[Sca-cooks] Redaction (Was: Some recipes that I have redacted)
Lilinah
lilinah at earthlink.net
Tue Sep 16 14:22:54 PDT 2008
Whether or not i redact a recipe depends on who i'm cooking for.
I successfully cook directly from historical recipes, without testing
or ever having tasted someone else's version. I did this in an "Iron
Chef" style competition (and won), i've done this in classes i've
taught, i do it for potluck dinners at camping events, i do it for
myself.
I try to take notes, because if the dish is successful and i want to
repeat it, it's nice to know what i did; and if it was unsuccessful,
i want to know what i did so i can improve on it.
If i were cooking only the cuisine from a single culture in one time
period, this would be less necessary. But i cook recipes that date
from about 1500 BCE to the mid-17th century CE (that's over 3,000
years), and from Europe and North Africa, to Southwest, South,
Central, and East Asia, so i'm not just dealing with one style.
When cooking a feast i MUST make redactions. When I cook for 60-150
people, i give the recipes to cooks of various skill levels. I CANNOT
give a period recipe to a cook and dependably get a tasty dish for
all the feasters.
I've had experienced cooks in my kitchens and i've had people helping
who have never cooked period food and even one who didn't even cook
much modern food.
Even when working with experienced cooks, i want the recipes to taste
a certain way, so i prefer to use my interpretations, which are
likely to differ from theirs. The exception is when i've had a cook's
version of a dish and already know how it will taste - but this is
infrequent. I'm always one of the cooks even when i'm Head Cook - i
heard somewhere that the Head Cook should just supervise, but i
couldn't be there and not cook. I usually taste the dishes before
they go out, but i'd rather not have to change a dish because of
someone else's interpretation or inexperience.
--
Urtatim (that's err-tah-TEEM)
the persona formerly known as Anahita
My LibraryThing
http://www.librarything.com/catalog/lilinah
More information about the Sca-cooks
mailing list