I am not a natural cook. But in the last year, I’ve been using LLMs to help figure out recipes with more stuff in season, on sale or any combination of things I’m trying to get rid of. It’s also been fairly good at “I liked this, what are similar dishes?” It’s really helped me eat more local and vegetarian foods and be willing to grab whatever is on sale at the grocery store as I know I’ll be able to make something out of it.
Tips etc so far:
I usually ask for three recipes with whatever constraints (vegetables in season here on this date, using a cup of cream etc), just a name and brief description for each. Repeat, varying as necessary.
Once I have something that appeals, I’ll ask for three or four different recipes for that dish of increasing complexity and select as appropriate.
I don’t quite trust the LLMs with cooking times so I’m pretty careful to check w a meat thermometer.
Any thoughts, suggestions etc?
They just got tried and true recipes there… it’s like asking the LLM to make something up for you but someone’s already made sure it’s good.
You don’t have to read the blog posts either, it’s just nice to get insight into why something works.
I wouldn’t trust cooking to a program anyway. The LLM has no concept of flavor or nutrition and some shortcuts and techniques can be counterintuitive in a way that a memetic approach isn’t necessarily helpful.
The LLM isn’t really making up a recipe, it’s borrowing from hundreds of recipes and can figure them out pretty well.
Have you taken a look at an LLM generated recipe and evaluated for yourself?
The thing is, if I want to combine local in season veggies with things that are going to expire, I’ve got to google or search for however long on this recipe site, then repeat a few times until I find one that fits the mood etc.