Recipe testing
A solid, clearly written recipe always impresses. I offer detailed feedback, concise suggestions, and reliable results.
Apple tart by Safia Osman.
What to expect
I’m here to help people enjoy cooking your recipes and trusting your brand.
As a serious home cook and food enthusiast with a keen eye for detail and exceptionally strong writing skills, I strive to make every recipe a positive collaboration that delivers results beyond expectation.
If you’re creating content focused on cooking (a website, book, blog, etc.), you already know that successful, well-written recipes are critical to growing your brand’s success with engaged, interested followers.
Skills I learned as a teacher translate directly into how I write thorough step-by-step directions. One of my principles as an educator — people want to feel invited to learn, not pressured — requires a lot of detail and organization behind the scenes. My cookbook shows examples.
Click here for a sample of one of my recipes. I’m happy to provide other examples of my work, including before-and-after treatments, editorial content, and how-to’s.
Writing over 300 recipes in the last few years has been one of my greatest pleasures. I want to cook well when I follow a recipe, and I’m passionate about helping others do the same.
Additional skills, insights, and experiences:
I’ve worked in NYC restaurants. I recently spent two years as a waiter at Lincoln Ristorante at Lincoln Center in New York to deepen my understanding of commercial cooking. I also wrote their menu descriptions for staff training.
I also helped manage the opening of an upscale 70-seat full-service restaurant and was a front-of-house consultant at a famous Hell’s Kitchen wine and cheese restaurant.
There’s an entire sidebar in my cookbook dedicated to kitchen scales. The words “bunch” and “handful” do not appear in my book!
My background in designing and editing publications in marketing environments, along with a BA in journalism, serve me well in taking rough, first-draft material and polishing it into prose with broad appeal.
I’ve lived in Los Angeles, the Bay Area, and New York, absorbing food trends at every stop.
I can also style and photograph your recipe, including process pics. See my Food section in Photography.
How I work
I evaluate the overall recipe, and then I really get into it. I provide the client with thorough notes and questions. Is everything clear? Does the cook feel confident throughout the process? I assess the order and clarity of directions, ingredient quantity accuracy, and the final outcome.
I also check for these three items:
1 – Consistent standards
They are crucial to recipe success. For example, my cookbook has a recipe roadmap to explain the book’s conventions. Also, my recipes highlight user-friendly hints, such as pointing out that 2 teaspoons of lemon juice will require about 1/2 of a lemon (no need to make beginners guess). A legend explains all of the abbreviations.
2 – Rigorous organization
We all know that creating a mise en place is the most efficient way to cook professionally. But many home cooks don’t even own three ramekins.
So, I instead use the phrase “First things first” as shown in this excerpt. It’s not a complete mise, but these up-front steps get most of the prep out of the way so the actual cooking goes faster with more pleasure.
Also note the lines “While bacon fries—” and “While onion cooks—.” The steps that follow help the reader make the most of passive cooking time.
3 — Built-in timesavers
Nobody likes wasting time while cooking. Here’s how I would suggest new language to streamline and simplify.
Original — In the middle of a recipe, a step in the directions says to “Boil water for pasta.” The recipe is inadvertently asking the cook to watch water boil. Ugh.
Better — Instead, say at the beginning: “Fill a 6-quart pot 2/3 full of cold water. Cover and set over low heat.”
This simple step preheats the water and removes guesswork about amount and pot size. Just before the boiling water is needed, say: “Turn pasta water up to medium-high. Add 1 tsp. salt and stir to dissolve.” Easy! The saved time makes for a happy cook.
