Really enjoyed this peek behind the curtain for the process that goes into recipe testing!! I would love to hear how you made your way into this line of work, for sure! Also curious, are most of your clients newspapers or online publications? I feel like other than the big shot cookbook authors, first time or more niche or blog-based cookbook authors seem to try to crowdsource some of their recipe testing and it’s hard to imagine they are given a budget to pay professional recipe testers? But definitely a lot of cookbooks could use a lot more testing, based on a lot of Amazon reviews I read about measurements being off or gaps in the directions, etc. Your playlist is very eclectic! I totally get what you mean about not being able to focus when the music is too weird/new. I have a couple tried and true tailored pandora stations that I use for background work music and a lot of the songs repeat frequently enough, which works to make me not notice the words and just occupy my subconscious enough to free up my focus on what I need to focus on.
This was so interesting, Kara! And nothing gets me more than a recipe listing ingredients that are already chopped, cut, etc. Like, no, it's not "just a 20 minute recipe." It's going to take me twice as long since I have to prep everything!
This post is both a really great insight into what you do, and something I’m going to bookmark because as a professional recipe developer I think I should use your list of things you check for as a end of typing up a recipe checklist!
Thank you for answering all my questions—and more! You explained your work so clearly and thoroughly; no wonder you make such a great recipe tester.
"There’s a difference, isn’t there, in suggesting and asking: maybe the developer doesn’t care to explain because the reader should be capable of looking up something for themselves. Or maybe something really does need a little clarification. It’s ultimately up to them, I’m just here to pose the question." I love that mentality.
It reminds me of the writer Lucia Berlin; she edits her sentences down to the bone, so there's rarely any connective tissue even when she moves characters from one scene to another in the span of a paragraph. But she does so with a few signposts along the way, so that if you as a reader are lost, you can quickly regain your footing.
Really enjoyed this peek behind the curtain for the process that goes into recipe testing!! I would love to hear how you made your way into this line of work, for sure! Also curious, are most of your clients newspapers or online publications? I feel like other than the big shot cookbook authors, first time or more niche or blog-based cookbook authors seem to try to crowdsource some of their recipe testing and it’s hard to imagine they are given a budget to pay professional recipe testers? But definitely a lot of cookbooks could use a lot more testing, based on a lot of Amazon reviews I read about measurements being off or gaps in the directions, etc. Your playlist is very eclectic! I totally get what you mean about not being able to focus when the music is too weird/new. I have a couple tried and true tailored pandora stations that I use for background work music and a lot of the songs repeat frequently enough, which works to make me not notice the words and just occupy my subconscious enough to free up my focus on what I need to focus on.
This was so interesting, Kara! And nothing gets me more than a recipe listing ingredients that are already chopped, cut, etc. Like, no, it's not "just a 20 minute recipe." It's going to take me twice as long since I have to prep everything!
This post is both a really great insight into what you do, and something I’m going to bookmark because as a professional recipe developer I think I should use your list of things you check for as a end of typing up a recipe checklist!
Thank you for answering all my questions—and more! You explained your work so clearly and thoroughly; no wonder you make such a great recipe tester.
"There’s a difference, isn’t there, in suggesting and asking: maybe the developer doesn’t care to explain because the reader should be capable of looking up something for themselves. Or maybe something really does need a little clarification. It’s ultimately up to them, I’m just here to pose the question." I love that mentality.
It reminds me of the writer Lucia Berlin; she edits her sentences down to the bone, so there's rarely any connective tissue even when she moves characters from one scene to another in the span of a paragraph. But she does so with a few signposts along the way, so that if you as a reader are lost, you can quickly regain your footing.
Love this, Kara! Recipe developing is HARD (and FUN, too, most of the time), and more people need to understand the work that goes into it.