Last month, I spent a good bit of time working on five healthified southern recipes for Our State Magazine’s online food blog. For me, recipe development starts with research. I look at recipes online, brainstorm, bookmark, flip through cookbooks, and talk to my foodie friends, all the while scribbling down notes and ideas. Then comes the testing. I lay out the ingredients and get to work, jotting down notes (usually on the back of some random envelope from the recycle bin) as I go, tasting and adjusting continuously.
Obviously, one of the perks of developing recipes is eating the wares. Well, after you’ve snapped approximately 3,000 photos of each dish, that is. Normally, I incorporate whatever recipe I’m working on into my weekly meal plan. No sense in wasting food! But, at the time of this healthy southern recipes project, I also happened to have a a whole ham to cook for the North Carolina Pork Council.
Want to throw a successful holiday party? Just add ham.
