Prove that Chef Solo works just fine with default attributes. Output of chef-solo -c solo.rb -j test.json:

README.md

Proves that default attributes work fine in Chef Solo:

chef-solo -c solo.rb -j test.json

  /t/w/solo-def ❯❯❯ chef-solo -c solo.rb -j test.json
  Starting Chef Client, version 11.4.4
  Compiling Cookbooks...
  [2013-08-02T10:30:01-07:00] WARN: I see that solo works... fine
  Converging 1 resources
  Recipe: solo-def::default
    * file[/tmp/what] action create (up to date)  
  Chef Client finished, 0 resources updated
  /t/w/solo-def ❯❯❯ cat /tmp/what
  fine%

attributes-default.rb

default['solo']['works'] = "fine"

recipes-default.rb

Chef::Log.warn "I see that solo works... #{node['solo']['works']}"

file "/tmp/what" do
  content node['solo']['works']
end

solo.rb

file_cache_path File.join(File.expand_path(File.dirname(__FILE__), "cache"))
cookbook_path File.expand_path(File.join(File.dirname(__FILE__), ".."))

test.json

{
  "run_list": [ "recipe[solo-def]" ]
}