Escape From Recipeville

I’ve always been a strict recipe follower. Maybe it’s because I’m a dietitian (amounts of butter and sour cream matter) or because I’m pretty Type A. But I’ve never understood how some folks can just go forth and make a dish without knowing exactly what they’re going to put in it. Those people have always seemed like artists to me—able to riff on tradition and follow an innate culinary compass to greatness. I, on the other hand, have always felt like a chemist—if I didn’t add the correct amounts of compound A and B, my results would be less than satisfying. Plus, since my kitchen time is limited by a busy schedule (whose isn’t?), I believe it should be productive, and I don’t want to end up with a concoction that no one wants to eat. I’m happy to announce that I’ve finally left the land of the chemistry geeks and I’m flirting with the cool kids.

Last month, when it finally got chilly here in Birmingham, I decided to make a hearty soup. I also decided that it was high time I traded the comfort of my favorite cookbooks for a bit of creativity. My husband, Jon, and I went to Whole Foods Market to cruise the produce aisles. He tried to pass me a sweet potato, I told him I prefer butternut squash. When he gave me that “Why do you always have to get your way?” look, I shrugged and said, “We’ll use both.” Then I picked up a couple of parsnips to add some sweetness and depth. I grabbed a bunch of kale; I hardly ever use it, but it’s so darn tasty and good for you, and soup is the perfect arena to soften its roughness. Inspired, I went to the canned aisle and picked up some black-eyed peas, which I’ve never used before, and organic chicken broth. And knowing that Jon wouldn’t truly enjoy the soup unless it had some meat in it, I threw a package of smoked chicken sausage into the cart.

Usually when I embark on any dish, I search MyRecipes.com for the type of dish and the ingredient I want to focus on, like “butternut squash soup,” and follow the recipe that most closely matches my desired results. But this time I was determined to totally wing it.

I knew that I could roast root vegetables, tubers (sweet potatoes), and squash at the same temperature for the same amount of time because they were all about the same degree of toughness. And from editing so many recipes for work, I was sure I could cook them for about 40-45 minutes at 400°F to get them tender. Yes, I could have just diced the veggies and added them to the broth to cook. But roasting them would bring out their sweetness by caramelizing the sugars and would probably make the soup taste even better. Plus, you can move on to the other steps, like chopping the onion and slicing the sausage (or kicking back with a glass of pinot), while the vegetables are roasting. Another tip: If you decide to experiment with something you haven’t tried before, like rutabaga, just roast it in a separate dish. Give it a taste once it’s cooked and see if you want to add it to the mix.

Anyway, the soup was darn fantastic. Jon—a reluctant vegetable eater—confessed that if I want to get him to eat more veggies, this was the way to do it. The following weekend, I adapted the recipe for some friends who have their hands full with a new baby and hadn’t had a decent meal in weeks. Since Karen’s a vegetarian—which previously would have made me entirely rethink what to make—I simply substituted vegetable broth for chicken broth and left the sausage out. I felt so confident in the base recipe, I knew that it would be flavorful enough without any meat products.

The beauty of cooking regularly is that you learn techniques you can apply to multiple ingredients and recipes. I’ll be making the soup without a recipe in hand again, for my mother—the ultimate critic. But since I’m not totally reformed, I will have a printed-out prep plan for the rest of the meal, which centers on rack of lamb. That’s just something I can’t leave to chance quite yet.