The programmer/engineer in me has been deeply unhappy with recipes (both online and in print). The recipes in this online book are no exception.<p>Chief complaint: the ambiguity of description means that ten different chefs could follow the recipe and have ten different results.<p>To explain: consider the simple act of "browning an onion". Variables that might affect the outcome include the fine-ness of the dicing, the heat of the skillet (is my medium heat the same as yours?) and the extent of caramelization. The range of outcomes here can be anywhere from a crunchy, almost raw onion, to a nearly disintegrated brown paste. Take this and multiply with all the other steps involved in a typical recipe and try to tell me that the end result is predictable.<p>Has anyone found any technique/recipe books that attempt to deal with this ambiguity? The only place I ever see clear instruction on such topics are cooking classes, but that's not convenient and it makes me wonder what the point of recipe books are at all.
I don't see how this could ever truly compete with traditional cookbooks.<p>I don't want to eat the exact same macaroni and cheese dish served on one side of the country that I can on the other.<p>I think what I am trying to say is that cooking can never be standardized, nor should it.<p>You cannot standardize the world's recipes into a monolithic volume like Wikimedia has done with facts.<p>I mean you could, but the 7,000 variations on every chef's take on a Reuben sandwich would be a chore to sift through.<p>Facts rarely change, tastes often do.
This is an example of people trying to use technology to fix a social problem.<p>I don't know who is editing or curating these recipes. Taste is subjective. At least with Wikipedia, I can point X sources and back my claims up. On here, I could just add random family ad-hoc recipes and no one can really debate them. Which leads to: Mac n' Cheese 1. Mac n' Cheese 2.<p>Traditional cookbooks solve a problem: people may not know any recipes (or want to learn new ones) and want a <i>curated</i> collection from a chef that knows what they're talking about. Not random people online. Sure, books aren't guaranteed to be quality, but they're far less likely to be junk than random websites. They're even better if you only go by word of mouth- ask your parents/grandparents what they used!<p>This wikicookbook idea doesn't solve any problems because it's no better than randomly searching "how to make tres leches cake" and picking some web page that had good enough SEO to get to the first page of duckduckgo.<p>---<p>Things people actually want and/or need:<p>* a website that matches (curated) recipes based on your ingredients. i.e. I can input "chicken bouillon, kale", and have it show me various recipes.<p>* a standardized schema for recipes, i.e. in json. This way we can programmatically build apps, share recipes with friends, and maybe have browser/site integration.<p>* a digital, open source collection of recipes <i>only</i> from chefs/etc with credentials. aka a curated collection.<p>* a website that parses said recipes and can display multiple types of units depending on your preferences.<p>* a website/app that lets you bookmark recipes and automatically parses them with said schema. and lets you categorize/tag recipes so you can filter by "favorites" or "want to try", etc.<p>Bonus points if your app can interface with Apple's Homepod / Alexa, etc, so I can confirm a recipe while I'm cooking or washing dishes. This is the biggest let-down by far for the homepod.
The only thing missed in <i>Wikibooks</i> — export to PDF is disabled now.[0]<p>[0] <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/wikipedia/comments/8yta9l/how_get_pdf_export_convert_from_wikibook_now/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/wikipedia/comments/8yta9l/how_get_p...</a>
I need a decent json schema for a recipe.
There are some out there but they have problems.
Can we all agree on a recipe json schema so we can put our recipes in json and share them and make apps on top of them? I'm talking a schema that has quantity that can be plugged into IoT devices.
> <a href="https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cookbook:Roasting" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cookbook:Roasting</a><p>> Roasted foods get drier and browned on the outside by initially exposing it to a high temperature. This keeps most of the moisture from being cooked out of the food.<p>This is scientifically wrong I believe.<p>This is a common problem with attempts at axioms of cooking online like cooking.stackexchange.com it just can't be crowd source using known methods. It's mostly incorrect information.<p>Solve this and you will allow a lot of great wikis happen, but most topics are stuck here.<p>Roughly Maths->Physics->Chemistry are ok, then it starts to fail Biology ->
I use Bing Recipes for all my recipe needs and I think it does a great job. It's a little rough around the edges, but you can tell its a dedicated investment on their side.
I thought it was programming "recipes" for working with Wikimedia at first.<p>The FAQ should probably mention the year it began, which is 2004 going by homepage history.