not that kind of test
15 Dec 2018 21:08![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
domarzioneThis is the recipe I'm making for dinner tonight: Spicy Chickpea and Sour Tomato Curry with Noodles. (Yes, it's 9pm and I'm still making dinner.)
I am, to be completely immodest, a very good cook. I consider the recipe oddly written, but extremely easy to follow. The oddness throws me a little, though, which is why I'm putting it up here.
The first step is 'caramelize the onions' in a lot more words. It has a description of what's supposed to happen, more or less, but no sense of how long it should take beyond "a while" and leaves the end state at "browned to your liking."
The second step has the similarly unhelpful "let the sauce simmer."
I know caramelizing onions takes a half-hour or so and what kind of brown it's supposed to be and I have a good sense of how long a simmer it would need for the flavors to meld, since that's the point of that action. But if you are not familiar with these processes or if you are just starting to stretch your culinary wings, does this kind of instruction make things easier or just anxiety-inducing because it's so laid-back and vague?
I am, to be completely immodest, a very good cook. I consider the recipe oddly written, but extremely easy to follow. The oddness throws me a little, though, which is why I'm putting it up here.
The first step is 'caramelize the onions' in a lot more words. It has a description of what's supposed to happen, more or less, but no sense of how long it should take beyond "a while" and leaves the end state at "browned to your liking."
The second step has the similarly unhelpful "let the sauce simmer."
I know caramelizing onions takes a half-hour or so and what kind of brown it's supposed to be and I have a good sense of how long a simmer it would need for the flavors to meld, since that's the point of that action. But if you are not familiar with these processes or if you are just starting to stretch your culinary wings, does this kind of instruction make things easier or just anxiety-inducing because it's so laid-back and vague?
no subject
Date: 2018-12-16 03:20 (UTC)Audience. Cook books need to know their audience. And audiences have to adapt to heritage cookbooks. (Lots of good historical evidence in a cookbook. Butcher charts, things you can learn about...)