What’s your challenge process?

[TastyReuben]

For those who participate in the challenges…what’s your process once a new challenge is announced?

Do you rush to the internet to do some intense research, looking up origins, trivia, and historical uses of the ingredient, as to get a better understanding of it?

Do you pile into your cookbooks and personal recipe collection, scouring for dishes that include the ingredient in wild and wonderful ways?

Do you forego all that and simply take stock of your pantry and freezer and think, “I could do this…or that…?”

Do you plan out a certain number of entries from the start, or just let it flow naturally, and what happens happens? Two entries, fine! Six entries, even finer!

For me, the first thing I do (and this drives MrsT bonkers) is grab every single cookbook I have (currently close to 40), stack them in two cookbook towers next to the sofa, and I pore over the indexes and tables of contents, marking ones that have potential. Makes me appreciate a good index, I can tell you that.

Then I go out to the internet and search for things like “cooking with <ingredient>,” just to see if there’s anything interesting waiting there.

Finally, I think back to being a kid, and I try and remember what things my grandmom and mom may have made using the ingredient, and whether one of those things would work.

That done, I start whittling down my list, shooting for a bit of variety, or even approaching it like a menu (a cocktail recipe, a first course dish, a main course dish, etc).

Once I have that, throughout the challenge, I try and post some interesting trivia, or a song or poem, or a painting or sculpture that incorporates the ingredient somehow, just for fun.

How do you do it?

 

[badjak]

Only 40 cookbooks?

To answer the question:
Depends
First thoughts: do I have this ingredient or can I get it and can I get it before the challenge ends?
If yes, then the question .
is if I like the ingredient and am I familiar with it.
If I don't like it, I'm out.
If I do and am familiar with it, I free wheel
Otherwise I put on my thinking cap, use google and checkmy cookbooks

 

[medtran49]

My first thoughts are do I want to make something with this ingredient and will we like it? If the answer is no to either, I'm out.

Next thing is do we use this ingredient and how much? With the soy challenge, the answer was yes, but... I am of the mind set that a challenge ingredient should be predominant or at least a good part of the taste or ingredients. If there's just a couple of shakes of soy sauce, I'm not going to enter it. If it's something I have to hide, like tofu in an Asian meatball recipe, because someone wouldn't eat it otherwise, I'm not going to enter it.

As to finding recipes, I'm like badjak , only 40? Quite a few of our cookbooks are specialized to 1 cuisine, so I can skip those that I know won't be appropriate. We also have quite a few  cheffy cookbooks, which also come into play with the next consideration. Fortunately, I have a very good memory so can remember whether there is a dish we like or something that looked interesting but we never tried in a lot of our cookbooks. Plus, we have our own "cookbook" virtually and bookmarks of recipes that I've saved over the years. Then, if I haven't found something interesting, I Google.

The last thing is a consideration that has come into play the last couple of years. Do I feel like and have the energy to mess with a challenge recipe? The answer to that question has become no or probably not more and more often unfortunately.

 

[blades]

For those who participate in the challenges…what’s your process once a new challenge is announced?

Do you rush to the internet to do some intense research, looking up origins, trivia, and historical uses of the ingredient, as to get a better understanding of it?

Do you pile into your cookbooks and personal recipe collection, scouring for dishes that include the ingredient in wild and wonderful ways?

Do you forego all that and simply take stock of your pantry and freezer and think, “I could do this…or that…?”

Do you plan out a certain number of entries from the start, or just let it flow naturally, and what happens happens? Two entries, fine! Six entries, even finer!

For me, the first thing I do (and this drives MrsT bonkers) is grab every single cookbook I have (currently close to 40), stack them in two cookbook towers next to the sofa, and I pore over the indexes and tables of contents, marking ones that have potential. Makes me appreciate a good index, I can tell you that.

Then I go out to the internet and search for things like “cooking with <ingredient>,” just to see if there’s anything interesting waiting there.

Finally, I think back to being a kid, and I try and remember what things my grandmom and mom may have made using the ingredient, and whether one of those things would work.

That done, I start whittling down my list, shooting for a bit of variety, or even approaching it like a menu (a cocktail recipe, a first course dish, a main course dish, etc).

Once I have that, throughout the challenge, I try and post some interesting trivia, or a song or poem, or a painting or sculpture that incorporates the ingredient somehow, just for fun.

How do you do it?

I think of ideas then look on the internet to see how others have approached something similar. I process all of that, adopt and adapt, check my pantry and then include any missing ingredients the next shopping trip. It is fun and a great learning experience. I had never used edamame or tofu in the past, for instance, and learned a lot participating in the soy bean challenge. And it is fun.

 

[kaneohegirlinaz]

For myself, first, do we like this ingredient - don't wanna waste food ya know - if it's no, then like others I won't be participating.
Next up, I scan my food photo library - have I made something with this ingredient before? Is it on my wish list to make?
And then I jump in from there.

 

[TastyReuben]

Only 40 cookbooks?

Yes, I don’t like clutter, and I have two small shelves designated for cookbooks, and when those fill up and I buy a new cookbook…something’s gotta go.

It’s largely my personality type - I get really overwhelmed with too much choice. It’s also why I’ll rarely read through an entire menu at a restaurant. I just get the first thing that looks good.

 

[karadekoolaid]

My first thought is : "Do I usually use this ingredient for cooking?". If the answer is yes, then I proceed to step 2. If the answer is no (as in, for example, the last challenge, where I rarely use soy, never use tofu or tempeh and have only once ever eaten edamame) then I don't bother.
Step 2: think if there are any recipes in my repertoire which use the ingredient. If there are, then that's a start.
Step 3: look through specific cookbooks ( I've got mine more or less organised by country/cuisine) to see if anything stands out.
Step 4: google - and I often google in a different language; French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, German, and then translate if necessary. Why? Because if I'm looking for an authentic Spanish dish, for example, I don't want to read what All Recipes, or BBC Food or Kenji López-Alt made; I want something genuinely Spanish.
Step 5: decide which dishes I'm going to make

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

Do you pile into your cookbooks and personal recipe collection, scouring for dishes that include the ingredient in wild and wonderful ways?

This mostly, ish.

I have 1 large shelf with mostly vegan, but some vegetarian (and 1 non-vegetarain) cookbooks on which we will go through on a Saturday morning prior to going shopping. It doesn't matter if there's a challenge ingredient we would like to use. But if there is a recipe that we've been waiting to do for a while, that the ingredient challenge covers, we'll take that opportunity to cook that recipe.
There is also a stack of Vegan Food and Living magazines to go through as well.

 

[Herbaceous]

Oh wow, you all have much more of an actual process than I do!

My process is to think “Hmmmm, what good recipes do I have that use this ingredient?” then I make them and enter them. That’s really about it.

 

[vernplum]

I've only entered 3 times (I think?) but once I've decided to join I will think about the flavour profile of the ingredient and what kind of dishes ingredients of that profile or type would typically be used in. This might take a day or so of (mostly unconscious) consideration until an idea forms

Once I've narrowed down the kind of dish I want to make I will then scour my cookbooks (I can't remember how many I have - could be between 35 and 50...) and also the web to see what precedents there have been for my idea and what I can do differently, what complementary flavours go with the chosen ingredient and so on. At this point I will also start to imagine what it will taste like and visualize how the final dish will be presented. Then I will get to work to try to realize it.

I think generally I want to create something that is just a slightly new spin on something established and has a little bit of a surprising yet familiar element.

 

[JAS_OH1]

I've only entered 3 times (I think?) but once I've decided to join I will think about the flavour profile of the ingredient and what kind of dishes ingredients of that profile or type would typically be used in. This might take a day or so of (mostly unconscious) consideration until an idea forms

Once I've narrowed down the kind of dish I want to make I will then scour my cookbooks (I can't remember how many I have - could be between 35 and 50...) and also the web to see what precedents there have been for my idea and what I can do differently, what complementary flavours go with the chosen ingredient and so on. At this point I will also start to imagine what it will taste like and visualize how the final dish will be presented. Then I will get to work to try to realize it.

I think generally I want to create something that is just a slightly new spin on something established and has a little bit of a surprising yet familiar element.

Mine's mostly the same other than I don't own any cookbooks.