Ok, maybe not that glorious, but I’ll take what I can get. Food Junta has just secured our first honor for the narrative recipe I submitted to a contest on Marx Foods, a gourmet ingredient purveyor. While I didn’t win the contest (or the two pounds of fresh morels that were first prize), I was a finalist, and they did select my recipe put it up on their page about morels.
I found about the contest through a comment on this blog, and decided to enter just for fun. Reading the entries, I was struck by how elaborate and traditionally written the recipes were. As you all know by now, simplicity is the name of the game for me, but I have also been thinking a lot lately about how recipes are actually written.
I don’t have the patience to write out recipes as lists of ingredients with numbered steps, so I’ve been writing them as narratives with the ingredients interwoven. This is maybe not the best format if you need to make a shopping list, but I’m really becoming convinced that this is a superior way to write recipes. My friend sent me some Thai recipes (coming soon) written this way, and I found them much easier to follow than a “traditional” recipe format.
I’m interested to hear what people think. Has anyone out there tried any of the techniques I’ve described or others written in a similar fashion? How do you like it? Would you prefer steps 1, 2, 3, 4, etc.? Lemme know…
In the meantime, here’s the recipe. Props to my good friend Gordon Jenkins for teaching me this technique. And please excuse the flowery language. I don’t know what got into me.
Mushrooms en Papillote
Make those morels shine with this simple recipe that provides gentle accents to help the flavor of the morels explode:
For each serving, place 1/2 to 1 cup of roughly chopped morels in the center of a square of parchment paper. Dot with bits of HIGH QUALITY butter. Sprinkle with fresh rosemary.
Now fold the parchment square in half over the mushrooms and begin rolling in the open edges tightly to make a small, crescent-shaped envelope. (Think about those pre-packaged apple pies they sell in convenience stores. Shape it like that.) Pop the packets in a 350 degree oven for 20 minutes.
This simple technique allows for really fancy-seeming presentation, as well. Place a packet on each diner’s plate, and let them slice it open. The steam will escape all at once, and they’ll be smacked in the face with buttery, mushroomy awesomeness.
Impressive, simple, and a great way to highlight the flavor of morels.
For the record, your recipe was my personal top pick. If only I was running a junta like you are…I’d be the ruling general and would’ve ordained you the winner. But, alas, we’re a democracy…and I got overruled! Oh well. Thanks for participating and check out our blog on June 2nd for our next contest!
Actually the narrative style is how all recipes came until sometime early in the 20th century. I’d have to go look up my notes, but the current style started with a cookbook from (I believe) the mid 30s. And I’m pretty sure it was put out by a food company, so they wanted you to see the name of their product at the top of each recipe.
As for which I prefer … The only thing I can say for certain is with the narrative style I’m much more likely to read the whole thing ahead of time. The modern style I tend to only read one step ahead. But a good writer will produce a better recipe than a poor writer no matter which format they choose.
With your morel recipe you’ve only got a couple of ingredients and it’s all about the technique. Trying to wedge that into an ingredients-and-numbered-steps format wouldn’t work. But something like a marinade that’s got 10 ingredients and the first step is “combine all wet ingredients in a blender”, trying to do that as a narrative would be painful.
Drew
http://blog.CookLikeYourGrandmother.com