Recipes that don't work. So frustrating!

[losenotloose]

Does this happen to other people? I've followed two recipes recently which have both been disappointing. One was Paul Hollywood's carrot and almond cheesecake (not keen on the texture and fairly bland) and Delia Smith's chocolate mascarpone cheesecake (not as bad as the first one but the description promised a lot. Needed more sugar imo).

So, tell me this happens to you and I'm not just a rubbish cook!

A lot of the recipes in the JO Ministry of Food book contain far too much water - I think there's a bolognaise recipe that says to add two cans of water after the tinned tomatoes. WHich is ridiculous when it's a book that's aimed at inexperienced cooks who might not know that you can boil the fuck out of it to get the water out, but need to keep stirring so it doesn't burn, or just use less in the first place.

AGree about timings for onions and most meat/veg traybakes being optimistically short. Similarly for any pre-prepared frozen potato product I do know this doesn't count as cooking, but I think that's to do with them not being 'allowed' to recommend cooking times that will lead to high levels of acrylamide, or food that is properly cooked, for that matter.

If you want a decent cheese cake add a slosh of Baily’s

For novice cooks (or severely dyslexic ones who can't cope with multitasking) I recommend Jane Hornby, What to Cook and How to Cook It. It has pictures and the instructions say 'keep stirring on a low heat until it looks like this'

Different hobs, ovens and pans make a huge difference. And sizes of chunks. I grew up with the mantra that potatoes took 15 minutes to boil, carrots eleven. So we saved in washing up by adding carrots after 4 minutes.

Housemate tried this and complained. I pointed out his spuds were four times the size I cut mine to, and he hadn't started with boiling water.

My chopped onions go transparent in about 5 minutes, no problem. Big chunks wouldn't. I usually use frozen onions which adds a couple minutes back on.

I've given up with recipe books mostly and tend to invent or adapt my own recipes. I do have quite a collection of vintage/antique recipe books and have never had a bad one from those.

I do really rate some blogs for recipes too, I made gluten free salted caramel cupcakes from a recipe I found on a blog and nearly collapsed in shock at how amazing they were. My non-coeliac best friend loved them, they were as close to "normal" cupcakes as I've ever eaten in thirty years of having coeliac disease. Shame they didn't last long

I’ve learnt now that if I see a recipe and think that it won’t work - it generally doesn’t! And I either don’t make it, or if it’s savoury then I just adjust if it’s a cake, I don’t make it.

Trust your judgement OP

@magimedi forgive the late reply. I have just had a knee replacement operation. I will get my book out later and post the recipe 😊

@bourbonbiccy leave it to simmer a bit longer - so you started with dried chickpeas? Did you soak at least 12 hours and then cook until v soft?

I also keep my own recipe book and write them in as I go back to them.

Yes I soaked them overnight in the fridge, I then boiled for 10mins and proceeded to simmer for about 90mins. I added olive oil and then tried to whizz it up in the Nutri bullet but it just kept going too stiff to blend. So I added more olive oil..no joy. My hubby suggested adding butter (I melted it then added that ) then added water which finally made it into a bit more of a hummus consistency. So a bit of a disaster really. If you have a good method I would love to know it if you have the time too share and don't mind giving your secrets away 😉😉😉

@nilcarborundum

No hurry at all - I have a breadmaker so can do the dough in that bit.

Poor you - knee replacement doesn't sound much fun, but hope it heals well & works well afterwards.

@bourbonbiccy There are some amazing hummus recipes on this thread: Here The trick of whipping up the tahini & lemon first really does work well. And I always add extra water to it.

I use Delia 's cookery course for instruction; it is utterly reliable but was written a long time ago and my taste has changed so I adapt. I would put Mary Berry in the same camp as utterly reliable manual.
I use most cookery books and recipes for ideas only . The issue comes if I am cooking something with unfamiliar ingredients where I have to follow the recipie exactly the first time;this can be a bit disappointing sometimes but I think Meera Sodhi/ felicity cloake and Nigella are exceptions.

Yeah if they kept going stiff, the probably weren't completely cooked through or still al dente. Soaking in cold water in the fridge could be a problem, I usually cover the dried chickpeas with hot water from the kettle and leave on the hob overnight. Also the older your beans the longer you may have to cook them - 90 mins is the absolute lower limit, you have to taste them to see if they're actually soft enough. I have known some to take 3 hours A pressure cooker/instapot will speed this up massively. or just use tinned!

Another tip for hummus is to add some bicarb to the cooking water. It makes them really soft. Google for quantities/timings as its been a while since I made it. You have to keep an eye on them as they can go too soft, but it will hugely reduce cooking time. I've never had success with boiled or tinned chickpeas - too chalky and don't blend well at all.

I also saw someone on here say that chana dhal works well for hummus as it's split chickpeas without the skins. Not tried it myself.

I get annoyed with cooking times that end up taking twice as long.

One thing that confuses me sometimes is the amount of onion a recipe calls for. I followed a recipe using mince, it was a spag bol or something similar. By the time I chopped the onions, there was twice as much as the meat Honestly didn’t want a pan full of onion.

If you’re after a cheesecake, try this:

thatboycancook.com/no-bake-kinder-bueno-cheesecake/

This is the best cheesecake imo, I make with mascarpone cheese. So creamy. Also, instead of crushing up the buenos, I open them and scoop the cream out, as the wafer goes soggy by the time it’s set.

The worst ones are when they say "When the sauce thickens..." I wait and wait. It doesn't. 20 mins later I decide to add a bit of Cornflour in water and still it doesn't work until 10 mins later it is concrete!

Hasn't happend for a while and as I am normally cooking for just me I tend to just chuck things in a pan.

Sometimes though when reading a recipe it just is not clear.

What irritates me more is when watching a cook/chef on tv. They start to do something a bit hard (for me) such as tackling a fish - descaling, gutting/whatever and the camera pans away or is too slow. No wonder Keith Floyd used to to yell at the camera man!!

I was watching Jaimie the other day preparing a fish and the camera was too slow at catching what he was doing to it. I have only tackled a whole fish once - at the Ideal Home exhibition. I was on stage and I think I probably butchered the fish!!

There is a special place in hell for: Add the onions to the pan and after 5 minutes when they have started to caramelise...

Joe Wicks is very bad for this. His duck rendang is really nice but he wants you to put the breasts into the pan when it's hot and in the next breath says that the fat will have rendered! He also wildly underestimates how long it takes for meat to cook through, especially chicken.

grincheux that Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall pie with rice and courgettes works perfectly for me, I think it's a great recipe! I wonder what went wrong for you?

I have followed SO many recipes also to get a duck breast rendered properly with crunchy skin. I've tried hot pans, cold pans, low heat, high heat, cooking skin side down in the on the transferring into to oven to finish. Still end up with a soggy duck skin.

Any tips? Is it my pan? I wondered if chefs use a different sort of pan which helps! (Mine is a bog standard tefal non stick griddle type one). Cast iron the way to go?

Thanks so much @Xiaoxiong. I still have half the packet left from my original disaster on Friday, so will try again and leave them a lot longer and not put them in the fridge this time.

I wouldn't mind it's for my DS (21months old) as I try to stay away from processed foods where possible for him, I don't even bloody like hummus lol

I like Delia's cakes, but not anything else. Paul Hollywood has clearly eaten far, far, far too much salt and it's killed his tastebuds.

I like Diana Henry (though she has a super-sweet tooth IMO), and I agree with a PP that Sabrina Ghayour is very good. DP got me to go to her book signing for her last book, which I wouldn't have thought to do, but it was actually really interesting to hear her explain how she's increasingly got keen on making every recipe with supermarket stuff rather than fancy/niche ingredients and how much she tests it all. She sounded really down to earth and sensible.

My absolute pet hate with recipes is when they tell you to do it in a totally stupid order for no reason. Eg., making a cake, when you diligently follow about 6 steps for sifting flour then beating eggs then chopping apple then creaming butter and sugar, and it's only when you have about 5 bowls precariously perched on the worksurface that you realise you could have just done it all in one if they'd bothered to tell you to cream the butter and sugar, add the eggs, mix in chopped apple, sift the flour over the top, and job's a good'un.

Btw, deathray, there isn't a magic trick to gutting/descaling - they just pan away because it's not very appealing. Descaling you just brush a knife over the skin in the opposite direction to the scales, and they flick off, then you wipe the rest off with a paper towel. Gutting you get a sharp knife, cut down from just below the jaws to the little opening near the tail end, and use the flat of the knife to scrape/pull/occasionally snip or cut all the dark red bits out. If you're fussy you get a pair of sharp scissors and snip out the gills, which are the dark red frilly bits behind the jaws. You can also just cut the head off, though it tastes nicer if you don't.

(Sorry if I am overreaching and you weren't keen for instructions! I'm just evangelical because I know we Brits don't eat enough fish and it's a pity.)

@motheroftinydragons maybe your non-stick pan - I can never get a proper sear on non-stick. Do you have a cast iron pan? I always score the skin while the oven preheats, then put skin side down on a cold cast iron frying pan and turn on the hottest flame you can get on the hob. As the fat renders out it should get the skin crispy. Then flip and finish off in the oven.

Some of the Australian Womens’ weekly ones are inventive and yummy (and I bought some cheap cooking cups to measure ingredients) but I get annoyed that it says “moderate” oven etc. have to look up what deg C that means.

I made some houmous from a recipe on here & it nearly burnt out my food processor motor as it was so dry. That recipe said to keep some of the cooking liquid to thin it out. The result was delicious, but maybe I didn't cook the chick peas long enough - about an hour (something bakery, I'll see if I can find it again).