Learning an entire life story just to get a simple waffle recipe

I know very old texts use the word “receipts”, but I always figured it was in the sense of “I received these instructions for making jellied larks’ tongues”, rather than “this is the receipt for the ingredients from the grocery store”.

Anyhoo, I don’t have a problem with prose about how to actually prepare a dish, but I don’t think aggressively heteronormative WASP lifestyle bragging really helps me beat butter and sugar together.

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Something tells me that that’s not what they’re concerned with right now.

https://jezebel.com/inside-the-culture-of-racism-at-bon-appetit-1843965414

Yeah i read about that as well, hoping they can get things changed for the better though the business is owned by Conde Nast which has its own history of bias against minorities.

That goes for good cookbooks.

There are however also thousands of cookbooks that do the exact same spiel of first telling some ‘wonderful’ story about the dish or the cook or something, accompanied by lots of photographs of things that may or may not be vaguely related to the recipe.

They’re ‘lifestyle’ cookbooks as much as anything you’re supposed to actually cook from.

I blame Elizabeth David. (joke)

“This one simple trick that will change the way you X forever!” — video is 20 minutes long, so called trick takes 20 seconds to explain.

This isn’t restricted to recipes by any means. It’s a pattern I refuse to play along with anymore. I’ve been watching gardening videos recently and it’s the same nonsense. I don’t care about the old farmer who told you this thing you promised never to share.

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Cookbooks vary enormously in how useful they are. My favorite book for inspiration to use up something is The Flavor Bible. Not a cookbook at all, just an alphabetical list of ingredients and cuisines, and for each, a list of things that a bunch of chefs said go with it.

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