The Great Recipe Divide

In my view, the world can be divided into two groups of people.

Those who follow a recipe and those who don’t.

There’s no judgment here. Just an observation.

In my house, my younger son and I consider a recipe to be an outline or a suggestion about how to make a dish.

My husband and my older son consider a recipe written in stone, at least the first time it is prepared. After that they may make changes.

An example of my laissez-faire approach to cooking is if the recipe calls for artichokes but I only have Brussels sprouts, I substitute them in. Same with almonds for pine nuts.

A close friend recently made my baked oatmeal recipe and raved about it.

She is one of those people who use a recipe as an outline. She added chia seeds and pumpkin seeds, which aren’t in the recipe, and she used less oatmeal than called for. I’m not so sure it’s the same recipe, but it works.

My only recommendation is that these two groups of people rarely cook together.