Recipe book meal planning...

Sarahsaver · 2 August 2006 at 10:41PM

What the eck is that then?

I do it sometimes, usually I am governed by what's already in and needs using up - and now an organic veg box ( i have gone up in the world :rolleyes:)
But this week we are eating recipes from Jamie's Italy after DS aged 6 saw his prog on tv and was impressed. The spaghetti fritters went down a treat, and I had the usual applause for the minestrone

Other weeks have been Nigella's how to eat, Norah's dinners, French Leave and the Madhur jaffrey book. It is quite fun, and this week has been really cheap too

All I do is pick a book (have quite a few, used to read about food rather than eat it, I knew how to do complicated meat dishes whilst i was still a veggie) then work my way through til I find a recipe I like or have storecupboard ingredients to enable me to make it.
Tuna 'meatballs' tomorrow night

thriftlady_2 · 3 August 2006 at 12:45PM

I cook this way quite often too. The only thing is, I tend to improve the recipe as I go along;) Mind you, I think I can do this successfully because I spend so much time reading about food. Recipes become assimilated and you instinctively know when something will work with the ingredients you've got.

My ds1 loves reading cookbooks and often asks if we can make something or other from a book. Often though it needs ingredients we don't have.I am trying to teach him to cook without recipes - ie; looking at what we have in hand and making something delicious, rather than choosing a recipe and going shopping for it.

So, we might have some lamb for instance, we go through the cookbooks looking for lamb recipes.Sometimes there's something we can make exactly, more often than not we 'merge' a couple of recipes. I think this is a useful skill.

rumblytum · 3 August 2006 at 12:57PM

thriftlady wrote:

.I am trying to teach him to cook without recipes - ie; looking at what we have in hand and making something delicious, rather than choosing a recipe and going shopping for it.

So, we might have some lamb for instance, we go through the cookbooks looking for lamb recipes.Sometimes there's something we can make exactly, more often than not we 'merge' a couple of recipes. I think this is a useful skill.

Hi Thriftlady,

I'm interested in your comments above.
I make the same mistake as your DS.
Although I menu plan (since finding this site - thank you all), I menu plan with all my recipes books (or printed recipes from here), and order the ingredients necessary according to the recipes.
So if I'm doing a monthly meal plan, I choose about 20 recipes and order the ingredients accordingly. I only do 20 because that allows for any recipes that are larger quantities than we can eat, or for leftovers.

What I find, however, is that I lack inspiration when I run out of recipes, and don't know what to do with what I've got. I always end up falling back on the frozen mince and doing things with that, rather than using up what's fresh.

How are you teaching the skills for cooking from random ingredients? I didn't learn to cook growing up, and am only acquiring these skills from cooking every meal from a recipe. I don't seem to have this innate skill for looking at things, and knowing what to do with them.

Thanks.

rumbly

Aril · 3 August 2006 at 1:11PM

I do something similar. I borrow one or more new cookery book from the library per month and then aim to try out one new recipe per week [cost/time/enthusiasm permitting] If I like it then I copy it into a notebook I've got before returning the book. I find on average I only ever do 2-3 recipes out of any one book as many are variations on a theme.
Another thing I do when I am eating out [not that frequent occasion these days or if I'm at the supermarket is that I note down any unusual combination of ingredients I like the sound of and then try it out at home. That's how I came to make leek and apple quiche.
Aril

Sarahsaver · 3 August 2006 at 1:18PM

I am like thriftlady, I will adapt things, and have luckily inherited some sort of knack for knowing what to do. Maybe i shouldnt say that cos it can be learnt. Mum and nanna both made cakes and pastry without the need to measure, nanna made fantastic curries done slowly in the oven. The thing I have found especially with Mr Oliver;s book is that the ingredients follow a theme, so I just bought a load of tinned tomatoes and a huge lump of cheese, the rest I had just about everything I needed. In fact I am swapping today with saturday as I cant be bothered with the meatballs. Just had my hair done for the first time in about 5 years so I feel too glamorous to get my hands dirty LOL

DD was interested in risotto though she wouldnt eat it, and a decent risotto only needs 2 main 'flavours', once you know what you like you can use 'random ingredients' in that. Most of my pseudo chinese dishes have 3 main ingredients besides onions, i.e. one green veg, one other plus meat or aubergines, and curries start with frying the spices, the onion and adding the tomatoes (tin) If you give yourself little 'rules' like that it is easier to adapt, as you won't be really doing the whole thing from scratch.
Above all have fun;)

Lucie_2 · 3 August 2006 at 1:22PM

Saturday night is quite often our "recipe book night", when we have more time to shop for the ingredients & prepare the food. Recent favourites have been from the Wagamama cookbook & various Jamie Oliver books feature heavily too (I bought most of them in paperback for about £5 each from Amazon). The book club at OH's work has the new Gordon Ramsay book for a tenner, so I guess we'll be trying that for the next few weeks.
I enjoy doing it as it gets us out of a food rut, you learn new cooking techniques & often try new foods & flavours.

thriftlady_2 · 3 August 2006 at 2:12PM

Hi Rumblytum,

First of all I wouldn't say it is a mistake to choose your recipes and buy for them at all. It's very efficient and moneysaving if you use up all your food.

My ds sometimes looks at a recipe for profiteroles for example and says 'can we make that today? 'So I say,'well, it has eggs in so your sister can't eat it, it has cream in which we haven't got and which your brother doesn't like, and it's not the weekend so we're not having a pud:rotfl:' When he's got over his disappointment(he's just 11 btw) I might say, 'we've got flour, sugar, cocoa, and milk so we could make a choc fudge pudding without having to buy anything else - at the weekend of course'

It might be something as simple as him wanting to make lasagne and us not having lasagne pasta. In which case rather than going out and buying it we'd use penne or fusilli - make the meat sauce, cook the pasta, mix together and top with cheese sauce and bake. Same flavours and he's learnt how to adapt a recipe.

Meat sauce is a great basic recipe to have under your belt. You can use it for chili, bolognese, lasagne, curry if you change the spices, layer it with cheese and potatoes, spread it on pizza, baguettes, dollop it on baked spuds etc etc.
You don't even have to stick rigidly to the basic recipe - use more or less tomatoes depending on the consistency you want, or more or less meat, or use lentils instead of meat, use different meat, leftover meat. Use other veg -peppers, mushrooms, courgettes and so on.

Some kinds of cooking are very adaptable like the meat sauce, but baking requires more strict recipe following. But once you've done a cake a few times you can be pretty adaptable with that too.
We make muffins a lot- never the same way twice. Dd and I made currant muffins last week using all (about 2 handfuls) redcurrants and blackcurrants from our garden.

The key to cooking this way is to have a basic storecupboard list from which you can always make something. I keep my storecupboard well stocked and buy a couple of kinds of fresh meat and fish a week (although I also keep meat in the freezer) plus fresh fruit and veg. I'm very keen on eating local and seasonal produce which is often another objection to my son's menu choices -'apple pie ! not until English apples are back, here have some raspberries from the local farm instead' I want my kids to know what's in season and to realise that some things are worth waiting for.

A great book which teaches you how to cook without a recipe is Nigel Slater's Appetite. It's quite wordy,but if you like reading about food that's not a bad thing. He takes a basic recipe like 'pasta with blue cheese and broccoli', tells you how to cook it, and then suggests other cheeses to substitute for the blue cheese, other veg for the broccoli and other kinds of pasta, he also suggests adding bacon.The book includes info on seasonal food, flavours that work well together and how to plan a menu.I often see it in my local libraries;)

rumblytum · 3 August 2006 at 2:57PM

Hi all,

Thanks for the tips. I'll look out in the library for the Nigel Slater book.

You've got me thinking much more laterally now. For instance, I've just harvested some yellow courgettes from the garden.

So I could make a cauliflower cheese with them?

Saute them with onion, and cover with cheese sauce? Add chopped chicken or ham?

How does that sound - am I getting the hang of it?

Thanks.

rumbly

Sarahsaver · 3 August 2006 at 3:02PM

Precisely! Or call it courgette surprise! Sounds really nice;)

Softstuff · 3 August 2006 at 3:07PM

rumblytum wrote:

Hi all,

Thanks for the tips. I'll look out in the library for the Nigel Slater book.

You've got me thinking much more laterally now. For instance, I've just harvested some yellow courgettes from the garden.

So I could make a cauliflower cheese with them?

Saute them with onion, and cover with cheese sauce? Add chopped chicken or ham?

How does that sound - am I getting the hang of it?

Thanks.

rumbly

I'd say you have got the idea... the basic theme of it is like the old saying "if life give you lemons make lemonade", just use what you have to make the best of it. Though with yellow courgettes I'd be very tempted to slice them, batter them and fry them

I find with a basic tomato meat sauce and a cheese sauce I can make absolutely anything.

thriftlady_2 · 3 August 2006 at 3:57PM

You've definitely got the hang of it Rumbly;) :j

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Recipe book meal planning...

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