(Can you hear the sarcasm dripping off that header?)
Reading Kristina's post this morning (catch it here - if you don't follow her yet - what are you waiting for!) made my hackles rise. Calcium water? Really? One of my pet peeves (and as I get older, I am getting way more peevish) are recipes that include very, very, special, nay - precious - ingredients. Those ingredients that a) most of us do not have access to and, even if we did, would not pay a gazillion dollars an ounce for something that we'd use once. You know, like the salt craze. There is nothing more frustrating than finding a promising recipe, reading through it and finding it littered with "I prefer-s". All those recipes that include even one "I prefer" are immediately chucked in the trash on this homestead. "I prefer Dromedary Salt, made from the dried tears of nomadic Saharan camels..."; "I prefer rice threshed against the wrinkled knees of African elephants raised on horseradish". Know what I mean? If it means that much to these folks to be On The Cutting Edge of Cuisine, well, bless their hearts. But keep your recipes targeted in that tiny bulls-eye of the one percent who are desperate to be there with you and have most of the money. Quit tormenting the rest of us. Instead, why not come up with some really interesting new combinations of normal ingredients? Hmmm?
Can you tell I haven't had my quota of coffee yet?
26 comments:
Or . . . you have had your quota of coffee and are now your delightful, chippy, take-none-of-this-nonsense, ever-lovin' self!
I'm with you all the way on this, girl. Let's face it. These uncommon, unrealistic, un-needed (!) ingredients are all done in an effort to present something new and different and bring praises of glory upon those writing food columns or blogs. Those recipes go right into the wastebasket here, too.
Rats, my secret is out! It doesn't make a whit of difference whether I've had enough coffee to make me cranky...although, I wouldn't want to be around me before cup #1....
ha ha ha ha ha! Loved reading this today. I totally agree with those oh-so-special ingredients.
With you all the way !
Gill
Great post Susan, I feel the same way! All these trendy products that come and go, at one point all I saw was "truffle oil" in so many recipes, made me batty.
HAHAHA, I once made a recipe by Martha Stewart, NEVER AGAIN !!!!! What are some people thinking, that we have all day to get them "special" ingredients ??? If I can remember that I put in each batch, I would be happy. So far no one complains much, since I hand whoever is complaining the spatula and say, GO AT IT !!!!!
"I prefer Dromedary Salt, made from the dried tears of nomadic Saharan camels..."; "I prefer rice threshed against the wrinkled knees of African elephants raised on horseradish". BRILLIANT AND SO ACCURATE! I hate those kinds of recipes too.
I've often wondered if people are REALLY that "in-the-know" that they can tell one damn salt from another in a recipe!?!?!
Plain stuff for me. All this froo froo in cookery is for twits. Give dear hubby meat and potatoes and cut the fluff!
LOL...great post. As soon as I see an odd ingredient in recipes, I find another. Ain't nobody got time for that!! Dromedary salt...hahaaa
teehee. and here i am totally stocked up on wild plantain, wild strawberries, wild lambsquarters, wild raspberries, blueberries, cranberries, cultured wild apples from a friend's farm....let's not even mention i grow wild sorrel and bitter vetch. sometimes for fun i like to add a sprig of pea shoots to our meals - bahahahahahah!
i hate crazy ingredients. but am now growing my own kombucha scoby and have successfully made kombucha. then there's the fact that we eat wild seaweed from the ocean.
jeesh louise...it seems i must be a libtard and/or a foodie. or heaven forbid - BOTH!
(oh just as an aside - i love reading foodie blogs. they say you need at least one good belly laugh a day and reading foodie blogs provides me with plenty!!!)
my favourite recipes are those that come from trusted sources and don't have any fancy ingredients...at least fancy for me. i learned how to make watermelon and pomegranate molasses. still don't know how to properly use them...but when i make a particular something, i ask myself "would this go with this"? and then i try it out. turns out there is a lot of stuff...like ground sumac...delicious in all kinds of things...that may sound "fancy"...but the stuff grows everywhere!
so i am a big fan of fancy ingredients...as long as i have access to them. calcium water? never heard of it. and will not look it up to find out what it is. deal?
sending love. thanks for all of your supportive comments. i really like you and the way that you do things. and i learn a lot from you.
your friend,
kymber
Funny!
I couldn't help myself, I had to find out what calcium water is & why it's used. If one is diabetic it would be helpful. But I like regular food & some of the foods that Kymber makes that I think are 'regular'. Susan I adore your sense of humor.
Sandy
Yeah, that calcium water really got to me! Thank goodness for Google!
Hurray for us!
Rain, as much as I really do like truffle oil (having once lived in NYC and had access to it - and no farm, so a lot more available money...) it is as rare as hens' teeth where I live now. And as expensive.
You have a marvelous attitude! Go at it, indeed!!!
No offense to camels or African elephants - although they are not the ones benefiting from the profits, I bet. If those were, indeed, products.
You, my dear, are an exception, seeing that you live in Paradise with all kinds of wonderful and exotic ingredients right outside of your door! Plus you are the Queen of Combinations! xoxoxo
I will go through Hell and High Water to make something that really speaks to me - but not with exotic and rare and precious ingredients. I know that anything is now available through Amazon.com, but that rankles - creating that giant carbon footprint. And don't get me started on the looming threat of Amazon.com taking over our world.
Exactly!
Thanks... :)
Thanks, Sandy. I agree that Kymber has the ability to make the exotic out of the everyday. Her food presentation is enough to turn me into Pavlov's dog.
I have always just wrote down the simplified ingredient and used the brand/version I have on hand. I haven't died yet.
P.S. Thanks for the comment on my blog and I left the recipe for you in the comments section of that post with just the generic ingredients listed... and that was before I came over and read this post!
Thanks, Ed! I will go over and copy it down.
Sweetie, your heart blessing is on the spot!! You'd think you were raised in the South.
"Normal" ingredients! LOL Trouble is, what's normal for some of us is weird for others! I'm with Ed, I always, always end up adapting it anyway.
Post a Comment