Unfortunately, cooking is not a superpower that we are born with. It is a skill that needs to be conquered and someone has to teach us it. That someone could be a parent, or other relative, friend, roommate, or neighbor – I learned how to whip up an outing from a boy next door who was in cooking school when I was 12 and still do it, 40 years later, just the way he did it to me. . Certainly, in theory you can also learn to cook from cookbooks or via videos on YouTube or TikTok. But in practice you often do not learn to cook, but to follow recipes.
Marlies Kooiman also experienced that there is a difference between those two things. She enjoyed cooking recipes from others for years, but noticed that without a recipe she still looked despairingly at a broccoli stalk. Why couldn’t she feel anything after all those meals she’d prepared? She once inquired in her environment and discovered that she was not exactly the only one. She then decided to crack the code herself. If no cookbook could teach her to cook freehand, she would write it herself.
Five years later there is Recipe-free cooking, a self-published book in which Kooiman first presents her readers with a thorough amount of theoretical knowledge and then provides them with a parade of recipe ideas. That theory is very clever. For example, she divides the making of one-pot dishes such as soups, risottos, pasta sauces and stews into 7 steps, with each step intended to add flavour: 1) aromas 2) fry 3) deglaze 4) ling on 5) top up 6) sample 7) garnish.
With risotto, for example, it looks like this. You start by frying an onion and/or garlic, celery, dried herbs, spices (the aromas), then fry the rice, deglaze it with wine, then add stock little by little (step 4, ling at). At step 5 (complete) you add separately fried mushrooms or pieces of chicken or roasted vegetables or something. Finish the risotto with butter and Parmesan cheese and taste it to add extra salt and pepper (or cheese, or lemon juice) if needed. The last step consists of garnishing with something fresh (like fresh herbs, lemon zest), crunchy (pine nuts, fried pancetta) or whatever.
Do you want to make a pasta sauce? Same story. Stew? Ditto. Once you’ve internalized these seven steps, call it the building plan of stews, you don’t need any recipes at all. The lists that Kooiman gives are enough for him. Like the list for a red wine risotto with sausage and spinach: 1) onion, carrot, fennel seed, thyme 2) risotto rice 3) red wine 4) chicken stock 5) sausage meat, spinach 6) Parmesan cheese, lemon juice 7) lemon zest. Or this list for an Arabic chicken tagine with apricot: 1) onion, garlic, cardamom, ras el hanout 2) chicken legs 3) red wine vinegar 4) chicken stock, bay leaf 5) fresh tomatoes, dried apricots 6) harissa, lemon 7) yogurt, pistachios. Clever, right?
The only caveat you have Recipe-free cooking could place is its thickness, its almost overwhelming amount of information. It therefore feels a bit like a Teleac course and I wonder if it will appeal to the TikTok generation. Will Marlies Kooiman become that someone from whom they will learn to cook? If, then, that could just create a wealth of confident casual home cooks in the future.
Risotto with asparagus, peas and broad beans
To be in the style of Recipe-free cooking to stay I could give you the following list: 1) olive oil, shallot 2) risotto rice 3) sherry, lemon juice 4) vegetable stock 5) broad beans, peas, green asparagus 6) butter, pecorino, wild garlic, lemon zest 7) egg. But come, you are used to a much more detailed explanation from me, so I’m just going to give it today. However, I would like to emphasize once again that my recipes are rarely if ever cast in concrete. Don’t have dry sherry at home but do have white wine or vermouth? Feel free to replace the sherry. No time to shell broad beans and peas? Use frozen vegetables. Do you dread poaching an egg? It can also be a soft-boiled egg. Or chunks of pecorino, or some crumbled goat cheese. It’s too late for wild garlic anyway – to my surprise I saw it somewhere else – but the green of spring onion makes it delicious too.
for 4 persons:
1 tbsp olive oil;
2 shallots, finely chopped;
320 g risotto rice;
125 ml dry sherry;
juice of ½ lemon + zest of a whole;
1 – 1.4 l hot vegetable stock;
1 bunch of green asparagus;
750 young fava beans, shelled (about 200 g shelled weight);
500 g fresh peas, shelled (about 150 g shelled weight);
4 very fresh eggs;
dash of (natural) vinegar;
30 g of butter;
40 g grated pecorino;
a handful of wild garlic or the green cut into rings of 2 spring onions
heat the olive oil in a heavy bottomed pan and fry the shallots until light blond. Add the rice and let it cook for a while, stirring. Deglaze with sherry and lemon juice.
Joint Now add a splash of hot stock at a time and let the liquid be absorbed by the rice while stirring. Only add new stock when the rice is dry. Continue adding stock until the rice grains are al dente and the risotto flows smoothly through the pan.
cook Meanwhile, the broad beans and peas are just al dente. When they are very young and small (like the beans in the picture) the broad beans only need 4 minutes or so. Larger or older beans maybe 8 minutes and the peas at most 2 – 3 minutes.
Sets also a grill pan on high heat. Remove the bottom, stiff part of the asparagus and roast them for 6-8 minutes until al dente. Cut into diagonal pieces.
Bring Bring a little water to the boil in a wide, low pan. Add a splash of vinegar and turn the heat to low.
break the eggs one at a time over a cup and then slide them quickly into the water. Fold the fanned-out egg white around the yolk using 2 spoons.
After 2.5 to maximum 3 minutes, scoop the eggs out of the water with a slotted spoon and let drain briefly.
Get Remove the risotto from the heat and stir in the butter, pecorino, wild garlic or spring onion and lemon zest. Let stand for 2 minutes, taste and season with freshly ground pepper. Divide the risotto among 4 plates and place a poached egg on each.