Table of Contents
I am so excited to share my behind-the-scenes of creating my new cookbook, “You Can Cook Any THING”!
How I create my recipes
People ask me all the time how do you come up with your recipes?
Truth be told, all my recipes are just variations of my tried and true favorites that are changed by the ingredients I have in the fridge at the time. And that, my friends, is the secret to success!
Using what you have on hand to create a dish that’s yummy-good!
My new book, You Can Cook Any THING, is devoted to teaching you how to trust yourself and believe in your ability to cook for friends and family.
My rule of thumb… don’t name the dish until after you bring it to the table.
Your Steak Dianne may end up being Beef Stroganoff.. and no one has to know!
Easy for Beginners to learn how to cook at home
To best coach, I used all the tools I could find to inspire your confidence and interest.
My recipes contain two measures for ingredients. One large bell pepper chopped is about 1 cup.
If your pepper is smaller, you might need one and a half.
If it is extra-large, you might only need three-fourths. Just chop enough to measure about a cup.
The amount of food each recipe yields differs based on your portion size. One 8-ounce steak can feed a couple for supper but it can also feed one hungry teen-age boy as a snack!
Your cookies can yield 2 dozen 4-inch cookies or 3 dozen 2-inch cookies.
It’s all good.
My recipes make allowances for all your variables.
How I created food photography with AI
Rather than hire a food photographer and stylist, I chose to work with a graphic artist for this book.
So many times, we see gorgeous photographs of the finished dish and know that we cannot possibly serve something that beautiful.
Truth is you can’t. Those photos are designed to be gorgeous… not consumed.
It just adds pressure to your cooking!
In place of the unattainable, we entered the recipe ingredients into the computer and asked A.I. to show us the end result. Out came little works of art that depict the final dish.
These are representations meant to inspire.
And they do.
As an added benefit, I found that any recipe depiction that did not resemble the dish at all was a fault of the recipe.
So, I re-wrote it.
In a way, A.I. became an additional recipe tester!
Behind-The-Scenes of my cookbook videos
Next, at the suggestion of my publisher, Warren Publishing, we added videos that further instruct you on the how-to of the recipe.
If you see the word “dice,” you can use your camera to capture the related QR code and see a short video that teaches you how to dice.
Over the five volumes of You Can Cook Any THING, you’ll be able to view 125 videos.
That is a lot of shoots.
Each shoot of twenty-fine videos took two days to shoot and before that, two to three full days to prep.
One Sunday, I logged in over 13,500 steps and never left my kitchen!
Then, there were countless hours of editing.
I think you will find that this additional instruction in the book was well worth the effort.
Learn to cook at home with me
And just to ensure that you can cook anything, I added a free app that you can download onto your phone. There you will find further instructions, extra recipes, more ways to use the recipes, additional substitution suggestions, product, ingredient links and more!
You can chat with me at any time. I’m (virtually) in the kitchen with you!
Putting it all together
All of this has taken over a year to come together. The first Volume of the book will be available in January 2024 followed by four more volumes throughout the year. I am excited to present this to you, and I hope that you will be excited to own it.
Here are a couple of behind-the-scenes pics of the video shoots.
More stuff to come. Stay tuned!
Delicious Ideas, Scrumptious Possibilities
Join Jorj for home cooking conversation and fun foodie ideas!
