I shared this tweet before, but the post was more about life than cooking:

I’m not a big fan of cooking, but I have certain recipes that I do quite well. One of them is a stir fry. Last night’s was really good! I’m not just saying that because I enjoyed it, both my wife and daughter complimented it, and my daughter said, “I have to slow down so I can enjoy this longer.”

I didn’t use a recipe as my baseline. I didn’t measure anything. I just added things that I thought should go together. I cooked the peppers, red onion, carrots, and beans longer than the broccoli, which I cooked longer than the green onions and cilantro. I added way more sesame oil than any recipe I’ve ever followed, and way less soy. And I added a whole lot of garlic powder. This no-recipe-as-a-base approach doesn’t always work, but my stir fry always does.

One of my favourite things to do is to start with a recipe then go on a tangent. This is a lot less risky than flying by the seat of my pants, and it makes cooking fun for me. A couple days ago we made tacos, and when I went to the fridge for salsa I saw sweet chili pepper sauce and decided to try it instead… Absolutely delicious!

I don’t like easy puzzles, and to me a recipe is an easy puzzle… I like to spice things up a bit, and I’m usually glad I did.