Start with a recipe

Want to strengthen your use of your creativity?  Start with a basic recipe and then adapt it in different ways.

 

Look in any recipe book or the back of any packaged mix and you'll find the basic recipe as well as different ways you can adapt the recipe.  By starting with a basic recipe, you don't have to make something up out of nothing but you do have to consider how your adaptations will affect the basic ingredients. 

 

Will it add more moisture that I will have to compensate for?

Will it make the mixture more dry and, if so, what sort of moisture will I have to add?

Will the new ingredients taste nice with the basic recipe? (There's nothing less tasty than anchovy muffins.)

 

The photo above shows a muffin recipe with 11 different variations to it but you can do the very same thing with spaghetti or rice or salad or smoothies or meatloaf or your garden or curtains or any number of activities.

 

Want new curtains?  Get a basic pattern and then go crazy with colors and patterns and textures. 

 

Want to do hanging pots (it was our first snow of the winter today so I'm quite happy to dwell on the spring)?  Get a variety of annuals and lay them in different patterns until you get something you like and plant away.

 

Want to write a song, use a standard recipe like A, A, B, A to arrange some verses to get you started and work out from there.

 

Want to write some poetry? There are tons of recipes here like the limerick:

 

Edward Lear wrote:

There was an Old Man with a beard,
Who said, 'It is just as I feared!
Two Owls and a Hen,
Four Larks and a Wren,
Have all built their nests in my beard!'

 

Or the haiku:

An afternoon breeze
expels cold air, along with
the fallen brown leaves. 

 

Cut your teeth there or use them as warm ups before you begin your magnum opus. 

 

There are so many areas that recipes can be used so you can play with creating new things on top of a standard base.  How will you use this hint today?