We’ve all been there; you bookmark a recipe that looks amazing but, when you get home and take a peek in your pantry, you realize that you’re missing an ingredient or two. Bummer. And, while that might be a deal breaker for some recipes, you’ll find that there are plenty of others where it’s completely OK to take creative control and use whatever you’ve got on hand. These recipes represent the latter; they’re really adaptable and practically made to handle whatever substitutions you throw at them. If you stick to swaps that are similar in texture and moisture content (say using different nuts and seeds interchangeably or replacing one leafy green veggie with another) we’re confident you’ll get great results every time. One of our all-time-favorite recipes to play around with? Baked eggs. This satisfying strata makes a hearty meal out of leftover bits of bread and cheese (although you could just as easily apply the same anything-goes mentality to a quiche or frittata, too). Grandma gave us the go-ahead to riff on this recipe — so feel free to use any type of cheese, leafy greens, meat or bread that you happen to have on hand.
