I Followed The Directions Exactly Only I Changed Everything

One of my top five favorite websites is epicurious.com.   It holds a database of hundreds of thousands of recipes from cooking magazines and cookbooks and because of that, it has virtually replaced every cookbook I own.  It says something that even my favorites are inconveniently stored in the cabinets above the refrigerator, while my laptop computer sits on the kitchen desk ready to show me dozens of recipes with a couple of clicks.  For a particularly involved project, I take the laptop right to the cutting board and reference it as easily as the old cookbooks that collected stains from heavy use.

Every recipe includes a “review” section where people can go back and comment on the dish after they tried it.  Most people don’t wish to reveal their email addresses, so the website substitutes “cook” and adds a location, so I am a “cook from Syracuse, N.Y.”

Often the reviews go something like this …” I made this for my husband and even though he doesn’t like olives, he asked for seconds!  It’s  a keeper!” Or, “This is a new family favorite.  I didn’t have time to make my own bread crumbs so I used the ones in a box and it came out just fine”.

Occasionally epicurious.com becomes a source of mild comedy for me because some “cooks” make significant substitutions such as …“I made this recipe exactly as described except I added garlic, omitted the cheese and switched the peppers with zucchini from my garden”.

Then the “cooks” are invited to rate each recipe with forks; one fork isn’t so hot, but four forks means it is outstanding.

With millions of recipes to chose from, I often eliminate the ones without at least a three fork rating.  And then, before deciding whether to try it, I read the comments.  Sometimes the advice is consistent such as…“Next time I’ll double the amount of sauce”, or “it was way too salty, like others have suggested, I reduced the salt by half”.

Today I stumbled across a review that was borderline hilarious and annoying. Here are the ingredients for “Modern Macaroni Salad”:

• 2 1/3 cups elbow macaroni (about 10 ounces)

• 2/3 cup mayonnaise
• 1/4 cup Dijon mustard
• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar
• 1 1/3 cups chopped drained bread-and-butter pickles
• 1 1/4 cups chopped celery
• 2 4-ounce jars sliced pimientos, drained
• 1/2 cup thinly sliced green onions

I read through all the favorable comments and came to this one, from a cook from Connecticut:

I made this yesterday and it was good…I did however make some changes …I omitted the sugar and the bread and butter’s and added chopped dills…instead of pimientos I roasted a red pepper …and instead of green onions I used a red onion…I also added dried oregano,thyme,dill& red pepper flakes…also a tad bit of relish…chopped blk. olives and a few chopped sundried tomatoes….and diced green bell pepper….So basically I used this recipe as a base …and a good one it is…just needed a little sprucing up

I’ll say you used this recipe as a base!  By the time you got done with it, it was a completely different recipe!  You might as well have called it something else.

And here’s the punch line.  By the time this person finished tampering with what other reviewers said was a perfectly good way to prepare a modern macaroni salad, she didn’t even give her own creation four forks.  She gave it three.

Tagged as: cooking, recipes