What are your ‘by the heart’ baking recipes that you can make with no recipe help?
To start, I’ve made genoise cake for many decades, don’t need to think, just measure and mix.
Same with pastry cream and ganache.
Resulting in this Boston cream pie ‘by heart’.
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Nothing. I have a memory like a sieve. I’ve made bread and pizza and pita a million times, and I still need to make sure I have the proportions right.
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Not even boxed pancake mix!
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Two things come to mind:
Any fruit pie and meat/chicken pot pie. My Aunt taught me pie crust when I got married nearly 40 years ago so I’m solid with that recipe (not when I try a new version or technique). And fruit pie filling and meat/chicken pot pie filling I never measure-total visual/taste as I go prep.
My wife LOVES pie-any type…and now so do I. My Aunt made sure I could bake a pie for my gal.
My niece has started learning pie crust baking recently. We’re having fun playing with flour, butter and she marvels at that fp.
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Pie crust and my basic sourdough boule, focaccia and pizza crust recipes, although those really are more about understanding baker’s percentages than memorizing actual recipes. I don’t bake cakes frequently so I always consult recipes for those.
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Nothing as we always try new recipes (way too many cookbooks/magazines at home) and so practically never repeat recipes (savory or sweet)
Lucky wife! I always need to pay more attention making pies.
I used to whip up brownies not using a recipe, but now I mix it up a bit and use different recipes/ratios. As for pies, I can do fillings well without a recipe, but refer to standby recipes for crust, especially since it varies what sizes/amounts of crust I need. But, in a pinch I could make a basic pastry crust pretty easily from my head and hands. Same applies to frostings, but that’s not baking!
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This peasant bread duo is in my head without a recipe because I bake it often.
Tonight a few slices w chicken piccata and long beans.
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Beautiful loaves!
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Appreciate that vote of confidence. By far, the easiest loaf to bake I’ve tried.
Great topic! Like @biondanonima , pizza and focaccia, and agree it’s just different percentages. Sandwich bread is a different type of recipe, have made close to a thousand probably. Also have memorized a few of the Artisan in 5 formulas. Like @Rooster, pie crust. Also, rough puff pastry, although that can be thought of as a different percentage (in this case butter instead of water.) The staples, of course: pancakes, banana bread, chocolate chip cookies, brownies, yellow cake, cheesecake, pastry cream, buttercream, etc. Everything else I have to look up, even those I’ve made almost a hundred times. Just too many to memorize.
I used to think all baking is exact, but for some things I think technique, understanding the ingredients, and not overcooking go a long way. If I accidentally use 2 eggs instead of 3 for my cheesecake, as long as I do everything else correctly, it will still come out okay.
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Very impressive!
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Hi everyone, a happy migrant from chowhound although I have been lurking here for many years.
I have recently been making a sourdough loaf adapted from Andrew Janjigian, which he refers to as “The Loaf”. His formula is easy to scale up and down to adjust to your size requirements. His basic formula is 80% high protein white AP, 20% whole wheat flour, 74% water, 2% salt and a 100% hydration levain at 6%. The levain can be up to 10 days old. I’ve made this at least a dozen times with consistent results.
Hopefully, this image will come up.
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Welcome! That looks amazing, and Nan is what my family calls me. I’m starting to embrace it.
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Thank you for your welcome…my mother became Super Nan!
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Even better!
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Beautiful loaf!
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