Introduction

Recipes should be viewed as jumping off points. If you don't have, or just don't like, some of the ingredients in a recipe that you see, try to understand what that ingredient is doing in the recipe and find a substitute that can fulfill the same role. Find a recipe a little bland, change it to make the flavor profile closer to what you want.

Lentils

  • 1 medium yellow onion
  • 1 cup dried lentils
  • 2 stalks celery
  • 1 medium carrot
  • 3 cups water
  • 1 ham bone
  • 2 tbsp distilled vinegar
  • 2 tbsp olive oil
  • 1/2 tsp smoked paprika
  • salt to taste
  1. Dice onion into 1cm pieces, and cut carrot and celery into 1/2 cm pieces.
  2. Heat olive oil in saute pan until shimmering. Add onion and a generous pinch of salt. Saute until onion becomes translucent.
  3. Add celery and carrot and continue to cook until onion begins to brown and carrot has started to soften
  4. Add ham bone, water, and lentils and bring to a simmer.
  5. Cover and simmer until lentils have softened, about 30 min.
  6. Remove ham bone, picking any loose pieces of ham off and adding back to the pot.
  7. Add smoked paprika and vinegar. Stir and salt to taste.
For example, consider this recipe for lentils. First understand what each ingredient does for the dish. The single most significant thing in the recipe is that you use about 3 times the water as you do lentils by volume. Beyond that, everything else is changeable.
  • The lentils are the primary protein and body of the dish.
  • The water hydrates and softens the lentils (and everything else)
  • The onion, celery, and carrot are providing a base for a vegetable stock to add richness.
  • The ham bone is providing a meatiness and umami.
  • The olive oil is providing a medium to bring heat to bear on the onion.
  • The smoked paprika is there to provide a smokey flavor.
  • The vinegar is there to brighten up what would otherwise be a very dull and one-note recipe.
  • The salt is there to balance out all of the flavors.

Don't have any olive oil? Well it's primary job is conducting heat, any other oil will also work. To play it safe, use a neutral oil that won't add a lot of other flavor such as canola oil.

Don't have any smoked paprika? You could provide the smokey flavor in other ways. For instance, you could use a smoked tea such as lapsang souchong, you could add liquid smoke, or you could replace the ham bone with a smoked turkey neck.

Don't have any vinegar? No problem, use lemon juice to provide that same acid punch. Just remember, lemon juice is stronger than vinegar so use less.

Want more body to the stock? Add another vegetable, maybe leeks or cabbage. Want more umami, saute some mushrooms in at the start. Not rich enough or sweet enough for you, add some brown sugar at the end. Find the texture to one note, sprinkle dried bread crumbs over the top and toast them with a torch.

Tips for modifying recipes

  • Test anything you're unsure of: Think adding sugar might help the flavor, but worried it might ruin the dish, take a spoonful out and add sugar to that and taste it. If it's a mistake, the dish is still fine.
  • Trust your palate: Taste between each addition so you will have a better idea what else needs to be added.
  • Something missing but you don't know what: Try salt. Unless the dish tastes salty, adding salt is likely to round out the flavors
The possibilities arising from this one simple recipe are endless. The key to be able to cook this way, though, is to become comfortable with how ingredients impart flavors and how flavors combine with each other. This comfort comes with experience.

Gaining this kind of experience with cooking can be difficult. Especially at first, you're afraid you're going to ruin perfectly good ingredients. The truth is, you will. There will be times when you make a mistake that makes what should be a perfectly good dish inedible. If you follow a few basic rules on adjusting flavors (see tips in the box), it is unlikely that you will ruin anything. You may not end up with the dish you had in your head, but only you know what that dish is anyway. You will gain knowledge and experience and, if your cooking for other people, they will probably assume you made exactly what you wanted to.

So, without further ado, let's explore ingredients and flavor together in What are Ingredients? and The Language of Flavor.

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Introduction

Recipes should be viewed as jumping off points. If you don't have, or just don't like, some of the ingredients in a recipe that you see, try to understand what that ingredient is doing in the recipe and find a substitute that can fulfill the same role. Find a recipe a little bland, change it to make the flavor profile closer to what you want.

Lentils

  • 1 medium yellow onion
  • 1 cup dried lentils
  • 2 stalks celery
  • 1 medium carrot
  • 3 cups water
  • 1 ham bone
  • 2 tbsp distilled vinegar
  • 2 tbsp olive oil
  • 1/2 tsp smoked paprika
  • salt to taste
  1. Dice onion into 1cm pieces, and cut carrot and celery into 1/2 cm pieces.
  2. Heat olive oil in saute pan until shimmering. Add onion and a generous pinch of salt. Saute until onion becomes translucent.
  3. Add celery and carrot and continue to cook until onion begins to brown and carrot has started to soften
  4. Add ham bone, water, and lentils and bring to a simmer.
  5. Cover and simmer until lentils have softened, about 30 min.
  6. Remove ham bone, picking any loose pieces of ham off and adding back to the pot.
  7. Add smoked paprika and vinegar. Stir and salt to taste.
For example, consider this recipe for lentils. First understand what each ingredient does for the dish. The single most significant thing in the recipe is that you use about 3 times the water as you do lentils by volume. Beyond that, everything else is changeable.
  • The lentils are the primary protein and body of the dish.
  • The water hydrates and softens the lentils (and everything else)
  • The onion, celery, and carrot are providing a base for a vegetable stock to add richness.
  • The ham bone is providing a meatiness and umami.
  • The olive oil is providing a medium to bring heat to bear on the onion.
  • The smoked paprika is there to provide a smokey flavor.
  • The vinegar is there to brighten up what would otherwise be a very dull and one-note recipe.
  • The salt is there to balance out all of the flavors.

Don't have any olive oil? Well it's primary job is conducting heat, any other oil will also work. To play it safe, use a neutral oil that won't add a lot of other flavor such as canola oil.

Don't have any smoked paprika? You could provide the smokey flavor in other ways. For instance, you could use a smoked tea such as lapsang souchong, you could add liquid smoke, or you could replace the ham bone with a smoked turkey neck.

Don't have any vinegar? No problem, use lemon juice to provide that same acid punch. Just remember, lemon juice is stronger than vinegar so use less.

Want more body to the stock? Add another vegetable, maybe leeks or cabbage. Want more umami, saute some mushrooms in at the start. Not rich enough or sweet enough for you, add some brown sugar at the end. Find the texture to one note, sprinkle dried bread crumbs over the top and toast them with a torch.

Tips for modifying recipes

  • Test anything you're unsure of: Think adding sugar might help the flavor, but worried it might ruin the dish, take a spoonful out and add sugar to that and taste it. If it's a mistake, the dish is still fine.
  • Trust your palate: Taste between each addition so you will have a better idea what else needs to be added.
  • Something missing but you don't know what: Try salt. Unless the dish tastes salty, adding salt is likely to round out the flavors
The possibilities arising from this one simple recipe are endless. The key to be able to cook this way, though, is to become comfortable with how ingredients impart flavors and how flavors combine with each other. This comfort comes with experience.

Gaining this kind of experience with cooking can be difficult. Especially at first, you're afraid you're going to ruin perfectly good ingredients. The truth is, you will. There will be times when you make a mistake that makes what should be a perfectly good dish inedible. If you follow a few basic rules on adjusting flavors (see tips in the box), it is unlikely that you will ruin anything. You may not end up with the dish you had in your head, but only you know what that dish is anyway. You will gain knowledge and experience and, if your cooking for other people, they will probably assume you made exactly what you wanted to.

So, without further ado, let's explore ingredients and flavor together in What are Ingredients? and The Language of Flavor.