Don’t Cheat!

I was (shamefully hanging head) watching The Next Food Network Star. They harp continually on the contestants for not having a culinary point of view. I don’t understand the need for one, though I suppose for a show it is important. So I got to thinking about what mine would be. I thought back on my recent culinary adventures: Baguettes from scratch (which are finally good enough to post about, soon), soup dumplings fully by hand. And I realized what mine is: Don’t Cheat! From the most basic recipe–I can make a mean papardelle pasta with shaved parmesan that tastes like freaking heaven in ten minutes from scratch–to the most complicated, do it all. Don’t use premade sauces, don’t use short cuts (unless they are good ones, where you still get everything done–freezing your homemade stock in ice cube trays, for example). I guess you could say it is the anti-Rachel/Sandra tactic, though I think Anthony already holds that title. But seriously, my basic idea is that you have to choose a recipe that fits your time period, not try to fit the recipe into your given time period.