*ahem*
DISASTER!
I’m an awful cook.. I can’t follow a step-by-step recipe 🙁
Normally, I just cook my own way.. and chuck in whatever I want that’s available, and it turns out fine. Today, I decided to follow a recipe for once, and follow it exactly, and it was HORRIFIC!!! The recipe came from some magazine, New Idea or Womans Day or something – it was for Salmon & Potato Cakes. Thought it sounded quite fun to make, so decided to give it a spin tonight.
Urk.
I mashed up the cooked potatos and stirred salmon and butter in as dictated. It was all slushy and I was supposed to roll it in breadcrumbs. Ended up so slushy and wet that I had to slop it into the pan to cook! And the sauce? Whisk egg yolk and lemon juice, then add olive oil. It tasted like… battery acid or something. Totally inedible and had to scrape all the sauce off the cakes 🙁
Fortunately though, the salmon & potato cakes weren’t too bad. They were quite nice as I used chilli salmon, so it gave it a bit of a kick. Still a bit slushy, but edible and quite tasty. All in all, that recipe is SCREWED UP! They must have gotten their measurements wrong or they’re just a dodgy magazine with inedible dodgy recipes. Ugh. Will never get recipes from those kind of trashy gossip mags ever again.
Salmon & Potato Cakes, served with beans and carrots
I always find recipes from smaller weekly magazines to be a bit hit and miss. The one and only time I have made an awful cake I was following the recipe that was in a magazine that comes free with the saturday express newspaper. Since it is endorsed by a celebrity chef and I followed the recipe to a t I assumed it would be fine. Not so, they didnt give the right measurement of batter for the pan they said to use so my cake was like a frisbee! It was also far too dry and cloying so I am sticking to delia smith and other tried and tested recipe books!
I tried those rice balls btw, yum, I like that nobody in my family likes peanut so I get to scoff the lot myself!
I don’t think I’ll be using those recipes anymore! A pity, as the photo they included made it look so nice.. Quite annoying they can get away with dodgy recipes :X
Those balls are nice hey! I still have some stuffed in the freezer 😛
On the pictures it looks good ! Usually when I cook I follow my mom’s recipes which have been tested for a long time haha but most of the time when I try new recipes the first time’s always a bit… surprising !
Haha yeah so true! It makes me wonder if they REALLY used the recipe to make it.. and also what it tastes like 😛
I always find recipes from smaller weekly magazines to be a bit hit and miss. The one and only time I have made an awful cake I was following the recipe that was in a magazine that comes free with the saturday express newspaper. Since it is endorsed by a celebrity chef and I followed the recipe to a t I assumed it would be fine. Not so, they didnt give the right measurement of batter for the pan they said to use so my cake was like a frisbee! It was also far too dry and cloying so I am sticking to delia smith and other tried and tested recipe books!
I tried those rice balls btw, yum, I like that nobody in my family likes peanut so I get to scoff the lot myself!
I don’t think I’ll be using those recipes anymore! A pity, as the photo they included made it look so nice.. Quite annoying they can get away with dodgy recipes :X
Those balls are nice hey! I still have some stuffed in the freezer 😛
On the pictures it looks good ! Usually when I cook I follow my mom’s recipes which have been tested for a long time haha but most of the time when I try new recipes the first time’s always a bit… surprising !
Haha yeah so true! It makes me wonder if they REALLY used the recipe to make it.. and also what it tastes like 😛
Wow! That actually looks pretty good! 😀
Haha, it was friggin awful
I usually let Google decide the recipe I’ll follow. I search for what I want to cook, along with “recipe”, and take the top result. I figure that if the recipe is #1 on Google, it must be decent.
I also really, really like this site. Especially the sideways-tree representation at the bottom of each recipe.
I love that Cooking for Engineers site too!
Cool link!
I’m off to surf it some more 🙂
I’m like you in this sense. I had a couple of disaster dishes while following seemingly simple recipes. And when i cook my own way, they usually turn out quite good. It’s odd.
It’s a bit strange! I feel that sometimes recipes in random magazines just plonk them there without really finding out if the recipes work :X
Wow! That actually looks pretty good! 😀
Haha, it was friggin awful
Sorry to hear that the dinner didn’t go too well. For the salmon and potato cakes, the mixture shouldn’t be slushy. Once you’ve incorporated everything, you should be able to pick up a handful and then form it into a pattie. So if it’s too wet, maybe you should have added some breadcrumbs into the mixture to dry it up a little. I make these quite often but I’ve never put any butter into the mixture, so maybe that’s why yours was slushy?
I normally mash some potatoes, add in the flaked salmon, some finely chopped sauteed onion, an egg to bind the mixture, then season with salt/pepper/herbs. Form them into patties then dip them into breadcrumbs and pan fry them.
As for the sauce, sounds like Aioli to me. No idea why it taste so horrid but one possible reason could be because you incorporated the olive oil into the egg yolk too fast? I think the oil has to be added very very slowly in a thin stream. It’s not an easy sauce to make, maybe find other recipes and try again.
Hope this helps a little!
It was such a disaster.. I’m totally over making salmon cakes now, haha
Yeah, it was meant to be aioli but urk, something went wrong there.. maybe i whisked it too much 😉 Doh!
I usually let Google decide the recipe I’ll follow. I search for what I want to cook, along with “recipe”, and take the top result. I figure that if the recipe is #1 on Google, it must be decent.
I also really, really like this site. Especially the sideways-tree representation at the bottom of each recipe.
I love that Cooking for Engineers site too!
Cool link!
I’m off to surf it some more 🙂
I’m like you in this sense. I had a couple of disaster dishes while following seemingly simple recipes. And when i cook my own way, they usually turn out quite good. It’s odd.
It’s a bit strange! I feel that sometimes recipes in random magazines just plonk them there without really finding out if the recipes work :X
Sorry to hear that the dinner didn’t go too well. For the salmon and potato cakes, the mixture shouldn’t be slushy. Once you’ve incorporated everything, you should be able to pick up a handful and then form it into a pattie. So if it’s too wet, maybe you should have added some breadcrumbs into the mixture to dry it up a little. I make these quite often but I’ve never put any butter into the mixture, so maybe that’s why yours was slushy?
I normally mash some potatoes, add in the flaked salmon, some finely chopped sauteed onion, an egg to bind the mixture, then season with salt/pepper/herbs. Form them into patties then dip them into breadcrumbs and pan fry them.
As for the sauce, sounds like Aioli to me. No idea why it taste so horrid but one possible reason could be because you incorporated the olive oil into the egg yolk too fast? I think the oil has to be added very very slowly in a thin stream. It’s not an easy sauce to make, maybe find other recipes and try again.
Hope this helps a little!
It was such a disaster.. I’m totally over making salmon cakes now, haha
Yeah, it was meant to be aioli but urk, something went wrong there.. maybe i whisked it too much 😉 Doh!