And I could never duplicate it again. Who knew it was once in a lifetime?

for awhile, I'd write ingredients down, if I made something unique, with no recipe. Still rarely made anything a second time.

Would you got to a hypnotist to see if they could recover that moment in your life?

in spinach. I was rookie cook. I should have questioned that before I used that recipe. I guess I thought it might be just a hint and would be okay.

and other gravies, especially turkey or chicken. Way less than a dash ) I don't know if I'd like it with spinach.

or a white cheese sauce. Just like I always put a little mustard powder (or mustard) in yellow cheese sauce. And I like nutmeg in spinach.

Nutmeg's tricky, though. If you taste and think 'Hmm, what is that?', you got it about right. As soon as you taste it and think "Nutmeg!', you went too far.

Except for egg custard. Egg custard with nutmeg is one of the foods of my youth, and you gotta be able to taste the nutmeg. Also, eggnog.

We should be!

make chili or spaghetti sauce it's different. (but always good) There is no recipe, leftovers are often used and it's fun to do. My wife made spaghetti meat sauce last night. There was some leftover Tri-Tip which she minced into tiny pieces and we had some leftover Italian sausage. We had bought a bag of Pepperoni ends and pieces which we had put through the meat grinder. We had some canned sauce which we added some things like carrots and onions to and it turned out great.

The twist was we were at our grandkids house and not even working in our own kitchen. This drove some of the decisions about herbs and spices that were available. The only pasta available was Fettuccine. We are all spaghetti lovers, especially the great grandchildren and they all loved it. I had some of the leftovers for lunch today.

By now, we know what food, herbs, spices, work together. My Mom loved making soup, no recipes. She said every pot was different.

You all sound very creative!

but nothing comes to mind at the moment. After about 50 years of cooking, when using a new recipe or looking to combine things on hand, I feel like I can almost taste something by just looking at the ingredient list, as well as decide what might brighten/improve the flavors.

When I was growing up, I found a Durkee spice chart in a kitchen cupboard. I referred to it as I was learning to cook. After awhile, you just know what is what

was 26 years ago, before we were married and I was still living in another state. Future husband had just been to visit me for the first time and I had taken him to experience Thai food, also for the first time. He really loved it, and at the time this wasn't a great place for ethnic restaurants, so we went to the grocery and bought him a jar of peanut sauce to take home with him.

We were talking on the phone a few days later while he was putting together his dinner. He browned ground beef and made a box of mac n cheese. He put those together and, hold on to your gag reflex, mix in the peanut sauce. I told him not to, that it wouldn't taste right, but he did it anyway.

While we were still on the phone, he took the first bite and immediately declared it delicious. You know how tasting something sort of catches up to you? The second bite, it was declared horrible, and rightly so.

and after trying a couple times, gave up. I have never tried cooking any Thai food. No restaurants locally that serve it, so I wouldn't know if I was doing it right.

I like peantur butter chicken. I don't think peanut butter beef would work for me, either.

make it myself when I moved here. Like a lot of other things, such as Cincinnati chili. My parents used to send me the spice mix packets for that until I nailed it down on my own. Still can't buy it here.

No one opened any franchise restaurants in the town where we lived till after we moved away. I'd try to make copies of fast food, and of course, nothing tasted like it did in restaurants.

When Eddie Murphy did the bit 'I want Mc Donalds' My kids about died laughing

(it is based in Cincinnati so it was sold even in Texas) but they no longer carry it.

However I found a bunch of recipes for the spice mix on Pinterest. I am going to go to the bulk spices aisle and get enough to mix up spices for 2 or 3 batches.

Right now, a platter of 5 way sounds very good!!

The one sense being trying something for the first time and it either just doesn't work out or is just not to our taste. An example being a tuna budin (kind of a savory baked mousse or pudding) from a Spanish cookbook that I got for free at a church garage sale. (Nobody wanted it, so it ended up in the 'Pleeeze, for the love of God, just take me' pile. I also got a really great cookbook about indigenous foods from the Americas. same pile.) Anyway, the tuna thing came out of the oven, and slid out of the mold into a formless mass of goo, nearly running right off the plate. We didn't eat it.

The other sense is working with whatever's in the fridge and pantry. I'm a queen of 'This is a meal that will never come again', just because there will never be the same happy circumstance of available components. We either eat leftovers the way they are, or recycle them into a different meal. Sometimes, the second meal is better.

Hope no one minds, but I'm grinning as I read some of the replies!

Grandma Shorty, of blessed memory, made the best snickerdoodles. I use her recipe. L’dor vador. From generation to generation.💞

Once upon a time, my sweet mama, of blessed memory, clipped a recipe for chocolate snickerdoodles from her local newspaper and sent it to me. So I baked a batch.

They were not bad chocolate cookies, but they weren’t snickerdoodles. The cinnamon sugar coating made them too sweet for me. Meh.

I’m sticking with Grandma Shorty’s recipe.
🕊thatcrowwoman

I have thought about how chocolate snickerdoodles would taste. Have made the leap

I will never make it again.

If it takes way too much time and/or too many ingredients. This cook is over that!

Off the top of my head, I can only think of one "creation" that--after the fact--I wouldn't bother to attempt again. It was a mish-mash/hash of ground beef, cabbage and aromatics that I served with brown rice. I named it "cabbage and sh*t." It wasn't horrible--just not good enough to bother with (unless these are the only ingredients at my disposal).

But my first thought about something I have made that I wouldn't make again was: pie crust.

There are some store-bought options that are perfectly acceptable--so why bother with cutting cold butter into flour? (And frankly, I wasn't very successful w/ my attempt at homemade pie crust.)

I eat a lot of cabbage on my low carb plan, and lowcarb food that mixes in is fine. I love fried cabbage with bacon and onions.

I went from buying pie crust to making my own, which I don't do now. I thought the stores wanted a lot of flour, salt, fat and water. I found an old recipe that calls for boiling water, and if I make a crust, it turns out okay.

I have zero patience and after burning it a few times, I'll stick with the box mixes.

I'm sure I've tried plenty of recipes I'll never repeat especially if they were a lot of work for little payoff. I have experimented and made some great accidents never to be repeated.

Chia seed, almond milk, Monk Fruit sweetener, vanila. You mix the ingredients and let it sit in the fridge overnight. It has been a lifesaver.

Recipes online, and you can make chocolate, too.

I'll give it a shot. Thanks!

It has a texture like tapioca. The way I make it, 0 carbs

Me and no hardware beyond a rolling pin. Came out fine, but I use a sheeter/pasta roller now.