How the NYT Cooking Team (Obsessively) Tests Recipes

I absolutely love the NYT cooking app. It’s worth the subscription and I’m fine supporting the newspaper that continues to get beaten up in our world and we need more than ever. This is a diamond in the muck of horrible new stories these days. I then look at the app and think of something fun to make. The recipes have all been hits and I use this more than any other site now! Thanks nyt great job. To those that don’t want to pay. Nothing in life is free and if it is it’s usually not worth much

"Ms. Moskin said while a recipe that runs at thousands of words will definitely scare off readers, she tries to err on the side of over-informing her audience with that extra step or two" I just had to laugh at this excerpt from the article, because I so enjoy watching Ms Moskin's wordless videos. (More, please.) One quibble with a common qualifier in NYT Cooking recipes: how do I know "good" as in: good olive oil; good tomatoes; good butter, etc.?

I started using TNYT cooking app 3-4 years ago. In reading one of Melissa's recipes I was initially put off by the listing of spices without amounts. That was my left-brain response, but then I realized she's telling me something, that I will enjoy the experience more if I pay attention to the flavors imparted by each spice, and their amounts, and in so doing I will discover and understand what I like, and what the people I cook for like. Thanks Melissa, Julia and Sam.

Last weekend my son bought two cabbages in order to cook okonomiyazi. What to do with the second one? Here, I found a very tempting recipe of a cabbage and onion torta. It turned out very delicious but I didn’t have an inkling as to measurement: flour was given in grams but butter in spoons. I have no inkling of the weight or volume of butter, so please, make the amount of ingredients clear!

I have found that some recipes besides not working out do presume that their readers have access to some pretty sophisticated ingredients. I enjoy reading them but usually go to other sources for inspiration and reliability. Often they have complicated the recipe with too many steps....I have cooked professionally for 40 years and can read a recipe and pretty much know if it merits preparing.

one comment about the lack of specificity in many of your recipes. i often see you list "rice vinegar" or "rice noodles" without specifying which ones. there's dozens of types of rice vinegars or rice noodles. you seem to be very specific when listing italian ingredients (or french) but not when it comes to asian cuisine.

As a professional bread baker, I am accustomed to weighing ingredients, which most home cooks are not. Thank you for including gram weights in your recipes—they make the results far more accurate and consistent. My little kitchen scale is the second-most useful item in my kitchen, next to my chef’s knife. Stephen Knight, Seattle

I was so disappointed when Cooking went subscription only but couldn't live with out it so ponied up the credit card. I justify it by resisting the urge to grab last year's hot cookbook now at Costco and only wish I had additional time to try more recipes. Any need for a 47 year-old intern?

I have been saving my NYT recipes and have about 400 in my recipe box. My saved recipes are no longer available unless I pay a weekly/yearly fee. We pay for the times and have for years. Now there is an added fee to use your recipe box. I am at a loss without them.

One of my favorite sections of the NYT (have to do something to get my mind off Trump) and three of my favorite people in the photo (more videos please!).

The problem with NYT recipes is that they really are out of touch with the reality of middle/upper-middle-class lifestyles. The recipe for Bay Leaf Chicken mentioned in the article has 15 ingredients, many of them small-batch herbs that would require a special grocery trip to collect. The modern busy family, and dare I say, busy moms (because women are still doing most of the cooking), don't have time to even buy the ingredients, let alone cook them, and then clean up the mess. I would appreciate some simpler, reality-tested meals that reflect that most Americans don't have a three-person test kitchen handy to assist with meal prep.

I was under the impression that NYTimes cooking is now a separate service -- why is this appearing in the NYTimes? It seems like the Times wants to have their cake and eat it too.

I'm a single (old) guy and I religiously read the cooking articles and have made many of the dishes described. I'm especially fond of Melissa Clark's recipes---she's never done me wrong (I consider the "peas in guacamole" as an honest mistake). I offer a firm "Thanks!" to all the NYT Cooking Team. On days when the front-page news only depresses me, the food section raises my spirits.

I made the classic marina sauce last night. The NYT recipes are fantastic. Easy to prepare. Tasty, healthy ingredients. A few weeks ago, I couldn't get my saved recipes to load. The wave of panic was precisely the same when I can't find a saved work project of weeks' duration.