Family recipes often appear straightforward at first glance, but practical work quickly exposes their complexity. Many of these recipes exist as handwritten notes, partial records or habitual actions rather than clear instructions, and they depend on assumed knowledge that once passed naturally between generations. Measurements remain undefined, timings rely on experience, and several steps reflect conditions that no longer exist in a modern kitchen.
Ghemu Farm works with these recipes as living material shaped by use rather than as fixed instructions to be followed without question. Old notebooks, familiar flavours and remembered methods provide a starting point, but each recipe requires testing and adjustment before it can function reliably today. Some elements remain intact, while others lose relevance as conditions, ingredients and expectations change.
Practical work relies on repetition and careful observation over time. Certain recipes settle into a stable form after only minor adjustments, while others continue to behave unpredictably or produce results that no longer align with current ideas of flavour and texture. Progress depends less on speed than on attention, patience and a willingness to reconsider familiar assumptions.
Recipe testing naturally leads to wider questions about ingredients and conditions. Seasonality influences both flavour and structure. Produce quality affects consistency and outcome. Climate and soil determine what ingredients can realistically deliver. Family knowledge offers direction, but present conditions require rebuilding understanding through observation, testing and accumulated experience.
The process moves at a measured pace and follows no fixed path. The work gradually produces clarity around what remains essential, what can change and what requires renewed learning. That clarity develops through continued use over time.
Ghemu Farm develops within this ongoing work. The project takes shape through repeated testing, practical decisions and sustained attention. This journal exists to record that process as it continues.