10 Tips on How to Tweak a Recipe

Most Recent Lesson (#6): Don't Add Salt
To Only a Few Ingredients

Derived by Robin via Trial & Error

Ever made a recipe that seemed so right but went so wrong? Even when you followed the directions to the letter? Let’s face it, some recipes are just not that well written. They leave too much to the imagination. Or sometimes the recipe writer’s taste just isn’t the same as ours, even if s/he is featured on The Food Channel or has written a classic cookbook. Can this recipe be saved, and if so, how? Take heart. As well known coach and writer Dianne Jacob discloses in her book Will Write for Food, recipe development is an art, an exercise in non-linear thinking. Here are a few tips for reinventing an almost-good recipe—as a masterpiece.

Applesauce Oatmeal Muffins

Healthful Alternative

Recipe by Robin

Muffins aren’t what they used to be. These days they’re supersized, and available almost anywhere. But what commercially produced muffins have gained in size they’ve lost in nutrition. Even muffins produced without preservatives or hydrogenated fats are loaded with sugar and enough excess oil to stain your napkin and coat your fingertips. Whole grains have been replaced with refined flour. Artificial color and flavor are not unusual. Plus, they’re expensive. Let’s get back to basics with a low fat fall harvest muffin that’s full of whole grain goodness along with the natural moistness of no-sugar applesauce!

Shrimp Stir Fry with Zucchini and Tomatoes

Shrimp with Seasonal Veggies

Recipe adapted from Weight Watchers

Shrimp! So delicious and healthful, and so confusing to buy sustainably. The Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch website identifies 13 different categories for shrimp harvests, varying in country of origin and fishing method. Plus there are several species in each category. Sometimes a species can have several common names, and sometimes you’ll find a common name at the store that’s not on the list at all. What’s a consumer who’s concerned about eating shrimp sustainably to do?

Caprese Salad with Herbed Lime Vinaigrette

Before Adding Dressing

Recipe by Robin

With a wealth of tomatoes and basil still growing in my garden, a Caprese salad seems like a natural, except for one thing. I’m obsessive about fresh mozzarella cheese. I can barely contain my desire to eat whatever quantity comes into my house once the wrapper is open. Is it the mild taste, the texture, the way it combines with other foods? (Not the latter, since I happily enjoy it sans accompaniment.) Luckily, I discovered a sealed container of fresh mozzarella balls packed in water at the local natural foods store. The 8 oz. size is perfect for this salad, with no chopping (and sneaking bites) required. And just in time for late tomatoes and basil. The success of this salad depends upon the freshness of all 3 of these ingredients.

Apple Crisp

Traditional and Updated Crisps

Recipe by Mom, Fannie Farmer, and Robin

Of all the seasons, autumn makes me most nostalgic for my mother. It’s the season she died, and also the season in which she seemed most alive. She loved the variety of New England seasons, but the crispness of fall days invigorated her and inspired her to activity. When I was young, she’d take my sister and I to local farms for apples and fresh-pressed cider. We’d visit the farm animals and perhaps pick out a few pumpkins or some Indian corn to decorate at home. Once she bought us tiny woven cornucopias filled with mini candies. My memories of those times are surrounded with the golden glow of October sun in an unbelievably deep blue sky.

DIY Prunes from Plums

Prune Plums After

Method by Robin

In autumn, a young woman’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of…prunes? OK, I made that up. Since I’m no longer a young woman, how would I know? But a middle aged woman who spies the last of the season’s prune plums at her favorite natural foods store…that I can speak to. Prunes make are a naturally sweet snack that’s a fun way to enjoy fruit in winter. Don’t believe me? How about if they’re preserved in brandy afterwards? Dipped in chocolate? But I digress…

October Veggies and Recipes

Autumn Rose

Golden Light, Bright Leaves, and Bountiful Harvest

October is a beautiful month, no matter where you go in the US.  The weather can be balmy or crisp, but seldom excruciatingly cold or hot (except in Hawaii if the trade winds die). It’s the perfect time to travel, even if it’s just for day trips around your home county. The month often starts out with a short heat wave, like yesterday when it was 97 degrees in Santa Cruz county. And even more often there’s a cold snap towards the end of the month, where all of a sudden windows need to be closed at night and quilts and coats make their annual reappearance. If you look around, you can catch a bit of fall color no matter where you are, as deciduous trees and garden plants change their hues in preparation for winter. Marigolds, chrysanthemums, and pumpkins brighten doorsteps in a final blaze of glory before the snow (or rain) flies.

Dehydrator Dried Tomatoes

Dried Heirlooms & Super Bushes

Method from Excalibur and TomatoDirt

Tomatoes! Here in the Santa Cruz mountains, we still have them ripening like crazy in the garden. I’ve made baked tomato sauce and slow cooker tomato sauce, which I’ve frozen for a rainy (January) day. Bruce made raw tomato sauce and I experimented with baked tomatoes and even candied tomatoes. We’ve had herbed tomato soup, fresh tomatoes with basil and balsamic, chili spiced Romanesco cauliflower, turkey Hungarian goulash, squash with fresh tomato sauce, and more tomato/veggie/pasta dishes and salads than we can count. Freezer is filling up. What’s next? Dried tomatoes!

Slow Cooker Tomato Sauce

Pasta Alternative: Cooked Chicken and Kale

Recipe created from Conversation at Farmers’ Market

I love men who can cook and like to do so. It’s especially heartening to see young men experimenting with their own recipes and talking about them. Such was the case at the farmers’ market a few weeks back when a handsome young tomato vendor told me how he’d cook the discounted sauce tomatoes he was selling. Yes, I know it was a sales pitch. And it would have worked if I didn’t have 5 lbs. of tomatoes at home already. It almost worked anyway.

Harvest Vegetable Chowder

Instant Love!

Recipe adapted from Healing Foods

Welcome to Fall! Sometimes we need a bit of comfort food to ground ourselves. Perhaps we’ve been betrayed by a trusted friend, perhaps we feel alone in our world, perhaps we’re just stressed and need some nurturing…and perhaps I’m just projecting. Perhaps the change of season has left us a little blue. In any case, comfort food doesn’t really help if it’s filled with unhealthy ingredients. That’s not taking best care of ourselves. So I present a milk-based vegetarian chowder filled with comforting whole ingredients like corn, potatoes, and winter squash. Worked for me, and hope it does for you too.