate in English, then Italian, then English .. is a hard work but somebody will have to do it :D
Click to expand...

Well, your efforts are much appreciated here!
 
We use waste paper, halves of envelopes that have been through the mail, been used for last week's shopping list and are now bookmarking the chosen recipes for the week. Sometimes, not often, it's a printed recipe anyhow...

When I tweak a recipe I'll jot down the tweak on the bookmark (or printout). If it works the bookmark is kept and the recipe amended (by writing it down as a correction to the recipe in the cookbook) but always in pencil. If it hasn't worked as well as hoped, then the bookmark is recycled for firelighting duty.

New recipes are recorded in a similar manner but written up properly if they worked, ready for the bookmark tweaking.... Sometimes I'll handwrite them, other times I'll type them up. It largely depends on what is to hand and if my laptop is turned on.
 
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