What should I do when a recipe is vague or confusing?

Recipes are written by people who know what the dish looks like at each stage. The vagueness is not laziness so much as shorthand. Once you know what each phrase is pointing at, most recipes become considerably easier to follow.

What you'll need

• Thermometer (optional)
• Digital scales (optional)

Step by step

1. Read the whole recipe before starting anything.Most confusion comes from discovering step 6 needed something prepared at step 1. Two minutes of reading prevents it.
2. Translate heat descriptions into what you can see and hear.Low: barely any movement. Medium: steady gentle sizzle. High: aggressive sizzling, oil shimmering. Hob dials vary far too much to be meaningful.
3. Treat times as estimates and the described appearance as the real instruction.'Fry for 5 minutes until softened' means until softened. Your pan, hob and quantities are not the author's.
4. Interpret 'season to taste' as an iterative process.Add a small pinch of salt, stir, wait, taste. Repeat until the dish tastes present rather than flat. Never a single large addition.
5. Convert vague volumes to weights where precision matters.Baking especially. 'A cup of flour' varies by up to 20% depending on how it is packed; 120g does not.
6. Assume medium-sized and room-temperature unless told otherwise.Eggs, onions, potatoes. Most recipes are written around medium-sized ingredients.
7. When two instructions conflict, follow the one describing the result.If it says 25 minutes but also 'until a skewer comes out clean', the skewer is the real test.

Tips

• Write your own notes on recipes you repeat — actual times on your hob, adjustments you made. Second attempts become far more reliable.
• If a recipe gives no quantity for salt, work to roughly 1% of the food's weight for soups and stews as a starting point.
• A recipe that omits a pan size for baking is a warning sign. Tin dimensions change cooking time enormously.

Common mistakes

• Following times rather than watching the food — Hobs, ovens, pans and quantities all differ. The described appearance is the reliable instruction.
• Adding all the seasoning at once because the recipe listed an amount — Ingredients vary in salt content. Add most of it, taste, then finish.
• Starting to cook before reading the whole method — This is how you find out the butter needed softening an hour ago.

Questions people ask