“I don’t use recipes!” is an annoying brag!

[Lordoftheflyingpan]

AIBU in finding it really annoying and unbearably smug when someone says “I don’t use recipes, I just make up my own”?

It can occur any time the filthy word “recipe” is mentioned, but as an example:
A: This salad is really nice!
B: Thanks, it’s a Jamie Oliver recipe.
A: Oh, I don’t use recipes. I just make it up according to what I like.

I’m aware this is super petty, but if Mumsnet isn’t the place to put petty gripes then I don’t know where is.

YABU - it’s fine! Get over it/yourself.
YANBU - ugh, yes, so smug and annoying.

I have been cooking in restaurants and at home for 40 years. I never use recipes because I was taught how to cook by my two grandmothers, who worked by sight for weight, and chose what to cook on the spot depending on what food they had in the house or what they bought cheap from the market that day. That's what I do. I can make a meal from anything. I am very poor at the moment but we never go without good food.

It's not a brag, it's how to survive poverty and recession.

@Juliauns91

I have been cooking in restaurants and at home for 40 years. I never use recipes because I was taught how to cook by my two grandmothers, who worked by sight for weight, and chose what to cook on the spot depending on what food they had in the house or what they bought cheap from the market that day. That's what I do. I can make a meal from anything. I am very poor at the moment but we never go without good food.

It's not a brag, it's how to survive poverty and recession.

"I can make a meal from anything" sounds like a brag to me.

I'm from an Italian family. We don't use recipes, we just keep adding ingredients until we hear our ancestors scream "Enough!''

Exactly, @Anonymous48 - those “I just look in the fridge” people… where did the stuff come from?!

I agree it can sound smug, and a bit defensive. My dsis fancies herself a fine cook and as that’s her thing she defends her practice by saying the “oh, I don’t use recipes” as a way to prove she is better at cooking.

Slightly off on a tangent but I hate, hate, hate it when people say, My meatballs/brownies/cupcakes etc. as in, “Everyone loves my muffins.” The number of times my whatever have appeared suspiciously similar,at to a Jamie Oliver (why not just say you like a recipe?) or even very mediocre, as they smile smugly at their kitchen island…

Haven't read the whole thread, but I am with the non-recipe users.

However, I will concur that my mother "taught" me to cook, inasmuch as I watched her. But she also didn't use recipes, she was taught by her mother etc etc.

I don't own scales, or any other weighing device, or special spoons, or cups. I do own a measuring jug. That's it. I haven't ever measured anything for a meal, although I use the jug for baking and measuring flour and sugar.

Bragging? I don't think so. I just haven't been brought up to follow a recipe. Perhaps it's a cultural thing, as DM was Italian?

@Herani

I'm from an Italian family. We don't use recipes, we just keep adding ingredients until we hear our ancestors scream "Enough!''

Ha ha ha, so true. I concur.

There are meals I cook without a recipe because I’ve made them so many times I can do it with my eyes closed, but plenty of others where I rely on a recipe.

I love finding new ones to try out, and will tweak a recipe to my palate if the seasonings off but I’m a slave to a recipe honestly - got a whole Pinterest page full of ‘em!

Absolutely shocking baker though, truly truly awful…

My mum taught me how to make great salad dressing, stuffed cabbage rolls in tomato sauce, spanakopita triangles, and a really good asparagus filo strudel. I still have follow a recipe to make mapo tofu or a hyderabadi lamb biriyani or maqloubeh.

My grandmother taught me some of her "recipes" or methods really. It was later tricky to reproduce cake baking as she did do her measuring by eye and so I did consult the basic baking recipes in the Good Housekeeping book.
Day to day cooking of meals was a lot of osmosis really from family (and later friends), and hands on guidance (or yes, shouting that's enough!😂.)

Talking of the “I just look in the fridge…” people, did you know there’s a website/app you can use where you can type in “what can I make with chicken, tomato purée, cream, mackerel (insert ingredient/items of choice) and it’ll spit out a recipe?

I can't believe people are actually saying that they're too disorganised to use a recipe, or they're bad cooks. What's disorganised about buying a load of crap you've never heard of & you'll probably only ever use once? Surely the ones who have to follow a recipe are the bad cooks as they clearly have no ideas of their own. Last time I followed a recipe I was at school.

[quote Xiaoxiong]@SpongebobsPants or the opposite kind of review is equally irritating - you see something that looks fantastic but it's got a one fork review out of 4. You read the review to see if the recipe is really that bad and it says

"I really wanted to like this creamy pasta with chicken and mushrooms but it didn't turn out well. I cut the liquid by half as I don't like things too watery, I'm veggie so replaced the chicken with tofu and the mushrooms with peppers and had half a tin of tomatoes in the fridge so added that, I'm also on a low sodium diet so left out the stock cube and can't add salt and pepper. Pasta was hard and sauce was tasteless. One star, terrible recipe."[/quote]

The comments under online recipes that irk me are the ones that say 'Looks great! Will add this to our rotation next week' but they never come back and say (a) whether they did try it and (b) what it was like. I want to hear from people who tried to follow the recipe so I have confidence it's OK and doesn't leave out crucial steps.

I never use recipes, unless I'm baking and quantities really matter -- but I'm always hugely impressed by people who do. It strikes me as remarkably organised and together, to have all the necessary ingredients, and not ending up making substitutions that mean it's an entirely different dish.

I've just been staying with friends in France, and I left them a load of Guardian food monthlies, and they liked one of the Felicity Cloake recipes, and last night sent me a photo of the (delicious-looking) tart that resulted. I thought that was very impressive.

What's disorganised about buying a load of crap you've never heard

To disorganised to forward plan and think about a recipe. To disorganised to get to a shop.

Anonymous48 Tue 15-Feb-22 12:48:01

Juliauns91

I have been cooking in restaurants and at home for 40 years. I never use recipes because I was taught how to cook by my two grandmothers, who worked by sight for weight, and chose what to cook on the spot depending on what food they had in the house or what they bought cheap from the market that day. That's what I do. I can make a meal from anything. I am very poor at the moment but we never go without good food.

It's not a brag, it's how to survive poverty and recession.

"I can make a meal from anything" sounds like a brag to me.

In the context of the post you are replying to, which I have pasted in above, no, it doesn't. Only someone feeling very defensive about being unable to cook could interpret a statement of fact like this as a brag.

@Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g

Anonymous48 Tue 15-Feb-22 12:48:01

Juliauns91

I have been cooking in restaurants and at home for 40 years. I never use recipes because I was taught how to cook by my two grandmothers, who worked by sight for weight, and chose what to cook on the spot depending on what food they had in the house or what they bought cheap from the market that day. That's what I do. I can make a meal from anything. I am very poor at the moment but we never go without good food.

It's not a brag, it's how to survive poverty and recession.

"I can make a meal from anything" sounds like a brag to me.

In the context of the post you are replying to, which I have pasted in above, no, it doesn't. Only someone feeling very defensive about being unable to cook could interpret a statement of fact like this as a brag.

We'll have to agree to disagree. I'm a confident cook but it came across as bragging. It might not have been intended that way.

Most people I know who say this in a kind of sneery way tend to make lots of the same British food every week. Like Cottage pie, spaghetti bolognese, fish pie, roast dinners etc are all pretty basic and don't require recipes

@TheHaka

I can't believe people are actually saying that they're too disorganised to use a recipe, or they're bad cooks. What's disorganised about buying a load of crap you've never heard of & you'll probably only ever use once? Surely the ones who have to follow a recipe are the bad cooks as they clearly have no ideas of their own. Last time I followed a recipe I was at school.

I think you have just proved the OP's point.

I look up recipes for ideas but my kitchen is tiny with very limited storage. I simply don't have the space to be storing jars of star anise that I use once

@motherofgorgons
I'm exactly the same. It's not bragging it's just the way we were taught. If I had to share then I'll be able to tell you how to make it. It's just not a written recipe as such.

As an autistic person, I struggle to follow recipes. Even when I'm cooking something new, I usually get as far as the combination of ingredients to be used and kind of freestyle from there. It usually works out. Following a long, complicated recipe, with an unfamiliar technique, requires a LOT of attention. I still remember the dosa episode...that was taxing 😬.

I'm laughing at all the "My mum never follows recipes!" posters... last time I offered to make pudding at my parents', I fell out with my mum because I refused to use a recipe when making crumble. Crumble, FFS .

I'm going to sit on the fence here by saying that I can generally look at what is in the fridge and make things up (which happens a lot more towards the end of the week) but I also use recipes from time to time to expand my repertoire, learn more or shake things up a bit and to make sure I'm not stuck in a rut.

I'd be wary of anyone who thinks they know all there is to know about food and cooking, or indeed growing food/ornamental plants. Two areas where there is always something to learn.

This thread is funny!
So many people saying 'oh I don't need to follow a recipe to make bolognaise / lasagne or whatever because I've been making it forever seem to be failing to see that you ARE broadly following a recipe, even if it's one long committed to memory.

Same with people cooking dishes from their cultural background - you're ALSO following a 'recipe' otherwise how would one pasta dish or curry dish be differentiated from another? If everyone just chucked everything and anything into every dish we'd all be eating some sort of homogenous smush

But you set out to make 'lasagne' so you have an understanding of the elements that make a dish a lasagne - layers of different sauces interleaved with sheets of pasta. You can tweak this in a million different ways but the 'core' recipe is lasagne. If you put all the same components into a big pot and cooked on the hob, it's no longer lasagne. or if you deep fried all the same ingredients, it's no longer a lasagne etc

Meaning even if you have not opened a book or a website to make it, you are still following a semblance of a recipe.

@Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g

Anonymous48 Tue 15-Feb-22 12:48:01

Juliauns91

I have been cooking in restaurants and at home for 40 years. I never use recipes because I was taught how to cook by my two grandmothers, who worked by sight for weight, and chose what to cook on the spot depending on what food they had in the house or what they bought cheap from the market that day. That's what I do. I can make a meal from anything. I am very poor at the moment but we never go without good food.

It's not a brag, it's how to survive poverty and recession.

"I can make a meal from anything" sounds like a brag to me.

In the context of the post you are replying to, which I have pasted in above, no, it doesn't. Only someone feeling very defensive about being unable to cook could interpret a statement of fact like this as a brag.

Thank you.

What I find really confusing is someone who only cooks from recipes so they're clueless about changing things around and rigidly stick to the written details.
Tbh it's not something I worry about, it doesn't effect me in any way and doesn't change the way I do things.