Recipe First Aid, Fixing Seasonings

When a recipe goes awry…. fixing mistakes in the kitchen…

Mistakes happen even to the most experienced chefs but that’s how new recipes get made… Recently I was cooking for a client, who does not eat garlic or onions.

So I explored a new spice combination to enhance the flavor of the dish. I wanted to do something Ethiopian since I was cooking with Teff.

After looking at several recipes in an Ethiopian cookbook, I decided on using a combination of cardamom, cayenne, and fenugreek.

I sautéed the teff in extra virgin coconut oil with the spices.

I got a little over zealous with the cayenne.

Even though I only added a little bit more than usual, or was this cayenne hotter than usual?

However, when the dish was finished, it tasted a little too spicy for me.

Here is how to fix overly spicy dishes. 

Rule number one don’t add salt…that will increase the heat!

You can add fat, something sweet, sour or water.

I decided to add a little more coconut oil, and cinnamon, a sweet spice to cool the heat.

It took a few tries to get the cinnamon just right.

Thank goodness, I didn’t have time to start over!

It came out great and I now can add a new recipe to my repertoire.

This reminds me of another time when I was teaching where the balsamic vinegar had lost its label and a student mistook it for tamari and added it to an Asian vegetable stir fry. Oops!

So how did we fix that? What a wonderful teaching moment! To fix the sourness of the balsamic vinegar we needed to add fat, or something salty or sweet. We added a little maple syrup and tamari, a group of students and I tasted it again. YUM! That dish became one of our favorites at lunch!

I believe all the students actually learned more about cooking in that class. They learned how to fix overzealous seasonings.

And more importantly, they learned how to engage their senses vs. just following a recipe!

Cooking Tips- Recipe First Aid!

How to fix overzealous seasonings

Bring out the best flavor of a dish

Here’s what you can do:

Too spicy – add fat, water, or something sweet or sour…
Such as an oil or a sweet spice like cinnamon

Too Sweet- Add salt, fat or liquid

Too Sour- Add salt, fat, liquid or something sweet

The only thing that can’t be fixed is burnt!

Thanks to Tracey Eller for photos

 

 

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