A cauliflower, a white fish and a bowl of rice walk into a bar.

"Who wants to eat us for dinner?" they asked the crowd.

When the crowd saw how:

• pale

• bland

• flavorless they were

They groaned, stood up, and stumbled down the street to McDonalds, where they heard Trump was serving fries.

Me?

I'd snatch up all 3 of them.

I love ingredients like these, as do most chefs.

In fact, some of the most:

• creative

• inventive

• extraordinary

meals you've eaten started with a plain, ordinary ingredient as the base.

They're not boring - they're just blank canvasses.

Today, I want to guide you through the chef's creative process.

Think of this as a blueprint for combining everyday ingredients + fire in a way that makes flavors come alive.

Using supplies you may already have on hand.

I use it each week to pull new recipes out of thin air...

Like this SIMPL recipe for coconut-poached cod with spiced cauliflower and bamboo rice.

How to build a high-protein recipe

Whether you're a professional or an amateur, one guiding principle applies to cooking:

Don't re-invent the wheel.

Of course, that doesn't mean that you shouldn't take risks.

But chefs know that certain ingredient combinations are just proven to work well together after being tested for decades...

Or even centuries.

Food (unlike technology) has not improved over time.

I could think up hundreds of ways to cook a piece of fish, but I'll never discover a "new" food.

What I CAN do is re-interpret the classics.

That's why the time-tested flavor pairings are a resource that chefs endlessly re-use...

So we can creatively put our own "stamp" on the popular dishes that chefs cooked before us.

Where to start?

Cooking inspiration can strike from unexpected places. So be ready, and don't let it go to waste.

I like to start with a reference point, and build a dish from there.

What's a good reference point?

It could be a memorable restaurant meal you enjoyed. Or a colorful stack of rainbow carrots at the farmers market that you're inspired to create a meal around. Or a random craving that struck you just before lunchtime.

My favorite?

I like to build a dish around 1 specific type of cuisine.

When you have a specific country, region, or culture in mind, you can use all your memories (from eating that type of food) to create a new dish out of thin air.

Putting it all together

I drove past a Thai restaurant on the way home earlier this week.

It reminded me of my experiences with Thai food, and I started craving flavors like coconut, ginger, cilantro, etc.

It was just the spark I needed to build this week's SIMPL dish…

around those food memories.

I knew that coconut milk can be used to simmer chicken and fish (like in a curry) so why not use it as a poaching liquid for fish?

Cod fillets would work.

From there, I considered what else I'd need to make a complete entrée dish.

• Something starchy (steamed bamboo rice)

• A vegetable (roasted cauliflower spiced with turmeric)

...would accompany the cod nicely.

Finishing touches

But will the flavors taste exciting? I want it to be salty, tart, rich, and a little sweet at the same time.

So I added some finishing touches.

But before I wrote each down, I actually closed my eyes, and visualized how each one would change the overall flavor.

(Weird, but it works for me.)

• For my salty component I decided to use fish sauce instead of salt (common in Southeast Asian cooking)

• Something tart? Lime, because it pairs perfectly with coconut.

• Coconut milk is my rich ingredient.

• And I threw in just a dash of brown sugar for a bit of sweetness to bring the flavors all together.

Once you have a grasp of traditional ingredients from a variety of cultures, you can use this template for any cuisine.

For example, an Italian dish might include these components:

• Salty: capers

• Tart: white wine

• Rich: olive oil

• Sweet: San Marzano tomatoes

(Sounds like the start of a pretty good pasta dish to me.)

And here's a few more "can't miss" flavor combos from around the world, just to get your creative juices flowing:

• Peru: Fish + lime

• India: ginger + garlic

• Germany: pork + cabbage + apples

• Japan: kombu (seaweed) + bonito flakes + dried shiitake

• France: beef + red wine + mushrooms

• Italy: tomato + basil

• Thailand: chile + garlic

See it in action

Use this flavor blueprint next time you're in need of some kitchen inspiration.

Want a head start?

Become a SIMPL Insider today and see the exact steps for using it in every high-protein meal prep recipe I've made in the last 5 months.

It's your key to becoming nutritionally self-reliant at home while supporting your gains in the gym.

cooksimpl.beehiiv.com/subscribe

Here’s the nutrition breakdown for 1 serving:

Get the full 5-portion recipe for this, and all my high-protein dishes when you become a SIMPL Insider.

When you upgrade, you'll also:

• Get the full-length step-by-step videos showing how I created each weekly dish

• Save 2+ hours each week by using my links to order ingredients online for delivery (no more grocery shopping)

• Learn the fundamental skills that separates the kitchen pros from the amateurs in my video: Knife Skills Mastery

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