How To Find Reliable Recipes Online: A Recipe Rubric
- piketoplate
- 7 hours ago
- 5 min read
I Went Searching for a Recipe and Discovered a Dilemma
This past spring, I put a tremendous amount of time into preparing my garden for the season. Now I’m reaping the rewards of all that hard work. A couple of weeks ago I brought in some strawberries from the garden. I had an idea of the type of dessert I wanted so I went searching for a recipe. I found exactly what I was looking for on a popular website.
I read over the recipe a few times before I decided to give the recipe a go. I will admit that I had a few reservations about it. Since this was a baking recipe, I expected to see ingredient weights. Even though the author included some ingredient weights, they didn’t do that for the sugar, which I found odd. In addition, the flour was listed in ounces but it was an odd amount given that most digital kitchen scales measure in eighth, quarter, or half ounce increments. The ingredient list included turbinado sugar but the instructions said to use cane sugar. Out of all of the comments on the recipe, only two people appeared to have made the recipe and both raised concerns about the topping. Despite this, I went ahead with it knowing that I would need to convert weights to grams, use the sugar in the instructions, and be wary of the topping.
How did it turn out? Meh. By the time I was able to get good color on the topping, the bottom of the dessert had become rather dry - the same problem described by the commenters. Thankfully the strawberries rescued what was otherwise a mediocre dessert. I felt like I had wasted precious ingredients and my time.
This got me to thinking about how we should approach the recipes we find online. When there are thousands of recipes at our fingertips, how can we tell which ones are reliable before we spend our time and money making them? I know that I can confidently go to America’s Test Kitchen, for example, to find delicious and reliable recipes. However nowadays when we type “strawberry dessert recipes” into a search engine, tried and true sites like that are often buried deep within the search results. More than likely, we’re going to get an exhaustive list of recipes from food blogs along with videos from Instagram and TikTok. As we wade through all of this content, how do we know we’re being set up for chef’s kiss or a total fail?
To get some answers, I decided to turn to three experts. They have different backgrounds but shared some very similar insights.
Nik Sharma has written three cookbooks and has a fourth cookbook along the way. With a background in molecular biology, he approaches recipes like a scientist. He doesn’t just tell you how, he explains why. Most importantly, he does it in a way that is accessible to everyone.
Nancy Newberry is a recipe editor for Allrecipes.com and an avid baker. Though she’s officially retired from her professional baking role, diners at Nomad Kitchen & Mercantile in Tieton, Washington were treated to her carefully crafted desserts.
Joanne Stekler is a recipe developer and founder of the Ugly Duckling Bakery blog. Over the past five years, she’s created a site that provides readers with reliable food and cocktail recipes. Like Nik, she comes from a science background so careful testing and attention to detail are both priorities when creating recipes.
What the Experts Had to Say
How do you choose a reliable recipe website?
Nik said he will often check the author’s credentials. Nancy and Joanne agreed with this, specifically citing Sally’s Baking Addiction as an example of a reputable and reliable website. Even though Sally is a self-taught baker, her process is rigorous. She has earned readers’ trust by developing recipes that really work.
Joanne also looks to see if the identical recipe is showing up on ten different blogs. If so, that calls into question the author’s credibility. Nancy offered one more tip. “Look for people who make the things that you like to eat.”
Once you’ve found a recipe, what influences whether or not you’ll try it out?
Joanne said that while it’s tempting to click on the “jump to recipe” button, she likes to read the author’s commentary. The author should discuss testing the recipe and include photos of the process.
Everyone also mentioned the importance of looking at ingredient amounts. Joanne said, “I once saw a nine inch cake recipe that called for an entire tablespoon of baking powder. That would have tasted like metal!” Nancy closely examines sugar content, stating that it can often be reduced if it seems excessive.
Nik and Nancy emphasized that one needs to pay very close attention to cooking temperatures and cook times. Nik explained, “Cooking times can vary tremendously depending on your equipment, ingredients, and environment, so ‘cook for 10 minutes’ is much less useful than telling me what should have happened by the end of those 10 minutes.” Nik added that visual and sensory cues are also a plus.
Are the comments section for a recipe important to you?
This was important to all three experts. Nik said, “… {I} read the types of comments - did people actually cook the dish, or are they commenting about how wonderful the person/video is? Large social media followings aren't a reliable index either.”
Nancy likes to see a robust comment section with participants providing specific feedback. If she sees multiple comments stating that the cook time was too long or the recipe was too salty, she can be mindful of this when she prepares it. Nancy also avoids viral or trending recipes because all of those likes and shares don’t mean that it tastes good.
Joanne said that commenters have helped her improve and edit her own recipes by asking clarifying questions. She makes it a point to respond to comments and always appreciates feedback.
The Recipe Rubric: How to Evaluate an Online Recipe
In order to put the experts’ shared knowledge to good use, I decided to put on my teacher hat by creating a “recipe rubric.” In the classroom, I utilized this type of scoring method for student projects. This provided students with a framework of specific objectives, which took the guesswork out of what was expected of them. Back in the kitchen, all of us should have expectations of recipe authors. After all, we’re spending our hard-earned money on ingredients along with our precious time. Not only that, we want to bring a dish to the table that we feel proud to serve to family or friends.
Want to use the rubric while you search? Download a printable copy of the Pike to Plate Recipe Rubric.
So now I’m going to assign some homework. Look for a recipe for something that you’ve been wanting to cook and use the rubric to score it. Did you notice any red flags? Do you have unanswered questions? Are you feeling confident that the recipe will turn out well? If the score was less than stellar, compare it to a similar recipe from a highly reputable site like Food & Wine, Serious Eats, or BBC Good Food. How do those recipes fare? What factors made a recipe score higher?
The more experience you get at evaluating recipes, the more comfortable you’ll feel trying to execute them. You’ll also be more at ease knowing that what you’re about to cook is going to turn out well. Most importantly, with each success, you’ll build the confidence to start thinking beyond the recipe, which will provide the inspiration for your own experimentation and creativity. And that’s where you’ll find some of the true joy of cooking.
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