The Art of Reading Recipes

Since our business is food, we spend a lot of time reading, creating, and testing recipes. One of the exciting things about food delivery is that you can sometimes end up with produce that you don't know what to do with--and that's where we come in. We have a wealth of recipes on our blog, from simple to truly complex, that are designed to keep you cooking, and to walk you through how to fall in love with fruits and vegetables you didn't even know existed. But in order to use those recipes well, you have to understand that the recipe is its own unique form of writing. It seems like it should be straightforward, right? It tells you what to do and you do it. Well, yes--and no.

The recipe, like any other kind of writing, has its own shortcuts and secret handshakes. Here are the tricks that we know that will allow you to make sense of just about any recipe out there--and then make a meal with it.

1. Start at the beginning--and read the recipe all the way through. Every word. There could be hidden or assumed ingredients in the instructions, or maybe you'll learn that the salt needs to be split up over two parts of the meal. A recipe is a map, so make sure you know where you're trying to end up before you start going. Once you know all the ingredients called for, check that you have everything in your kitchen before you start cooking. You may always have sugar around, or you may have just run out--and you don't want to find that out in the middle of baking.

2. Pick a recipe that's going to work for you, for this meal, today. You won't know this until you've read the whole thing through. Things to look for: is there any part of the recipe that needs to be prepped ahead of time (like the day before) and do you have time to do that? Is the serving yield enough or too much for what you need (if too much, split the recipe in half before starting)? Do you have enough time before you need to serve this meal to prepare and cook the entire recipe?

3. Follow the order laid out for you in the ingredients. In general, ingredients are given in the order they will be used, so look to the order for easy clues on what will be combined with what, or which ingredients will be added last.

4. Commas are there for a reason. This is mostly for measuring stuff for baking, but commas are also relevant in the world of exact cooking measurements. What, you may ask, is the difference between "One cup of almonds, chopped" and "One cup of chopped almonds"? The answer is everything. In the first--"one cup of almonds, chopped"--the recipe is telling us to pour whole almonds into a cup measure, ensure we've got one cup there, and then take them out and chop them. In the second--"one cup of chopped almonds"--you first chop your almonds, adding the into your cup measure as you go, until you reach one cup. The amounts end up being very different, so when you're reading a recipe, believe in the power of the comma.

5. The little extras (at least, some of us think they're extras): things like preheating your oven. Is it really necessary? Yes. If the recipe tells you to preheat, then preheat. Especially for baked goods, which need to hit the oven at the right temperature (usually pretty hot) in order to rise properly.

6. But when is it done? The final step of a recipe--taking it out of the oven or off the stove at just the right time--is often the most daunting. Heat can differ widely from oven to oven, so using a recipe's exact time marker (40 to 45 minutes, for example) doesn't always do the trick. It is a good estimation and guide, however; just make sure that you stay nearby and check the oven as it gets close to the allotted time. The best way to know when something's finished? Make it more than once. The more familiar you get with a recipe, the more you can begin to trust your own judgment.

And remember--the recipe is there to help you, not to intimidate you. Have fun with it!