Recreating Recipes from Ingredient Labels and Menus

One thing I have gotten good at doing is recreating recipes based upon reading ingredients lists of products I like. This could apply to a store-bought sauce or dressing I opt-out of buying or an amazing-sounding entree at a restaurant that is expensive and will send me into a spiral of binge-purchasing entrees I can’t afford but can recreate. Of course, you are buying time when you order takeout. Ingredients aren’t cheap either, often the convenience of all the ingredients being owned by the restaurant makes it more cost-effective INITIALLY, to just buy the entree or item you’re trying to emulate. However, when you increase the number of foods, you’ll be able to save substantial money, as with an entree you’ll only be purchasing one serving’s worth. Often time you’ll still be hungry at the end.

A relish I can recreate without any of the preservatives (shelf life is not a factor) or any of the chemicals used for coloring.

Dishes take time, ingredient purchasing takes time, chopping takes time, cooking does. Everything has a trade-off what I particularly like is being able to control the quality and freshness of my ingredients. I’m also able to adhere to all sorts of dietary restrictions or desires.


This means if I don’t like a specific ingredient, say red 5, yellow 40, canola oil, etc. I can simply
Omit it. These ingredients are rarely what gives the item that special taste that I like.

This past summer I prepared a lot more food than I ever had, omitting a larger list of ingredients than I’d ever kept out of recipes before. Olive oil was a big one. Not only is it not ideal for our health.
Renowned environmentalist George Monbiot discusses the carbon-intensive process that goes into creating olive oil.

If this seems ridiculous, and that omitting even healthy olive oil is now a step,
I’d like to bring your attention to this video which demonstrates the unnatural concentration of the oil that we consume with little thought. Personally, I’d never seen this video before, nor had I put any substantial thought into the way oil was produced.

I definitely consume olive oil, it just does the world less harm and my body more good when I receive this oil from eating olives. Straight from the source.

So now I can be found in stores taking pictures of ingredients lists. I try to recreate things in an entirely plant-based way that may utilize animal products. I also have the opportunity to switch sweeteners to dates, which is a fruit sugar as opposed to a processed refined sugar.

Anyways, as I’ve evolved into making more foods myself, the amount of things I buy has decreased substantially! I now create many of the dishes I see in restaurants or grocery stores myself.

Thanks for reading, really appreciate your readership.!