Anyone else on here prefer using cookbooks more vs. online?

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Ilovemeatloaf

Assistant Cook
Joined
Jan 17, 2016
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Morrow, GA
Sometimes I don't know what to type in the search engine online so I feel it is easier to just open a cookbook and pick something versus going online. Plus I don't have a printer to print recipes off the computer anyway.plus cookbooks are generally written by established cooks but online most recipes I get don't turn out right because they are from amateurs. Maybe I'm looking at this wrong.
 
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I do a bit of both. In general, if you buy cookbooks from reputable authors, you can expect good results. I have read many recipes on various websites that are awful and tried a few that were less than good.

More often than not, I get ideas from internet recipes and apply my own experience in making the dish. I frequently gather a half dozen versions of a recipe and compare the ingredients and their quantities to try to find a consensus.

I have even found "reputable' cooking sites posting recipes they gathered from other sources that are not of the quality one would expect.

Internet recipes are often poorly written and excessively wordy.
 
I do a bit of both. ***

More often than not, I get ideas from internet recipes and apply my own experience in making the dish. I frequently gather a half dozen versions of a recipe and compare the ingredients and their quantities to try to find a consensus.

I have even found "reputable' cooking sites posting recipes they gathered from other sources that are not of the quality one would expect.

Internet recipes are often poorly written and excessively wordy.

I too, do a bit of both. For a new recipe I want to try, I will gather 4 or 5, maybe even 6, and compare. Pull up a chart for ingredients and quantities, then put together the style I want. It usually is successful.

There are two sites that I have found either consistently miss ingredients listed but are in the instructions, or vice versa. Then there are the 'methods' which don't quite make sense, even for an experienced cook! Of course experience counts, but it doesn't take much to change an entire recipe if the order of method is changed.

I need pictures - I often tell people I'm from Missouri (the show me state!) (not that many people get the innuendo). I watch as many cooking shows as I can. Tape them and rewatch them.

But in the end I need the printed word... ;)
 
If you go in to cooking forums, where any one with any skill level can submitter recipes, yes it poorly worded but sometimes recipe in English are written correctly, it just it is in Indian, Australian, American, Canadian or Queens English and there are subtle differences in all these form of English. Just take the dish casserole, in USA and Uk that isnt the same at all, biscuit is also two different things.

I do like my cookbook and use them too, but I also go for good sites online for recipe or just google my main ingredients and see what comes up.

I most often write down the recipe from online or take laptop into the kitchen, more then I print recipe.

I do like Nigella Lawsson and Jamie olivers home pages and there is few more.
 
I do a bit of both. In general, if you buy cookbooks from reputable authors, you can expect good results. I have read many recipes on various websites that are awful and tried a few that were less than good.

More often than not, I get ideas from internet recipes and apply my own experience in making the dish. I frequently gather a half dozen versions of a recipe and compare the ingredients and their quantities to try to find a consensus.

I have even found "reputable' cooking sites posting recipes they gathered from other sources that are not of the quality one would expect.

Internet recipes are often poorly written and excessively wordy.

+1
you and I think so much alike, but I'm better looking, 'cause I get better looking each day;).

Most often, I get an idea in my head of wanting to make something new. I go online for examples of what I want, peruse through a half dozen recipes, then create my own. I have enough experience to understand how ingredients, including seasonings, work together, and with heat, to be able to do this. But sometimes, just sometimes, you find a gem. One such person who made great stuff, and shared her recipes on DC was a lady who called herself Audio. Her recipes for banana bread recipe, and shortcake made the best of those that I've eaten, and I didn't alter a thing.

There are current members of DC whose recipes I trust implicitly. The ability to look at a recipe and know whether it will work or not just comes with experience. We all learn from both our successes, and failures. Ya just have to keep cooking.

Seeeeeeeya; Chief Loongwind of the North
 
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Chef's that have been published have an editor assigned to them to proof read their work and recipes. So I find their recipes more reliable. Home cooks like most folks here don't have the backup and they usually have just a blog that they have created themselves. They tend to insert more of their emotions than enough information about the recipe and directions. Some of the pictures are beautiful. I will give them that. But one thing I don't care for in personal blogs is when each ingredient is added and requires a picture to show how to put salt into food. You either just dump it in or hold it up in the air and sprinkle it in.
 
We're probably about 55% internet/35% cookbooks or food mags/10% handed down, made up in our minds or things that don't need recipes, maybe even a little more internet even though we have a whole lotta cookbooks and food mags. I find the majority of the internet recipes we use and also use my judgment and experience as a cook to decide if they look generally right.
 
If I just want a recipe for a specific dish I go to the internet read 3 or 4 recipes then come up with a version that works for me.

I go to my cookbooks when I want to experience the context of the recipe in peoples lives. Cookbooks like "The Taste of Country Cooking" by Edna Lewis give vivid descriptions of the food, the people and the place. It tells a story and that to me is the value of a good cookbook.
 
I have cookbooks that is so badly written it sad and I even have two that has a chronic problem of missing ingredients.
 
A word of caution. It's not unusual for various websites to publish a famous chef's recipe. I once did a search on one of Julia Child's recipes. I found it on several websites and there were differences. I compared them to one of the JC cookbooks I have and none f them were correct.

If you want a famous chef's recipe, go to their site or cookbooks.
 
I do the same as Andy. Recipe writing is a specialized skill and many bloggers don't take the time to actually learn how to do it right. And as others have pointed out, they typically don't have copy editors checking for errors. So usually when I'm looking for a recipe online, I select results from sites that I consider to be more reliable, like seriouseats.com (sometimes I go straight there and search for a recipe on their site) and cooksillustrated.com (I pay for online access so I don't have to look through years of old magazines). cooks.com and allrecipes.com are not included ;)

I have seen very few recipes in cookbooks that had major errors. It happens, because no one is perfect, but it's pretty rare, in my experience. And I love collecting cookbooks. I read them like novels and mark more recipes with stickies than I will ever be able to make. But that's okay :LOL: They're a great source of inspiration.
 
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A word of caution. It's not unusual for various websites to publish a famous chef's recipe. I once did a search on one of Julia Child's recipes. I found it on several websites and there were differences. I compared them to one of the JC cookbooks I have and none f them were correct.

If you want a famous chef's recipe, go to their site or cookbooks.

There is a recipe for braised beef short ribs on both Epicurious and Bon Appetit that is identical, word for word. And it is very good, so I guess it was worth repeating. All of the recipes at both of those websites are generally excellent.

I find that I go often to particular sites that I know and trust. I really like All Recipes.com, not only for the variety, but for the rating and modification suggestions that you find there. I go there often when I have a few ingredients and I want to find something different to make with them. I will enter the ingredients in the search bar, then browse the recipes that come up. I rarely follow any of the recipes exactly, but I get suggestions that help to supplement my imagination, and reading the various reviews also gives me more ideas for ways to tweak my ingredients.
 
Sometimes I don't know what to type in the search engine online so I feel it is easier to just open a cookbook and pick something versus going online. Plus I don't have a printer to print recipes off the computer anyway.plus cookbooks are generally written by established cooks but online most recipes I get don't turn out right because they are from amateurs. Maybe I'm looking at this wrong.
Cookbooks. I have, errm, rather a lot. I enjoy reading them in bed (OK, so I'm a bit weird) and I enjoy planning meals form them
 
I love my cookbooks, but I usually go online, and as others do, peruse a few like recipes and combine what I think will work. I also rarely follow a recipe word for word.
 
I think everybody looks recipes up in books or online. We are all different. We all have a different touch when it comes to cooking, and that influences our choices. I look on published recipes as guidelines and nothing else. My most prized recipes are those I've been given by friends who are experienced cooks, be they friends for a moment or friends for a lifetime.

di reston


Enough is never as good as a feast Oscar Wilde
 
There is a recipe for braised beef short ribs on both Epicurious and Bon Appetit that is identical, word for word. And it is very good, so I guess it was worth repeating. All of the recipes at both of those websites are generally excellent.

I find that I go often to particular sites that I know and trust. I really like All Recipes.com, not only for the variety, but for the rating and modification suggestions that you find there. I go there often when I have a few ingredients and I want to find something different to make with them. I will enter the ingredients in the search bar, then browse the recipes that come up. I rarely follow any of the recipes exactly, but I get suggestions that help to supplement my imagination, and reading the various reviews also gives me more ideas for ways to tweak my ingredients.

They are connected in some kind of business fashion.
 
I love my cookbooks, but I usually go online, and as others do, peruse a few like recipes and combine what I think will work. I also rarely follow a recipe word for word.
This is pretty much what I do. Cookbooks and magazines are good for inspiration when you are looking for ideas, though.
 
Gourmet, Food & Wine, Fine Cooking and Bon Appétit magazines are all owned by Condé Nast Publishing. Epicurious is the website for Gourmet and Food & Wine. Bon Appétit has it's own site. Not sure about where Fine Cooking ended up.
 
I love thumbing through cookbooks - lot of inspiration there...

I also have the general impression that recipes are more likely to be well tested. The internet - not so much. The number of times I've either tried or come across an online recipe that is fundamentally flawed is astonishing. Simple things like confusing baking soda for baking powder seem to be common online.
 
Some of my favorite cookbooks are from churches. Both DH and I grew up Methodist, and let me tell you, those women could cook! Gourmet they're not, but if you want some good, hearty comfort food (and hotdishes, and anything with apples, noodles, Velveeta, cream of something soups, etc.) they are a great resource.
 
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