Getting Started with Drupal CMS 2.x: Site Building with Recipes

Recipe	What It Provides
drupal_cms_blog	Blog post content type and listing view
drupal_cms_page	Basic page content type
drupal_cms_seo_basic	Metatag, Pathauto, XML Sitemap
drupal_cms_image_media	Responsive images, focal point, SVG support
drupal_cms_anti_spam	CAPTCHA, honeypot
drupal_cms_google_analytics	GA4 + GTM integration
drupal_cms_ai	AI alt-text generation, admin chatbot
drupal_cms_search	Search API + Solr-ready configuration

	Recipe	Site Template
Scope	Single feature	Full site starting point
Contains theme?	No	Yes
Example content?	Usually no	Yes
Applies to existing sites?	Yes	New installs only (recommended)
Built on Recipes?	Is a recipe	Yes, composed of recipes

Building Your Own Site Template

The Drupal Association provides a Site Template Starter Kit for teams that want to create reusable templates. A custom template is a recipe with a site_template type declaration and a bundled theme:

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You can then export an existing Drupal CMS site as a template using the Drush command added in recent releases:

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Drupal Canvas and the Recipe Connection

Recipes define structure. Drupal Canvas — the new default editing experience introduced in Drupal CMS 2.0 — defines presentation.

Canvas is a true drag-and-drop page builder with live preview and real-time editing, powered by the Mercury component library. Common building blocks — heroes, cards, testimonials, accordions, pricing grids are available as Mercury components.

The relationship between recipes and Canvas is deliberate. When a recipe creates a content type, Canvas provides the visual expression of that type's fields and layout. The two systems are designed to be used together:

• The recipe declares the data model (fields, content types)
• Canvas handles the visual composition on the page

Technical note: Canvas requires a component-based theme. The shipped Mercury theme is the reference implementation. If you have existing sites on Layout Builder or Paragraphs, migration paths are planned but not yet available as of mid-2026. The recommended approach is a phased migration or greenfield Canvas adoption for new projects.

Applying a Recipe: A Real Walkthrough

Let's walk through adding a full blog to an existing Drupal CMS site, no admin UI clicks required.

Step 1: Verify the recipe is available 

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Step 2: Apply the recipe

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Drush will:

1. Validate dependencies
2. Install required modules (pathauto, metatag, views, etc.)
3. Apply configuration actions in dependency order
4. Report success or specific failures

Step 3: Verify the result

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Step 4: Extend the recipe with custom config

You don't modify a community recipe's files. Instead, you create a wrapper recipe in your project:

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This pattern extends, don't fork is the idiomatic Drupal CMS approach.

Recipes vs. Distributions: Why This Is Better

The old Distribution model had a fundamental flaw: once a distribution was applied, its modules and configuration became entangled with the site. Updating the upstream distribution (or the site itself) was treacherous. Many agencies simply forked distributions and maintained them in isolation.

Recipes solve this cleanly:

• Recipes are applied once and leave clean config behind. The recipe itself isn't a runtime dependency.
• Sites don't "belong" to a recipe the way they belong to a distribution.
• You can apply multiple recipes from different sources without conflict (assuming their config namespaces don't overlap).
• Community recipes are versioned on Drupal.org and installable via Composer like any module.

The tradeoff is that recipes have no update path today. If the upstream drupal_cms_blog recipe changes significantly, you won't automatically get those changes on existing sites — you'll need to manually apply config updates. The community is actively working on a recipe update mechanism, and it will be a significant discussion at DrupalCon Rotterdam.

 

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What to Watch at DrupalCon Rotterdam 2026

The Drupal CMS track at Rotterdam will focus heavily on production experiences and the road ahead. As you plan your conference schedule, keep an eye for sessions covering:

• Recipe update paths — the open community problem that will define Drupal CMS 3.x roadmap discussions
• Template Marketplace — the Drupal Association's curated marketplace for open-source and commercial templates, with an MVP planned for 2026
• Canvas migration tooling — the long-awaited Layout Builder and Paragraphs migration paths
• AI + Recipes — using the admin chatbot to generate recipe YAML from natural language (more on this in Post #3 of this series)

Summary

Drupal CMS 2.x and the Recipe system represent a genuine paradigm shift in how Drupal sites are built and maintained. The key takeaways for developers heading to Rotterdam:

• Recipes are composable, additive, and idempotent — they fix the core problem distributions never solved
• Site Templates extend Recipes into full, opinionated starting points for specific use cases
• Drupal Canvas and Recipes are complementary: Recipes define structure, Canvas defines presentation
• The idiomatic pattern is wrapper recipes  extend community recipes without forking
• No update paths yet plan your architecture with this current constraint in mind

Drupal CMS 2.x isn't just a new version. It's the platform finally shipping a site-building experience that matches what the rest of the CMS world has expected for years, with the enterprise foundation underneath that has always made Drupal worth choosing.

This post is part of the "Drupal in Rotterdam" series — 10 technical deep-dives published ahead of DrupalCon Europe 2026. Follow along for weekly posts through September.

🎟️ Join Us at DrupalCon Rotterdam 2026

All of the topics covered in this series — Recipes, Canvas, AI integration, accessibility, DevOps, and more — will be front and centre at DrupalCon Europe 2026 in Rotterdam, 28 September – 1 October 2026.

👉 Register for DrupalCon Rotterdam 2026

 

 - Article by Iwantha Lekamge