jennyema
Chef Extraordinaire
Perhaps I should be embarrassed to say this, but I almost never cook any recipe exactly the way the author wrote it. I just can't help myself, I've developed my own ideas about how things should be cooked and I'm too headstrong to follow instructions. When I cook this crash recipe I'll read the recipe and maybe make a few notes in my head, and then I'll go right along and cook the recipe my way. I understand of course that you can't criticize the author or the original recipe unless you follow it exactly.
I think of recipes more as concepts than as procedures which much be followed. For me vague recipes are better.
I agree entirely.
I think of them more as ideas.
Something like Julia Child's beef burgandy, I'll make it the first time pretty much by the recipe and then improvise or change things after that.
Or if I'm entirely unfamiliar with a technique or ingredient, Ill follow it the first time.