Talk:Cookbook/Archive 6

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Contents 1 Merging category/type pages. 2 How to categorize something that is both an ingredient and something to be made 3 Purge 1881 recipes? 4 The purpose of "basic foodstuffs" page and category 5 Tasks that can be done 6 Redirects cleanup 7 Category sort enhancement request 8 Cooking Lessons 9 Budget or low cost Diet 10 Wikipedia templates 11 Import enabled! 12 Import questions 13 Duplicate recipes & similar 14 Ext links 15 Metric Measurements 16 Recipe template suggestion 17 Major cookbook formatting complete. 18 Ingredients 19 Google Search 19.1 Idea for beginners: 20 Fair use images 21 Lonely categories 22 Quick and Easy Recipes 23 South Asian cuisines 24 Photography 25 Units templates 26 Non-English cooking term translations 27 Scalability 28 Cookbook:Cuisine of Near East 29 User rating of recipes 30 Allergy infoboxes? 31 Audio Cookbook ? 32 Herbal teas? 33 External links on Vegan cuisine 33.1 Also Vegetarian cuisine 34 Copyright issues 35 Deletions 35.1 Simple recipes 36 Alternative Cookbook 37 Cookbook:Fruitmince 38 Random recipe 39 Hunting for some strange unit of measurement? 40 Respect people's sentiments 41 Search link

[edit] Merging category/type pages.

With the installation of DPLs, I think this is not necessarily a productive thing to do. Kellen ^T 10:53, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] How to categorize something that is both an ingredient and something to be made

Do you categorize a recipe for barbecue sauce in Category:Barbecue sauce recipes? If so, where do you categorize recipes which use barbecue sauce as an ingredient? Kellen ^T 10:53, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't see any immediate problem with allowing things to be both a recipe and an ingredient. I can think of a million things that require their own recipe, but are usually/often used as a recipe themselves (whipped cream, praline, bechamel sauce). So the main problem (if I'm reading your question correctly) is the ambiguity of the phrase 'Barbecue sauce recipes' as recipes that use the bbq sauce and recipes for bbq sauce. I kinda think we should rename all categories to 'Recipes using X' and 'Recipes for X' (or something similarly unambiguous). It's going to be a lot of work to rename al the existing categories, but we could at least start by making it policy, and work from there.risk 17:12, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

It is, in fact, the strength of the categories, that pages can be included in more than one.

Risk's suggestion for the category change is a good one. See Wikibooks:Categories for a proposal for an official policy/guideline. --Swift 21:06, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Hrm... I don't like having to write "Recipes including ____" and "Recipes for ____" every time. Maybe the default could be "____ recipes" for pretty much everything, but use the "including ___" and "for ___" when there is something ambiguous. We won't have categories for every possible thing (at least not for many years in which case they can rename all the categories), so maybe that's more workable. Kellen ^T 08:21, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

That would make the process of updating the categories a lot easier. It sounds good to me. I suggest we include it in the policy. risk 15:19, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Purge 1881 recipes?

Shall we purge 1881/decameron/oscookbook recipes? Many of these are poorly formatted and probably won't be used by the public. Why are we mirroring existing resources? Kellen ^T 10:53, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

I suppose the original idea was to have them evolve into original wikicookbook recipes, like the Wikipedia articles that are based on public domain Brittanica articles. I don;t really see that happening. These recipes only have historical interest, as far as I'm concerned, which is what wikisource is for. I agree they should be purged. risk 17:12, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Where elsewhere do these exist? Unless they are maintained somewhere else in as or better accessible form, I don't see the harm in keeping them. We might still see someone find these an interesting part of Wikibooks to contribute to. --Swift 21:04, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

The Household cyclopedia, the OSCookbook, and the Cook's Decameron are all available elsewhere. I kind of hate that these recipes are here, as a good number of them are really old and lack proper measurements (you know, fine for looking up, but not that useful to people in this day and age). Kellen ^T 08:13, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

OK, then let's toss them. --Swift 20:22, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

That'll be these: Special:Whatlinkshere/Template:1881, Special:Whatlinkshere/Template:Decameron and Special:Whatlinkshere/Template:Oscookbook... which looks like a lot fewer than what I thought was from those sources. I bet there's a bunch not using the templates... Kellen ^T 20:02, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

If nothing else they are serving as a starting point for other recipes, i wouldn't bother adding anymore but if any are still about id laeve them, they don't take anything away from the cookbook even if they don't add anything useful

[edit] The purpose of "basic foodstuffs" page and category

I don't understand what purpose Category:Basic Foodstuffs and Cookbook:Basic foodstuffs serve. Kellen ^T 10:53, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

They seem to describe foods or ingredients that are harvested rather than created from other ingredients. A sort of 'atomic' ingredient as far as the cookbook is concerned. I don't see much use for them either, especially since the amount of categories per recipe/ingredient can get out of hand pretty quickly. I think they can be removed. If not, they should at least get a clear definition. risk 17:12, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Tasks that can be done

• move the main cookbook page (and subpages) into the cookbook namespace done semi-recently by User:Gentgeen I think. Kellen ^T 20:12, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
• crosslink ingredients with the new gardening book

[edit] Redirects cleanup

I made Cookbook/Redirects, which is a listing of all our redirects. We should go through them and clear out the ones that are just trash. Kellen ^T 17:19, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Would some other (1 or 2) cookbook editors take a look at this list and write here when they've vetted it? It should be removed after this is done (since it otherwise adds "fake" wanted pages). Kellen ^T 20:14, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

I'll take N-Z over the next week or so. Webaware ^talk 22:48, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Me again. Hot kitchen, hot day, hot oven, so looking at this until I can stop running back and forth to the kitchen.

What would you classify as "trash"? I'd say stuff that is obviously debris from page moves, and stuff that has no links and no prospects of links. But then there's stuff that has no links, but has some prospect of links, e.g. alternative names for ingredients; see Special:Whatlinkshere/Cookbook:Edible_Cactus for some examples. I reckon that this isn't trash, because it is likely to help wikify a new recipe. What are your thoughts? Webaware ^talk 03:13, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

We should be trashing redirects that have no prospects of being used, imo. Redirects which someone could feasibly type in to a recipe should stay. Kellen ^T 08:36, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

I'll look at some when I have a mo (tho I think we could discuss "feasible" recipes for some time! I'm not a fan of redlinks - they encourage junk & vandalism quite a bit - cheers --Herby ^{talk thyme} 08:39, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

When I said "feasible" with respect to our redirects, I meant redirects mostly for ingredients where a user could type in any number of possible spellings, plurals, etc. I think these are valid and useful redirects and should stay. Kellen ^T 16:35, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps we should categorize our redirects, since that should also help clear up why each redirect exists. Kellen ^T 16:54, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

That would help identify redirects created by users who don't know about the categorisation, and page move debris, but ultimately it leaves a lot of redirects. Would there be any need to go further than "Alternative name Cookbook redirects"?

As to possible spellings, plurals, etc. I think that can go too far, and end up just encouraging redirection. It also helps persist problematic misspellings like "yucca" instead of "yuca" (cassava) - better to fix such misconceptions than to support them. Webaware ^talk 22:40, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

I was thinking of Category:Ingredient redirects and Category:Recipe redirects, where the ingredients redirs would be more lax; allowing plurals, alternate spellings, capitalization, whatever, and the recipe ones would be very strict, basically only allowing non-english-language names. Kellen ^T 09:53, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

Sounds good; that would allow us to tag the redirects that we want to keep, and thus more easily manage the new ones that build up. Just as long as a good dose of common sense is also applied - i.e. strict isn't STRICT and lax isn't brain dead ;-) Webaware ^talk 12:05, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

OK, I've done the page over and submitted lots of speedy deletes (nearly all of which have been actioned, to date). I skipped:

• alternative ingredient, tool, and technique names that weren't gibberish
• some alternative recipe names, mainly non-English stuff but also some wronglish
• some stuff that should be cleaned up, but there's a number of links using the redirect
• the odd one I wasn't too sure about

So, please feel free to run through the page yourself, and pick out any I left that you think ought to go. I should mention also that some of these links are now actual pages (not redirects), and that there is a number of redirects not here also (i.e. have cropped up since Kellen made the page). Have at it! Webaware ^talk 13:13, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

I looked over it again and it seemed pretty clean. Thanks everybody for contributing. I've removed the page to eliminate the links showing up on wantedpages. If you want to generate a list of redirects for yourself, you can use the script on my user page. Kellen ^T 09:17, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Category sort enhancement request

I've made an enhancement request on the mediawiki bugtracker requesting that categories be able to set the default sort key. This would mean that instead of doing [[Category:Category name|{{PAGENAME}}]] we would just go to each category and do __SORTBYPAGENAME__ (or something similiar). This would be a huge boon for the cookbook as we have many, many categories and this would mean many, many places where we don't have to sort things by hand. Please go vote for this bug. Kellen ^T 17:15, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Since MediaWiki v1.10, there is now a magic word {{DEFAULTSORT}} that allows you to do this. It only just occurred to me today that this can be stuffed into a template and thus fix any pages in a book that use said template. I've added it into {{Recipe}} and {{Ingredient}}, so it should be picked up on recipe and ingredient pages (including those using templates that include those two, such as {{spice}} and {{fruit}} etc.) I did not add it to {{cooknav}}, because that template is often used on categories - don't know if it matters, but at the very least it isn't required. If you can think of any other Cookbook templates that would benefit from this, please amend as necessary. Webaware ^talk 03:18, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Have now also done {{unit}}, {{technique}} and {{equipment}}. A valid reason for not just adding it to {{cooknav}} is that the other templates allow us to specify an alternative default sort, e.g. an ANSI version of a name with non-ANSI characters. Webaware ^talk 13:12, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cooking Lessons

Hello, at present this cookbook is a collection of recipes. But actually Wikibooks are not defined as a collection, but as learning books. Further recipes collection can be found thousands in the internet. But how to learn cooking for a REAL!! beginner, who never cooked before, you cannot find. No book is available and if you go to a cours "for beginners" i.e. at an adult education centre, it is never for real beginners. This is one reason more, to establish such a book here. The system of a lerning book i.e. French is learning and practising lessons with slightly progressing difficulty. Thus I would suggest to do the same here. Such lessons could be:

• What is the difference cooking / frying / microwaving?
• The first fried egg (How much butter / salt?)
• From a rough piece of goulache to a cooked / fried / microwaved one.
• From a bought potato (how to peel) to a cooked / fried / microwaved one.
• When using a pot and when a pan?
• What can be cooked in the microwave?
• Photos , Videos
• and so on

I would also suggest, to establish recipes which apply to the category microwave. -- 84.132.65.223 19:39, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I wouldn't say the cookbook is just a collection of recipes. In my opinion it's growing into sort of a general reference on everything to do with cooking. I think all of your questions could be answered by information currently in the cookbook, but I suppose that for someone with no experience whatsoever, those articles would be difficult to find. I think it might be nice to set up cooking 'courses' as gentle introductions to a field of cooking, explaining things along the way and referencing existing recipes and articles along the way. We could do introductions based on skill level (absolute beginner/beginner/intermediate/professional) and based on genre (French/Indian/Vegetarian). We could even have reading and cooking excercises. risk 17:12, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

risk wrote: > I think all of your questions could be answered by information currently in the cookbook.
If so, please tell me where for instance something adequate is described: "From a rough piece of goulache to a cooked / fried / microwaved one." -- 84.132.80.138 10:41, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

I like the idea of making something with very simple steps, and just as the first one who posted, said...it will be great help to someone new. Is there any category for 'very simple instructions'. I'm thinking of making some, with some images. Logictheo 14:11, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

There are Lessons now to fill in. -- 84.132.90.52 20:03, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Budget or low cost Diet

How about a section of low cost items? Such as for people who are living on a TIGHT budget. You could put in Ramen noodle recipes, ways to spice up mac & cheese, or how to turn a ramen noodle pack into a semi-rice cake type thing, stuff like that.

Go for it. That's difficult to do well, though. Kellen ^T 20:00, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia templates

The current wikipedia template for linking to the cookbook doesn't work so well (e.g.: "Wikibooks has a recipe for carrot...", when it should be "recipes using carrots", etc.), and as I had mentioned to Kellen earlier, I'd like to see something that looks a bit nicer thean the blue-gray link as it currently appears.

I'd like to propose something more along the lines of the following 3 templates. I think there should be 3 to differentiate between ingredients, single recipes, and groups of recipes.

Template:Cookbook-i-wikipedia

Template:Cookbook-r-wikipedia

Template:Cookbook-rs-wikipedia

For the image, I think it would be nice to change it every month to use the "featured recipe (I didn't do that for this one because that image does not have a copyright tag, and is not on commons (and I can't load it on commons with no copyright tag provided by the contributor). That's what I'm doing with the link template to A Wikimanual of Gardening:

It might need a better background color, but that can be changed at any time.

Any thoughts? SB_Johnny | ^talk 10:38, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Good start. I think that although we should change up the background color from the gray that it currently is, it should be in keeping with the (very desaturated and pale) color scheme of wiki(books|pedia). I'll try to come up with some color combos that look good. Also I think the wording might be better as "Recipes for Hummus can be found in the Wikibooks Cookbook" (or maybe "The Wikibooks Cookbook has recipes for Hummus" so that the location is specified first). Finally, it would be good if we could come up with some logo ideas so we have a unique identifier. We can actually change the corner logo based on the namespace, so the whole cookbook would be branded differently than main wikibooks. Kellen ^T 15:51, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

The traditional sister project link boxes have the actual link last on a seperate line to identify it more clearly. We might want to consider formatting the link somehow (italic or bold?). --Swift 15:43, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

How about deemphasizing the "wikibooks cookbook" like so? (indented abnormally for clarity) Kellen ^T 16:56, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually, the bolding doesn't appear on my browser (the font size is too small). Italicizing does. --Swift 21:20, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Speaking of emphasising the recipe; I feel that mentioning the Wikibooks Cookbook last draws emphasis from the recipe. "Plato wrote the dialogue Laws" feels to me like it is beginning to elaborate on Laws, while "The dialogue Laws was written by Plato" like it will elaborate on Plato. Hardly a great difference, though, I admit. --Swift 21:20, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Here's what I might do. Pick a color =) Kellen ^T 16:19, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

I'd vote for #fbf9ce. Looks most appetising :-). --Swift 15:36, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Do we really need two templates for plural and singular? I'd think the plural would suffice. Though a little inaccurate, as more recipes are added to the Cookbook these templates would "need" updating. Seems better to simply have one template.

Sure, a second template for ingredients could be useful. Alternatively, we could have an optional parameter (e.g. "use") which could be set to "ingredient" or something along those lines. I'm just wondering which would make the overview easier. A fairly simple multiple-template usage-overview solution would be to share usage documentation among the templates. --Swift 15:36, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Agreed; a multipurpose template is a better solution than three. I can help make this if help is desired. Kellen ^T 15:40, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

I strongly disagree actually: while it's more work to set up three templates, in the end it means less work as far as keystrokes and inevitable mistakes in the keystrokes. I'd rather just put in ((cookbook-i|ingredient name)) than ((cookbook|variable|variable|variable|variable...)). IOW, it's easier to figure out which of 3 simple templates to use than it is to learn how to use 1 overly complicated template, and they really should be easy to use, rather than "for the experts". --SB_Johnny | ^talk 17:39, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually, usually it comes out pretty much evenly. Every added variable is an extra little phrase. The "-i" will not need "variable|variable|variable|variable..." (:-D). I don't like in keystroke number arguments on their own (variable name length is a different, and better, one). The difference between ten characters for a slow typist is no more than ten seconds ... an insignificant time compared to the decision making process of which page to link to/from and where to place the link.

Nor do I think that remembering the difference between variables or template names is of great consequence.

My main concern is in the realm of maintainance and documentation. If a single template can be expanded a little by use of a little more complicated syntax, it will be a one-stop for those seeking information about it. Its documentation will list the available options which will give a nice overview. The alternative is to transclude/include (naming seems to depend on the project) the documentation. Personally, I find functional templates better than multiple ones.

As this is indeed a personal choice and of no critical significance, I've always though it should be up to the people who use these templates the most (e.g. those regularly contributing to the Cookbook should be allowed to organize their material — though I'm more than willing to share my thoughts and experiences). --Swift 19:10, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

No to linking in changing images: the template needs to become familiar and instantly recognisable. (Also, how would a pork or seafood related image be received by the world at large?) And it needs to maintain an appropriate family relationship with the rest of the Wiki templates (if it sticks out too much people will remove it from their neatly maintained pages). A Wiki style icon is needed for the cookbook. And absolutely: correct grammar at all times! It's hard enough dealing with human ideas of grammar, but fighting built-in defaults... There's no reason why templates shouldn't come in both multiple and single option variants. LittlePete 03:12, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Import enabled!

The import tool is now enabled for copying from wikipedia. We can directly copy recipes into the Cookbook: namespace, but is there a template and/or category to be affixed to these after import has taken place? --SB_Johnny | ^talk 11:09, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

The {{cookwork}} template should be added to the top of the imported page. User:Uncle G also had a cookbook-specific transwiki bot, which additionally added {{recipe}} or {{ingredient}} as appropriate. Kellen ^T 11:47, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Should that template be substituted? --SB_Johnny | ^talk 12:01, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Rather not. It would be hell to update. --Swift 21:25, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Oh, I wasn't talking about the recipe/ingredient things, just the {{cookwork}} template. I haven't been substituting that. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 21:46, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I see. The pro is that direct inclusion would automatically update the categorization if it were changed. That is unlikely, but the only drawback is that there are extra calls to the database. I wouldn't worry about that. --Swift 23:39, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

#How to categorize something that is both an ingredient and something to be made suggests a new categorization scheme which might be worth implementing. Not sure if this should be done at the import stage or later, though. --Swift 21:25, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm not fully convinced that the new scheme is the best naming convention yet, but it should be done at the time the recipe/ingredient is fixed and the cookwork template is removed, not at import time. Kellen ^T 08:02, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Import questions

Some of the cookbook-related stuff in w:Category:Copy to Wikibooks and w:Category:Articles containing how-to sections involve recipes or ingredients already discussed in the cookbook, but either have additional material (e.g. w:Dal vs. Cookbook:Dal), or have recipes that are different from the ones currently in the cookbook. I'm going to just transwiki these into the Transwiki: namespace (when there's no cookbook article yet, I just import directly into the cookbook), and then move them to the cookbook. What's the naming convention for this? Should they just be merged with the current article, or do two different recipes for the same-named dish get two different pages? --SB_Johnny | ^talk 14:43, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

It's a case-by-case basis. If the recipes are suitably similar, pick the best one and just trash the other (yes, it's okay to do that). If one could be incorporated as a variation on the primary recipe, do that in a new section. If the recipes really are substantially different and both are good, you can make a disambiguation page on the generic name for the result of the recipe (e.g. Cookbook:Hummus) and then put each recipe on a uniquely named page and link them from the disambiguation page. The new recipe pages should be named according to some attribute of the recipe if possible, but failing that you could use roman numerals to distinguish them (e.g. Hummus I and Hummus II) Kellen ^T 16:05, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Also, I remember a discussion several weeks ago about making articles for general cooking techniques. If anything in w:Category:Cooking_techniques would be useful, feel free to request imports at WB:RFI. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 14:47, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Duplicate recipes & similar

Looking thro these and ones such as Cookbook:Meatloaf and variations I was wondering if there was a policy on this. Could I propose for discussion (if there isn't) that they be incorporated in one page as sub headings showing Method 1, Method 2? In the case of actual dupes thro capitalisation (Fried Rice & rice for example), the the incorrect one could be a re-direct to prevent it happening again? Cheers --Herby ^{talk thyme} 16:47, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

There's already a policy, which I thought appeared on Cookbook:Policy, but it apparently does not. I shall write it up and direct you to it when I am done. Kellen ^T 09:55, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Okay, written up on Cookbook:Policy#Duplicate_Recipes_and_Disambiguation_Pages. The meatloaf page is following the policy. We decided long ago that it is better to split the pages rather than to have endless "method 1, 2, 3, 4, 5" on a single page. Kellen ^T 10:21, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

No problem, I'll go and read this properly - I was looking at dupe recipes category and wondered. In practice then recipes need marking as dupe ones to assist people finding them. --Herby ^{talk thyme} 11:57, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Ah yes, that category was made and populated by me when I have been going through all the recipes and doing basic formatting. It was a note for me (or you, now) to go in and either make disambiguation pages or merge them or whatever. That is; it's not meant to help users find recipes -- it's a utility category for us editors. Kellen ^T 13:54, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ext links

OK - someone won't like this I'm sure but Cookbook:Vegan cuisine seems to be breeding links - is there a policy on this sort of thing? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Herbythyme (talk • contribs) .

No there isn't a strict policy. I've been watching to ensure that the links were at least related to veganism, but haven't taken the time to actually cull the bad ones. On WP there is a similar problem, so we just delete pretty much any added links. They're more appropriate here since some of the links are for recipe sites, etc, but still we don't need all of them. Kellen ^T 09:53, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Kellen - it was a WP perspective I was coming from - I'll cease to worry! --Herby ^{talk thyme} 11:55, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Metric Measurements

Since 95% of the world use metric measurements (every country except USA, Liberia and Burma) it would be great if WikiBooks pages used both systems. Most pages I've visited use only imperial US measurements which means nothing to the rest of the world. I'm prepared to start to update all pages and use both systems but do we have any kind of template message that could be inserted on to the top of each page which isn't metricated so my job would be easier? Xania 20:41, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

I was thinking the same thing recently. There's no question in my mind that both systems should be used. The question of course is which measurement should come first. It's not very important either, but I think it should be made policy, so that it's done the same way every page. I also think it would be a good idea to use a simple template like {{unit|1 litre|33.8 floz}} or something similar for all measurements. That way it would be easier to create some kind of preference for users, so they can see the type of measurements they prefer. We might even be able to do automatic conversion (so you'd only have to say {{metric_unit|1 litre}} and the wiki software could calculate the rest) if the template system supports that sort of arithmetic easily.

I don't know if a maintenance template exists for this specific thing, but if not, you could probably create one. It wouldn't be a bad idea to set up some maintenance templates for the cookbook like wikipedia has. risk 07:49, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Virtually every page will have non metric units. Just go through the recipe index alphabetically and you'll hit most pages. A template message would be inappropriate. Tagging with a category might be okay, but you'd spend a lot of time just categorizing what will be the entire recipe listing. As for which should go first; it makes sense to have the original units first since they are authoritative. And as for having wiki software convert the units.... good luck. Kellen ^T 09:51, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Adding the category to the template would make things easier to find. You might need to find information on densities for some stuff though, i.e. from teaspoon to gram, ounce to ml.

A lot of the stuff I've been importing are Indian recipes, which are metric, and so need converting in the other direction as well.--SB_Johnny | ^talk 09:58, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm saying that it's not hard "find" these things. You go to any cookbook page, you'll get imperial units. You'd literally have to tag a few thousand recipes with "Hey this page uses imperial units", and have maybe 100 with metric units. It's silly to do it that way. A better way would be to tag the recipes you have converted and then use DPLs to generate a list of "things in category:recipes that are not in category:has_metric_units" or whatever. Kellen ^T 10:27, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

That may be true now, but what we're working towards is a cookbook where the pages without double measurements are in the minority, and then tagging the wrong ones would make sense. Even if it isn't much use now, I think it's a lot nicer to tag the pages that need correction instead of tagging ones that are good. I agree that tagging all pages with a maintenance tag is silly, but we could just hold off on tagging until it makes sense. And converting units with the wiki software won't work with the current implementation, but if the template syntax is improved, it would be nice to have all the measurements wrapped in templates. risk 14:41, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Your logic isn't wrong (it does theoretically make more sense to tag the incorrect things), but if this is going to be a major project for people, it makes sense to spend your time effectively (i.e. not doing lots of useless prep work). Try using DynamicPageLists and tagging the articles you have completed. In the end, you may do the same amount of work in adding the categories, but you'll do this work in conjunction with the (more labour intensive) conversions and you'll have fewer edits to do overall so you'll save time. Kellen ^T 17:21, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Here's how you would accomplish this, using DPLs and a theoretical category Category:Recipes with metric units:

<DynamicPageList>
category=Recipes
notcategory=Recipes with metric units
namespace=102
shownamespace=false
order=descending
</DynamicPageList>

Hope this helps. When you make this listing, you should try not to refresh it every time since it's quite a big database hit. Kellen ^T 17:26, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure that works... I just tried it, and it gave me categories, not pages. See User:SBJohnny/sandbox3 for what I mean.--SB_Johnny | ^talk 17:50, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

By default you get results from all namespaces (including categories). I've updated my previous comment to specify the Cookbook namespace, which should fix the problem. Kellen ^T 20:14, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't even know what dynamic page lists are - is there anywhere on Wiki which can help me with this? For now I'll continue to convert measurements and round up/down as appropriate (e.g. 1 ounce is 28g but nobody would ever be that precise so it'd be best to say 30g). Xania 19:48, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

You can take a look at meta:DynamicPageList if you want more info, but you should be able to just copy and paste the code I wrote above into a page, say User:Xania/Sandbox and get a useful listing of recipes. If you then add each recipe you convert to Category:Recipes with metric units, the listing will update to no longer show the recipes in that category. You will then have a listing of all non-metric recipes without the added work of tagging every single recipe as needing metric units. Kellen ^T 20:18, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks a lot. I've now set up both pages (the page for metricated recipes and the page in my sandbox for those needing metrication). I guess each time I update a recipe I'll need to manually edit the page for metricated recipes so it's removed from the unmetricated list - or is there any easier way? It's important that Wikibooks appeals to people from all around the world because most recipes at present mean nothing to non-Americans and they;re impossible to understand. I still fail to see how you can use cups as a basis for measuring weight! Xania 22:47, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure what you mean by "I guess each time I update a recipe I'll need to manually edit the page for metricated recipes so it's removed ". When you convert a recipe, add it to Category:Recipes with metric units and it should automatically disappear from your Sandbox page list (if you've used the same DPL code I pasted above). Kellen ^T 15:52, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

Oh, I see. You've created a flat, hand-maintained list on Category:Recipes with metric units. Don't do this. Instead, on each page with metric units, put [[Category:Recipes with metric units]]. The category will be updated and so will the list on your Sandbox page. Yeah and we don't really measure weight most of the time, we use a the volume as roughtly equivalent. Not good for bread, but fine for pretty much everything else. Kellen ^T 15:58, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

Just to jump in here, our current recipe formating policy (Cookbook:Policy/Recipe template) states: 'Quantities should be listed in whichever system (imperial or metric) the recipe was created in, with the other system's equivalent values listed immediatly after, in "()". This lets users know which units are "original" and which are estimated conversions.' So, the current policy supports having both systems on a recipe page, while preserving the actual recipes created by our authors. Gentgeen 10:13, 2 November 2006 (UTC) (I don't think that last bit made much sense, but it's 2:13 AM where I am, so I appologise.)

Thanks everyone. Yes it all runs automatically with no problems. A few of the early conversions I did have been added under 'm' for metric rather than under the correct letter in the metric category - I'm working my way through all these to fix them. All metric measurements if they are conversions will be added in brackets. Xania 22:01, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Recipe template suggestion

I noticed that the "recipe template (Cookbook:Policy/Recipe template) isn't actually a template. I use a few templates on A Wikimanual of Gardening that can be used with subst: and include other templates within them (see, e.g., {{weedprof}}... you have to open the edit window to see the included templates). Would something like "subst:new recipe" be handy? It might be especially nice for some of the transwikis, which have photos to go in the recipe infobox, etc. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 18:18, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure you can subst any page if you really really want to, e.g. {{subst:Cookbook:Policy/Recipe template}}. The recipe template as it is now is more of an illustrated guide on how to build a proper recipe page. On the German wikibooks cookbook, they (for some time) had a form which would populate a "new recipe" page with the template (no substing necessary) but it seems to have disappeared. Were we to take a similar approach (subst or not) I would think something much more minimal than the current template would be necessary to avoid lots of blanks and crappy additions. Kellen ^T 19:29, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

By "the current template" you mean the Policy/Recipe template page? Yes, definitely too much there. The {{weedprof}} one has "invisible instructions" in it that only show up on the edit page to avoid the need to remove things (or keep flipping back and forth to a policy page). Using a name like {{newrecipe}} would be a lot easier than typing that whole thing in, or course :).

Another variation of that (for the transwikis) could use a form similar to {{twwp-2}}, which is also substituted and adds 3 cleanup tags for 3 different chores. The "find a home" template wouldn't be needed for the cookbook (recipes can be transwikied directly to the cookbook namespace), and the {{newrecipe}} could both add the page structure and the {{cookwork}} message and category. I'm not sure if the dewikify would be useful or not, but the cookwork temp could include a link to Wikibooks:Dewikify to give people some pointers on that part of the process.--SB_Johnny | ^talk 21:16, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

If I remember correctly, the "recipe template" predates the creation of the template namespace, and has simply kept its now-confusing name. I'd have no problem renaming it something like Cookbook:Policy/Recipe guidelines. Gentgeen 10:19, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Major cookbook formatting complete.

For the past few months I've been systematically going through all the cookbook pages and doing obvious formatting, categorization, deletions and other types of cleanup. Today I have finished! There are still some things that need doing. Specifically:

• Go back over the past 3-4 months of edits in Cookbook recent changes and patrol/validate what anonymous and new users have changed. (I have done this in the past but have been slacking off)
• Make sure the recipes from the 1881 cookbook, the decameron and the oscookbook are converted and useful, or delete them. (Special:Whatlinkshere/Template:1881, Special:Whatlinkshere/Template:Decameron and Special:Whatlinkshere/Template:Oscookbook)
• Clean up Category:Cookbook pages needing work
• Delete bad/useless redirects
• Clean up all our Cookbook:Cuisines, which are a total mess.

Get to work! Kellen ^T 17:01, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

What can I say - congratulations - the tasks I will look at. Well done --Herby ^{talk thyme} 17:25, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

I'd be interested in helping clean up Cookbook:Cuisines... is there a page with pointers on that? I think I'd better do that for the Asian recipes in particular, because there's an awful lot of recipes on wikipedia categorized there as "cuisine of...", and a lot of these are cuisines of particular provinces in India, China, Pakistan, and Afghanistan (many of which look superlatively yummy, and often vegetarian which is good because my wife is not a meat-eater). I'd also just like to get more familiar with the cuisine cats because that would be useful to know when importing. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 19:57, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

No real pointers... We've just got a bunch of stubs that are either blank or have only minimal descriptive text. And they're inconsistently named and organized. Kellen ^T 21:45, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

They should all be on Category:Cuisines, though. Kellen ^T 16:03, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ingredients

I thoughtlessly edited this page when I added the ingredient butter to the ingredient subsection. I started out by fixing an alphabetic error but then added the link to test something. In doing so, I had an idea. When categorizing a recipe, the editor could pick up to three main ingredients by volume or mass. Or up to three ingredients that best characterize the taste of the dish. Use these as category items. For inclusion on Cookbook:Ingredient sub pages limit recipe inclusion to a maximum of those three main items. If a recipe contains a really unique item that creates a special taste this may be included as well. With this scheme clicking on an item in the ingredient list would take you to a list of recipes where the ingredient was one of the three main ingredients. Ingredient pages that have less than three recipes would not be elgible for inclusion on the ingredient subsection of the first page (Cookbook). Until such time they would have to be included under broader ingredient lists. The ultimate use of this is allowing you to look up recipes that focus on or use up something you want to highlight or get rid of. Apologize if discussed in detail in archives or somewhere else.--Psychofarm 17:58, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

It's already policy that recipes should be categorized by their major ingredients. If you check out Category:Recipes by ingredient, you'll see a lot of them. Kellen ^T 21:19, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Google Search

Past archives point to the frustration of not being able to use the searchbox without typing the prefix Cookbook: first. This month's Wikibook of the month on Nanotechnology, has an external link to a Google search box that specifies to search the Nanotechnology wikibook. I copied the link and substituted Cookbook and it works! Could we use it on our introductory page at the top? Here is the link: Search in Coobook using Google --Psychofarm 01:37, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

A link to the google search would probably be okay. It would be better to have a search done by mediawiki, with the InputBox extension, but the author would need to fix two bugs that I have filed against it. Kellen ^T 15:22, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Idea for beginners:

Hey, For noobie cooks like myself, I think It'd be very useful to list the necessary tools upfront. In many cases, having the right cooking ware is just as important as the ingredients.

Some recipes do this, but for all others, simply read the recipe one time through and you should be able to make your own list. Kellen ^T 08:34, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't know, I think he's got a point. Alton Brown's books always include what he calls a "hardware" list of the tools needed and a "software" list of the ingredients. There might be a "market" for such a layout. Gentgeen 22:52, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree. I'm no longer a newbie cook, but years ago when I started out I was always thankful that I knew, up-front, which tools I needed. That way I could buy any lacking equpiment when out shopping for ingredients (or choose a different recipe). Now when I write recipes for my friends, I always include two lists: Ingredients, and Equipment. I've always been thanked by my friends for doing so. -- Jason C Daniels 21:49, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

I think that this is particularly important when a special piece of equipment is needed. I'm sure I've had occasion in the past to actually buy ingredients for a meal, only to find I don't have the necessary tool - leading to a frantic search for a suitable substitute.

That raises another point - suggesting other options, when a specific tool is "required" but not always available. e.g. Socca is traditionally cooked on a 50cm copper plaque in a 300°C wood-fired oven; few people have access to either! This recipe suggests how to go about making socca with a lesser oven and a cast iron pan.

Having said all that, I don't think we need to alter every recipe so that it has an equipment section, as most are relatively obvious or assume only what is available in "most kitchens". It would probably be good to add the Equipment section into the recipe template, though. Here's one I prepared earlier, which I reckon fits the pattern - comments appreciated, before we go changing the template. Webaware ^talk 23:19, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use images

I have found a few fair use images being used only in the Cookbook. These images would easily be replaceable. Will someone replace them? I can find one thus far but have come across others.

1. Image:Salami.jpg (replaced by Commons image)
2. (another) Image:Pepperoni.jpg
3. (yet another) Image:Americas Favorite Grilled Cheese Sandwich.jpg (replaced by Commons image)
4. (#4) Image:Hotdog.jpg (nothing links to this image)

Thank you, Iamunknown 05:51, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I'll try to take a look-alike grilled cheese pic. be right back 24.205.34.217 20:22, 23 May 2007 (UTC) So, I'm back. Here: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Grilled_Cheese_with_hoisin.jpg#Summary is what I got. Had no American cheese, and I figured if I was going to use Gouda, I may as well go whole hog. it still captures the essence of grilled cheese: Crispy brown crust, gooey innards. Feel free to use, it's copylefted. 24.205.34.217 20:54, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, I've replaced it on the page that was using it. Webaware ^talk 01:40, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Lonely categories

I found a few lonely cookbook-related categories. Please find them a home. :-)

• Category:Leavening Agents
• Category:Final Process
• Category:Interim Process

Thanks! Cheers, Iamunknown 08:27, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Only one of these was actually a cookbook category, but I put the others up for deletion as they are unused, and created by an editor who hasn't edited anything since he made them a month and a half ago. Kellen ^T 16:52, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

I wanted to thank Iamunknown for pointing out the Leavening Agents category. Take a look at what I've done there and at Cookbook:Leavening Agent. The category page now transcludes the content from the Cookbook page, automatically updating both when any new information is added. Additionally, with use of the <noinclude> and <includeonly> tags, we can choose what part of a cookbook page is displayed in a category. For example, it may be good to include the opening section of Cookbook:Beef on Category:Beef recipes, giving some useful prose to the category, and only having it reside at one location. Just some thoughts. Gentgeen 00:55, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Another lonely category

• Category:Camping recipes

I looked all through the Category Tree, but I can't find a category for it. Neither Category:Recipes nor its subcategories appears to have room for "genre" categories. — User:Iamunknown 04:53, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Category:Recipes by preparation technique is probably the best fit for this. I've filed it as such. Kellen ^T 08:13, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Quick and Easy Recipes

I think there should be a category for quick and easy recipes. The new Betty-Crocker cookbooks have a section for 20 min recipes. I would like to expand on that idea and classify things as quick and easy. What should the requirements be for this section so it's not so subjective? I was thinking these recipes should be made in under 30-min with (at the most) less 10 ingredients, 5 pots and pans, and 10 steps for preparation. An example that I created is Cookbook:Beef Stroganoff. This recipe has 6 ingredients and requires 2-3 pots/pans and it can be made in under 15 min in 5 steps. What do you think? 67.181.242.202 05:08, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

We have Category:Very Easy recipes and Category:Easy recipes, but perhaps Category:Quick recipes is also appropriate. It would be good to do in an automated way, possibly with the recipesummary template, but I forsee lots of formatting problems arising from this. Maybe there could be two attributes, totaltimeinminutes would determine inclusion in "Quick recipes" if it's under 20 or 30 minutes or whatever, and the current time attribute, which just displays and can be in greater detail (baking time, prep time, etc all together). Kellen ^T 12:11, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] South Asian cuisines

G'day, I was looking at a few recipes from India and Pakistan the other night, and noticed a few things that buggered the bejesus out of me. Not sure which way to proceed, hence my questions now.

We have a category for recipes from this region - Category:South Asian recipes - and a page on the cuisines - Cookbook:South Asian cuisines - and a start has been made on cuisine pages and categories for each of the countries in the region. This is good!

The problem is that the countries in this region have had a complex history resulting in many shared "regional" dishes. Such dishes could be categorised as South Asian, or given multiple categories of Indian recipes / Pakistani recipes / etc. There are pros and cons to both approaches, which is where I arrive at this message.

What brings this all up now is that I did a little patch-up work on Cookbook:Makki di roti, which was evidently transwiki'd from WP where it was categorised as both Indian and Pakistani. Looking at Cookbook:Cuisine of Pakistan, I noticed that most (all?) of the recipes listed there were categorised as Indian, and that there was no Category:Pakistani recipes (there is now).

Now, if one was to categorise, say, aloo gobi as South Asian, because both India and Pakistan claim it, then that would reflect that it is common to many of the countries in the region. However, someone looking for quintessentially Indian curry recipes would be expecting to find it categorised in Category:Indian recipes (as it currently is). Which is best?

Worse than that, I believe that there might be some misconceptions in this cookbook as to which recipes are "Indian" and which are (separately or also) "Pakistani". For example, to my (rather limited) knowledge, Cookbook:Dosa is commonly made in South India, but not the North, and in the West (and possibly in Pakistan) is made differently as w:Dhokla (which more closely resembles Cookbook:Idli but cooked as a single piece - maybe! I've never seen one!) What would be best, of course, would be for people actually familiar with these foods to help categorise them properly.

OK, these are the problems. So, any suggestions? :) Webaware 10:04, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

A similar problem comes up with Category:Scandanavian recipes and Category:Swedish recipes, for example. I was not able to come up with a good solution for everything. Especially when talking about things like Hummus, which span continents... Kellen ^T 12:12, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps I'm being a bit naive, but isn't the solution to put it in all the categories where any ethnic group, state or other geographic/political group can rightly be said to have their own version of it? From what I've seen of curries, they tend to follow a very similar pattern, regardless if they're from Malaysia, India, North India, Pakistan or even Minnesota (ok... I'm shamelessly plugging my own skills... I'll stop now) Then on the page giving a basic curry recipe that's generally accepted as such by the major players; make notes as to substitutions, proportion changes, techniques, and other spice combinations that are typically used by the various regions known for curry. I can see the same technique applying to Scandinavian recipes. -- Jason C Daniels 22:04, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

I pretty much agree, and I've noticed that someone has already started adding "and Pakistan" to some recipes marked as being from India.

Perhaps a recipe should be marked as being from a region (e.g. South Asia, the Middle East) when it is broadly known across that region, and from countries X, Y, Z when just a couple of countries may lay claim to it.

Obviously, I haven't done much about this since I asked the question (three months ago!) but if you feel up to it, please step in! Webaware ^talk 23:06, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Photography

I've submitted some bad photos of food to this book before. While mine is the only photo of jambalaya, it was rightly moved to a footnote.

I found this article on food photography interesting; perhaps someone can condense these tips for use by cookbook contributors? For example, I know if I ever try for another Jambalaya picture, I'll use better light, raw celery painted with glycerin, and a better-looking bowl & place setting. --Polyparadigm 05:29, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Looking at the edit history your image was moved because it was for a variation rather than the "normal" recipe. You could move it back (maybe put it in a recipesummary template) without any ill effects or will by anybody I'd imagine. Kellen ^T 16:14, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

As for taking photos the best I can offer is (if you intend to eat the food in addition to photographing it) is to take photos near a window or outside to get appropriately bright lighting. Unfortunately this doesn't work so well for things you've just made for dinner or dessert... a friend of mine built a light box for just this purpose. Kellen ^T 16:20, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I love living in California, with a pool as a background! 24.205.34.217 20:55, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Units templates

I have been working on some template solutions that will automatically convert between metric/American measurement units. I would like to take some of the templates in use here on the cookbook (such as {{Kg}}, or {{g}}) and rewrite them to use this conversion process. At the moment, these templates only serve as links to pages in the cookbook that explain the different units. If people don't object to this change, I would like to get to work on it early this week. --Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 03:29, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Sounds good, in principle. However, I would like to make the following points about unit conversions in recipes:

• recipes aren't engineering – precision is generally undesirable and can be distracting, e.g.
  • 300°F → 150°C, not 148.9°C
  • 1 lb → 450g or even ½kg, not 453.6g (and conversely, 1kg might be better converted to 2lb, not 2.2lb)
  • 1 pint (US) → 500ml or half a litre generally, unless 470ml is somehow critical
• most mixes of flour and water need not be precise, as the cook will need to add extra flour or water to get the correct consistency for their ingredients and weather conditions
• I wouldn't bother converting things like cups, teaspoons and tablespoons, as they are relative terms and will normally scale well with the cook (e.g. 1 cup could be 200ml, 225ml, 250ml, but 2 cups is twice whatever 1 cup is, and ½ cup is half of whatever 1 cup is)
• watch out for imperial vs Queen Anne (US) liquid measures:
  • 1 pint (US) → 470ml, but 1 pint (UK) → 570ml

Webaware ^talk 07:08, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh yes, and: it's very important to leave the originally specified quantities in place, as cultural context can matter! I recently saw a recipe that had been "fixed" to say 30ml of soy sauce, when the original text said a few tablespoons – clearly a rough (and variable) measure by taste, not a precisely measured quantity. Webaware ^talk 07:14, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Have to say that I completely agree with Webaware - recipes do not make for easy conversion candidates. Taking bread as an example recipes will frequently say that such conversion is unwise and likely to lead to results that may not be satisfactory. I see it as desirable in some areas but in the case of Cookbook: caution is required --Herby ^{talk thyme} 07:45, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

In answer to many of the criticisms listed above, I do agree with these points. Due to the round-off errors inherent in computer arithmetic, there will undoubtably be problems in converting between systems. For instance, "1.973 cups" will only cause problems if the number is intended to be "2 cups". having a long decimal, such as "1.989991292 cups" will be even worse. My intention is not to use these templates in the cookbook itself. Most of these templates, such as {{Kg}}, and {{g}} are not used to show conversions or equivalencies, but they are instead used to provide links to cookbook pages that contain rough tables of these equivalencies. My point here is that the templates can be removed and replaced with the necessary links (a small task, considering these templates are only used in a handful of cookbook pages), and that the templates can then be used for other things completely external to the cookbook. In essence, I'm asking the cookbook to "donate" these templates to the greater wikibooks' community for use elsewhere.--Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 14:48, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Ah, my bad – I misunderestimated what you were saying. Sure, rip 'em out and use 'em for a good purpose, they're really not doing anything in Cookbook (except adding some double redirection). Webaware ^talk 21:39, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

I say go ahead and remove them from the cookbook pages, then use them for the general community. Kellen ^T 17:52, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Non-English cooking term translations

G'day, I've just lobbed in a bunch of Indian-to-Cookbook translations, currently just some common spices and veges. For want of a better home, I put them on the bottom of Cookbook:Cuisine of India. I reckon that it would be a useful thing to build up, particularly as some of the recipes coming into the Cookbook recently have had Hindi and Tamil names for stuff like cumin and chickpeas, thus frustrating the effort to wikify them.

However, such a list could get pretty big, pretty quickly. What is there now is just what I could be bothered banging out pretty quickly this arvo; I haven't even touched fruits and meats, for example. Whereas it seemed that the Cuisine page was the right place, I reckon it deserves its own page. Can I possibly abdicate responsibility for naming this new page? And while we're about it, are there other cuisines that could do with similar treatment? And yes, I know that we already have Cookbook:International food terms, but that really isn't the same thing, IMHO. Webaware ^talk 08:44, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Redirects for each of these to the english-name ingredient is probably appropriate, since the Indian dishes seem to mix both the hindi/tamil and english ingredient names. I think having these on Cookbook:Cuisine of India is fine, maybe transcluding or linking it to the international food items page might also be warranted. Kellen ^T 18:43, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

I like the idea about the redirects. However, the non-English names are often Romanised differently (e.g. v often as w, g as k or kk, and so forth) plus some names use short and longer forms interchangeably (e.g. coriander seed: coriander = kothamalli in Tamil, the seed may be kothamalli or kothamalli virai, or even varakothamalli, and the leaf (cilantro to them in the Americas) could equally be kothamalli or kothamalli ilai). I guess that we could try to cover all spellings, but that would be difficult - hence the list, so we can pick the name that it looks most like :)

I'll leave it all there on the Cuisine page for now, and make a link on the International food terms page. cheers, Webaware ^talk 23:30, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Scalability

How are you going to decide on what adjectives to use to modify "recipes" when you're dealing with countries like Côte d'Ivoire? Is there even an adjective for that example? And what is it? --Iamunknown 00:35, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

Ivorian. Webaware ^talk 00:59, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cookbook:Cuisine of Near East

Discussion shifted here from WB:VFD

The only cuisine listed here is Cookbook:Cuisine of Israel / Palestine, which is essentially covered by Cookbook:Middle Eastern cuisines through Cookbook:Cuisine of Israel and Cookbook:Palestinian Cuisine. If you feel that there is a reason to keep a Near East page, then please explain why; otherwise I reckon this page should go, and will list for speedy delete. Webaware ^talk 12:00, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't agree with it being here. I do agree it should be deleted. Given no other views over a reasonable period of time I will delete it now --Herby ^{talk thyme} 11:14, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] User rating of recipes

G'day, Frankatca raised a point in the Staff lounge about having some sort of user rating for recipes, a la Amazon book reviews. I know that we can already add comments on the discussion pages (and some readers already have), but I'm wondering if we could somehow direct people to rate recipes they've tried out, in a standardised way. I haven't thought this through (can't think too clearly today) but perhaps a template to stick on the recipe page, which presents a "click here to rate" link that lets a user pick a 1-5 rating and type in a rating comment. Perhaps ratings could be stored in a sub-page of the recipe in a standard format, rather than loosely on the discussion page, thus making it easier to keep track of ratings versus recipe / editing discussions. I dunno, brain only partially working here... what do y'all think? Webaware ^talk 08:12, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

There's no easy way to do this with mediawiki software and it might not jive with NPOV things. This is something that has come up repeatedly, but is not done obviously in any way on a wiki. Also, the cookbook shouldn't be seen as a "community recipes" site but as a reference book. Rating isn't really appropriate. Kellen ^T 09:06, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Allergy infoboxes?

Hi,

As a reader of cookbook recipes, it would be appreciated if some kind of info-box for allergy information was included on some recipes.

The common allergies being gluten, dairy and nuts...

If it were extended to include 'dietary' advisories then you could also state if a recipe was vegetarian friendly..

ShakespeareFan00 17:54, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

The diet-related bits (Category:Vegan recipes, Category:Vegetarian recipes, Category:Gluten-free recipes) are handled by categories, as for nut or dairy allergies, I don't think we currently have categories for these, but I'm not sure anyone will ever care to make them. Kellen ^T 15:22, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Additionally, I reckon it would be pretty complex to properly cover this - what about salicylates, biogenic amines, gluten intolerance (not allergy) vs wheat allergy, shellfish vs seafood allergies vs iodine intolerance, "dairy" vs lactose intolerance vs casein intolerance, peanuts vs cashew nuts vs true nut allergies, nightshade group vegetables/fruit (potatoes, tomatoes, capsicum family, etc.), allium family intolerances vs onion allergy – a box that marked recipes as "safe" would be bigger than the recipe. People with intolerances and allergies should be aware of the ingredients that are problematic for them, and avoid or modify recipes accordingly. I think that the category approach is best, for now at least. Webaware ^talk 22:11, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

I actually thought this was a good idea but reading Webaware I think I agree (happens sometimes!). Equally in a litigious (sp) world the opportunities for "I tried this recipes for nut casserole but it didn't warn me there were nuts in and I'm allergic" are endless (or is it only UK labelling that contains such things!) --Herby ^{talk thyme} 08:22, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Concerning allergies, I think the best thing you could do is to post a general allergy warning at the beginning of the book, such as "if you have a food allergy, read the ingredients list before you cook or eat any of this food". Because people who are allergic to something like nuts or dairy are likely to be taking some kind of precautions against eating those things, or else they would not be healthy enough to read our cookbook in the first place. A warning template here or there ("This recipe contains dairy products") might be the most you could do, without having to warn about every possible allergy/intolerance that people might have to food. --Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 11:54, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, anyone want to put make standard tages for this, so that I can tag recipes acfcordingly?

Or even a general allergy warning suggesting people check the ingredients list as suggested above?

ShakespeareFan00 15:48, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm not so sure about this. It sounds reasonable at first blush, as recipes for cream pies could be labelled with a warning about dairy in case a dairy-intolerant person is too ignorant of their own limitations to realise that cream is dairy. However, it could also be problematic, e.g. where a recipe blends milk or other liquids with the other ingredients, milk being used for a "richer" version but plain old water being used for a "less rich" version. Milk can also be substituted for by soy milk, oat milk, rice milk, ... should we deter the lactose or casein intolerant just because a recipe as written contains an ingredient that they can substitute something else for?

If the purpose is to provide legal coverage, then a standard book-wide disclaimer should suffice. Anything more would likely provide holes in the legal defence, unless we are all very diligent at tagging all recipes with ingredients that may harm someone (an impossible task, I would submit).

If the purpose is to inform the reader that a recipe is or is not safe for them to use, as written, then I would submit that an inclusive approach would be better than an exclusive approach. Tagging recipes as being unsafe because they have, say, dairy ingredients, marks them as undesirable, and could deter someone from modifying such recipes to suit their needs. Tagging recipes as being "dairy free", "gluten free", etc. is inclusive as it says the the recipe, as written, can be used unmodified for people affected by the specified problematic food. Putting recipes into categories already meets the inclusive approach, but if you feel strongly about pretty buttons, perhaps you could design templates for "Dairy Free", "Gluten Free", "No Nuts" etc.

Just my take on this, based on my personal assumption that anyone cooking food would know not to toss in an ingredient that their system can't tolerate. Webaware ^talk 05:30, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. As a person who loves to cook and who has gastrointestinal issues which results in numerous food sensitivities -- well beyond what's been discussed here -- I would hate a warning being slapped on recipes. In short if you've got problems with some sorts of foods, either you're making yourself suffer already unknowing, or you're already actively avoiding the problem foods. I think the motivation for this comes from the labeling that the food processing industry has to do. They share equipment for different products. If such a product is a common allergen, or severe allergen, then they must label their food as being processed with equipment shared with peanuts -- for example. And for those that have it as an ingredient, well, ingredient lists on boxes are so tiny, so that it's easy to miss a potential allergen item when reading it. Now contrast that with preparing the food yourself. If you missed the known allergen ingredient when reading the ingredient list, you probably didn't buy, handle, or use the problem food when making the recipe. This of course only applies to foods that are made only from base ingredients. (i.e. shellfish, peanuts ...etc) If a recipe contains a candy bar which is laced with peanut butter, it might be useful to know that before going to the store... BUT... If you're allergic to peanuts you should look up that candy bar online to get it's ingredient list. Just to be safe.

As I'm babbling here, I realized perhaps whats warranted is a general guideline page for basic safe cooking tips. Assuming a large population of newbies to the hobby of cooking it seems that listing more than just how to be aware of potential allergens in foods is a good idea. We could include basic safety tips such as how to put out a grease fire. (Use a powder based extinguisher, baking soda lacking the extinguisher, sand or dirt from outside failing that... BUT NEVER USE WATER!) I hope my pain-med induced ramblings are well received. -- Jason C Daniels 22:39, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Audio Cookbook ?

Hi,

Another suggestion, has anyone considered recording the Featured Recipes for possible inclusion on a podcast?

I ask because WikiCast - the free content broadcast, was considering having some kind of recipe slot. See: http://www.bitshuffle.org/wikicast/Recipe

Any budding Jamie's or Delia's ?

ShakespeareFan00 17:58, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Herbal teas?

Are herbal teas discussed in the cookbook? A couple of wp articles I transwikied for have herbal tea recipes in them... see A_Wikimanual_of_Gardening/Verbena#Herbal_Medicine for an example. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 12:30, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't see why not. We already have a few beverage recipes here, so why not some herbal tea recipes? I'm sure someone likes them, although they're not my, um, you know. Webaware ^talk 13:25, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] External links on Vegan cuisine

G'day, Cookbook:Vegan cuisine's external links are getting out of hand. The page seems to be a magnet for people wanting to push their website at present. Someone care to take it in hand, perhaps someone who can be bothered looking at all those vegan recipe websites to determine whether any of them should actually be linked to from that page? Webaware ^talk 13:28, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

I'll take a look. People do like to spam it. Kellen ^T 09:48, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for taking this on. I'm still not so sure about the 3 remaining links, however, as they are generically to recipe collections (as compared to specifically to information on eating or cooking vegan meals), and were likely to attract more of the same. As such, I've removed them too. If you have specific pages from these sites pertaining to vegan cuisine (other than just as another bunch of recipes easily found with a Google search), perhaps you could add them back. cheers, Webaware ^talk 06:17, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

There are unfortunately not many websites on basic (vegan-specific) cooking techniques. There used to be a really good page about vegan baking, but alas it has gone into the great beyond of the internets. Kellen ^T 20:41, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Also Vegetarian cuisine

Seems that Cookbook:Vegetarian cuisine has the same problem. I'll remove them all unless someone vets them before Friday (Aussie time, means Thursday in some places). They all look like links to recipe websites to me, rather than discussions about vegetarian cuisine. Webaware ^talk 22:56, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Copyright issues

(These are copied from Herby's talk page - there is a link there to this but this is the correct place for such discussion IMO)

"Hi - the recipes that you have added all look as though they come from a website ([1]) which has a copyright statement at the bottom of each page. If that is the case these will all have to be deleted as we cannot accept copyright materials here. Thanks --Herby talk thyme 16:58, 22 March 2007 (UTC)"

Retrieved from "http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/User_talk:Reever2"

Hi Herby,

Thanks for your comments about the copyright infringement, however i have permission from the Videojug website to use the content on their pages. I was actually told by a Wikipedia administrator (i know you're not totally associated with them!) that i could add pages to this website. The videojug website is actually a free resource for your users if they wish to get redirected to our website. Can you please let me know if adding material to your website is still ok. I believe that my content is valuable to the visitors at Wikibooks- so i really would like it to stay on your pages. Please can you reply as to the next stages, as i would like to add some more material (sparsely) but obviously it is quite time consuming! Thanks for the warning. Robert

Thanks for the message - as far as I am aware without specific written permission from the owners of the website t the Wikimedia foundation it would not be possible to host these pages as they are absolute copies. Please look at Wikibooks:Copyrights and then maybe Help:Boilerplate request for permission. I would also like a pointer to where you were given permission on Wikipedia to use the material and the admin's name - copyright policy is the same across all Wikimedia projects. Thanks --Herby talk thyme 09:48, 23 March 2007 (UTC) Retrieved from "http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/User_talk:Reever2"

I actually work for the organisation concerned, so i do have written permission from the website owner (in fact he is about five metres from me). If you would like me to change a few of these pages so they aren't absolute copies i can do that. The following extract came from Kariteh in the Wikipedia team. Hope that this is acceptable, and we can continue with this.

"This is the reason why the sister project Wikibooks has been created. Wikibooks is a collection of free "books" and annotated texts that are written collaboratively by anyone. While tutorials, guides, recipes, how-tos, etc. do not belong on Wikipedia, they are definively at home on Wikibooks. When people want to look for encyclopedic contents, they look here; when they look for how-tos, they look on Wikibooks. So you might want to check that project; there are a lot of other recipes there and yours would definitively be welcome. As a matter of fact, contents which are inapropriate for Wikipedia can often be moved to Wikibooks instead of being simply deleted or reverted". "So, as a conclusion, I hope you understand Wikipedia's reasonings and guidelines better now. Again, while recipes are not appropriate for an encyclopedia, they definitely are for Wikipedia's sister project Wikibooks". Kariteh 18:36, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

Ok- Thanks for your help on this matter. I won't add any more content to your pages until a decision has been made. However i would like to add that any external link coming from your site is predominantly promoting some product i.e. taking you away from your site to theirs/ another. We also do not sell any products on our site! I hope that an agreement can be reached. Thanks again for understanding and trying to get to the bottom of it before deleting the appropriate content. Hope we can resolve this soon.

Hope I'm not intruding here... In the US, apparently, recipes are deemed facts and thus are not copyrightable. I can get the reference if you need it. Chazz (talk) 21:00, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

I'll happily intrude also! US law does allow a list of ingredients, but a recipe is generally more than that. Where the recipe includes a description of the procedure or of the meal itself, it is subject to copyright law. [1] [2] [3]

Of course, WB must take into account the copyright situation in other countries too (yes, they do exist, they're out there somewhere!) so just because a plain list of ingredients is free of copyright under US law does not make it public domain for the rest of the world. Webaware ^talk 22:53, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Actually, a list of instructions (the procedure) isn't copyrightable. What is copyrightable is, as you say, the text explaining how lovely the dish is, or the particular way the dish's history has been described or whatever. But not the procedure. Kellen ^T 10:14, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

I suggest you go and read the links I provided. Webaware ^talk 10:43, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

A very good discussion of copyright with respect to recipes can be found on findlaw:

The short answer is that a single recipe is unlikely to receive much, if any, copyright protection, and a collection of recipes will be protected in its creative aspects, but less protected as to the specific ingredients and steps required to prepare a given dish. An author or cook considering publishing his or her recipes should approach the subject carefully.

Kellen ^T 09:09, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, an interesting discussion, which I read as "don't rely on copyright protection of your recipes". This is not quite the same thing as saying that copyright law does not apply to recipes; it does, but courts in the USA are wary of prosecuting violations of recipe copyrights due to technical complications. We should not take that as an invitation to allow breaches of copyright here in Wikibooks, however. Webaware ^talk 10:08, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Deletions

I want to delete the following for being variously horrible or unnecessary.

• Cookbook:Chicken Riggies
• Cookbook:Chicken Rice Salad - needs procedure (probably just chop chop)
• Cookbook:Carrots cooked kinpira style - no measurements
  • Now has measurements. (Webaware)
• Cookbook:Creme_Anglaise/trial - test page?
  • Delete as test page, probably of old attempts at {{recipesummary}} (Webaware)
• Cookbook:Creamy_Delight_Smoothy
• Cookbook:Easy_Orange_Smoothie
• Cookbook:Ethics - dumb, POV
  • Not keen on this but would like to see it done properly (Herby)
  • Yeah, very POV - could it be copyedited to more neutral language without losing some of its points? Some of them actually are valid considerations, albeit perhaps not for a cookbook. I dunno. See what others have to say about it. (Webaware)
  • I would agree with a rewrite. The whole while I read it, it felt like a stereotypical "vegan health nut" was breathing down my neck, telling me to go halfway around the world to get some fresh tofu, but not to neglect local growers, but to make sure that all food is perfect, et. al. Also, it contradicts itself at one point IIRC, stating that you should buy from 3rd world countries because they need the money, and then in the same sentence stating that local growers need money too. Very confusing, very POV, very little help. 24.205.34.217 20:06, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
• Cookbook:Faggot - no measurements
  • Now has measurements. (Webaware)
• Cookbook:Ernie_Salad - somebody's personal essay about a crappy recipe
  • Ernie, it was said, loved to talk about himself in the third person. Delete this Americanised Greek salad. (Webaware)
• Cookbook:Fantasy_and_Mythical_cuisines - dumb
  • - I have no problem deleting this one and will do so later unless there is an objection (Herby). Then I thought that Kellen might "rnjoy" dealing with this so I'll leave it! (H)
  • Category is surplus to requirements. (Webaware)
• Cookbook:Fruitmince - personal essay
  • A rambling memoir that should be moved to the discussion page and replaced with a summary in recipe format. (Webaware)
• Cookbook:Hot and Spicy Dip - seriously this is really stupid
  • Already gone. Was it at least funny? I don't remember it from my quick scan the other day. (Webaware)
• Cookbook:Italian_Pasta - merge with Cookbook:Pasta
• Cookbook:Marrow - no improvement since 2004, wrong place, etc
  • Could become a recipe one day, but hasn't yet. Besides, the best thing about stuffed marrows is the stuffing, which would be better expended on something flavoursome like eggplant. (Webaware)
• Cookbook:Nature - old WP naming of this page, makes no sense, content of questionable worth at best
• Cookbook:Pasta_alla_Carbonara - dupe of Cookbook:Spaghetti alla Carbonara
  • Duplicate, as identified. Delete this version. (Webaware)
• Cookbook:Fred_Steak - seem(s|ed) like a sneaky ad, but I suppose there is a recipe nested in there somewhere.
  • Strip the ad - keep the recipe? (Herby)
  • Sounds ridiculous enough to be a modern American classic. If people want to shove that crap down their throats, who are we to prevent them from cooking their own nasty version of it? (Webaware)

If no objections one week from today, I shall delete them. Kellen ^T 08:09, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

G'day Kellen, I had a quick browse and see some problems with your proposal. Some are junk, some are better stated in other recipes, some should be merged into other Cookbook pages, and some just need some copy editing. I'll attempt to address each one in detail, but not today. ITMT, can you explain why you want to delete the smoothie recipes? They seem fine to me, if a little thin on detail. Webaware ^talk 02:03, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

I looked too - I am not at all sure that they are all candidates for deletion. Some are - the Cookbook:Fantasy_and_Mythical_cuisines is one I would delete without any real concern but I think some actual reasons are necessary for any that really are going to go. A general "I don't like them" would cover quite a few bits of Wikibooks for me. --Herby ^{talk thyme} 10:36, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Ok. I had put these on my scratch page as things I thought should go, but I did it oh, 8 or 9 months ago, so I'm not 100% sure why I wanted to delete each one. It appears that some of them have actually become salvagable (e.g. Chicken riggies), whereas before I did not think they were worth the effort of trying to fix. I'll go back and annotate why I think things should be deleted or not. Kellen ^T 20:26, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Ok, added reasons. I tend to be pretty brutal when it comes to recipes. I think the recipes we have are by and large of poor quality and when I see a bad recipe I want to nuke it out of existence. The smoothies I don't like because they're just kind of obvious, but if we're allowing all sorts of recipes, whatever. Kellen ^T 20:39, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

• reset

Well I've "voted" on a couple of them! I'll look a little more later --Herby ^{talk thyme} 07:17, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

There, that's my take on the list. I'm not suggesting that I'm about to cook myself a Fred Steak with a side of Faggots, and (fruit) mince pies for dessert, but I recognise that not everyone has my good taste in food :P Webaware ^talk 08:04, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Simple recipes

Regarding Kellen's comments on "obvious" recipes, I'm starting to accept that there is no such thing any more. I'm on several food-related email lists (for various reasons) and have been utterly gobsmacked by the inability of many people to cope with the simplest of cooking concepts, a problem fostered by our packet-food-based society.

For some people, recipes with more than two ingredients and/or two steps to the procedure are simply too daunting to contemplate. Don't take simple recipes for granted, as they can be a nice first step away from the processed food industry for some people. Webaware ^talk 08:15, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Agreeing with this. A while back a celeb chef in the UK did a "basic cookery" TV series and got slated/loads of publicity for doing one show on "cooking eggs". When the fuss died down (quickly) the series was well received. I wonder how many folk actually learnt quite a bit from the series (I did) and whether there were not quite a few who got into cooking (and away from junk) via this. Some simple stuff is good --Herby ^{talk thyme} 12:18, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

What I think the WB cookbook could best do is fully and completely describe basic cookery concepts. This is not often done in cookbooks, nor is this type of information commonly available on the internets. I tend to think our recipes are generally crap, and I wouldn't shed a tear if 90% of our recipes were nuked. On the other hand, centralized information about ingredients and cooking techniques are invaluable; some of our pages are already quite good in this respect. Kellen ^T 12:49, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

I generally agree - there is a lot of poorly written stuff here, but I wouldn't be so quick to rip it all out - it's useful to someone, but could do with a bit of loving care. However, I'm totally with you on the cookery concepts bit. It troubles me that so many people are completely reliant on packet foods these days, especially given how crap most packet food is. Herby's comment about eggs rings a few bells too - both from being stunned at seeing a recipe for fried eggs in a recipe book, and from meeting people who manage to stuff them up every time. I quite like how some of the ingredients pages here tell you what to do with the ingredients, and I think this and the cooking techniques pages should definitely be expanded. All we really need is indefinite time to do it all, and money to keep us going while we're doing it, right? :/ Webaware ^talk 13:38, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm relatively new to the editing end of wikis in general, but it strikes me that recipes of all stripe should be here. What's childishly simple for one is insanely complex for another. Rather than remove simple recipes, why not tag them as needing improvement, or linking to related, more challenging recipes? Just my 2 cents. MatthewMiddleton 17:50, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Alternative Cookbook

Seen this? Webaware ^talk 09:29, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

100% should be merged or deleted. There is no reason for there to be a parallel cookbook. Kellen ^T 01:24, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Noticed it when it was created but didn't have time - something on the talk page (user or page) to suggest it being part of Cookbook:? --Herby ^{talk thyme} 09:43, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cookbook:Fruitmince

Moved from VFD Kellen ^T 00:53, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I've added this cookbook article as I don't think it provides any value to the Cookbook. It's written in an inpersonal style and hasn't been edited since it was written over two years ago. There is no actual recipe here and just general advice which is why I don't think it should stay. Xania ^talk 21:24, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Remove I agree. There is no useful information there. -- Jomegat 22:24, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Comment - see my comments in #Deletions, above. I won't be at all concerned if it gets deleted, however. Webaware ^talk 01:58, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Comment I've no problem with this being moved to Cookbook Talk but considering there are many other requests for deletion of Cookbook items (as per Webaware's link) we'd get more involvement if these kind of discussions took place in the main VFD page. Xania ^talk 01:17, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

It's kind of unnecessary to have the whole project look at content issues within the cookbook. If there is a site policy breach by a cookbook page, by all means take it to VFD, but I think things that are just kind of bad can be dealt with internally to the cookbook. Kellen ^T 03:33, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Comment - I'm all in favor of the authors of a Wikibook having control of the content of that book. I think the project-wide VfD should only be used for Wikibooks policy violations when the authors of the book fail to solve the problem and for the deletion of entire books, not for individual pages in an established book. In my view, the discussion here is appropriate. If other eyes are needed after this discussion, than either post a note at VfD or move the discussion there for a wider participation. Gentgeen 18:37, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Comment - 1) On the subject of this particular module, it seems to be a food essay. I don't know if food essays have been included in the past, or if we want them in the future. This is the first I remember seeing. 2) This essay is getting dangerously close to the "no original research" policy. However, here at the cookbook we get close to that policy all the time, as many of the recipes are technically "original research". We might need to revise the cookbook's policies in this area to establish where to draw the "NOR" line. Gentgeen 18:37, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Comment and remove My reasoning was that more people would view the discussion on VFD but now I've been proved wrong because of the number of comments above so this page is more active and more viewed than I thought. No problems then. Xania ^talk 20:41, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Random recipe

would it be possible to put a link (either in the main page or ideally in the side bar) that links to a random recipe? i think it would be a good featuer for the cookbook wikibook as unlike most of the books a cook book is normally read in a random order! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 144.82.192.102 (talk • contribs) 2007-05-06T07:35:38.

I don't know how easy this would be to do. It's easy enough to make a random page link to any Cookbook page, using Special:Random/Cookbook, but what you're suggesting would be a random page link to pages in Category:Recipes - don't know how to do that without a custom script (either server side, or some really bandwidth-heavy Javascript). Would it really be that useful, though? Webaware ^talk 08:25, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

At some point in Wikicookbook's life, it will grow big enough that just browsing through the pages becomes impractical. At that time, it could be really nice to have a wikipedia-esqe random button. I actually found a great recipe on Wikipedia with their random button, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brown_Windsor_soup . I could see a button like this being really handy. 24.205.34.217 20:11, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Hunting for some strange unit of measurement?

A Dictionary of Units of Measurement - found when hunting down an obscure measurement. Webaware ^talk 00:09, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Respect people's sentiments

Pl respect sentiments of all while adding a recipe to the main page.The current article about ham may not like by some people.203.81.200.237

A good point but with regards to food anything can not be liked by some people. Wikibooks is not censored and we should continue to offer a range of recipes even if they're not the norm in some countries, cultures or religions. Many Christians eat only meat on Fridays but we have no problem having an alternative food as the recipe of the day. Equally horse meat isn't very popular in the USA but I'd love to see it included as a featured recipe. Xania ^talk 21:30, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Search link

I have added a link by which people who (like me for a long time) do not know that there is a "search this book" link down below can search for their favorite recipe or ingredient, RV if you don't like the idea. Regards. Mattb112885 (talk) 21:30, 15 June 2007 (UTC)