Or anything, for that matter,” Sifton says with obvious pride. “We don’t have, and I hope we never will have, some of the issues that plague the comments sections of news sites, where people are displaying vituperative language about race or gender. And if the 456 notes-and counting!-on a simple chocolate-chip cookie recipe are any indication, I’m hardly alone. No other comment section has made any tangible improvement to my life, let alone several. I’ve made substitutions for certain hard-to-find ingredients and taken a leap on a flavor combination that initially raised an eyebrow. Thanks to the Cooking community, when attempting to replicate a beloved Chinese restaurant’s signature dish, I skipped the laborious deep-frying step, opting instead for a much less messy stint in the oven. Scroll down on any given Cooking page and you’ll find scores of testimonials from people who’ve already conducted the kitchen experiment you’re currently mulling over, offering their experience for your own culinary benefit. But what truly makes Cooking such an oasis is much more mundane. A woman named Sydne Newberry infamously used Katharine Hepburn’s brownies to share a scandalous tale of infidelity and betrayal the introduction to Craig Claiborne’s parsleyed noodles became the unlikely fodder for a widely circulated meme. Occasionally, the stray Cooking note has crossed over into the culture at large. I see that on other recipes, and I’m glad that we don’t have those comments, because we don’t have comments. That’s very different from ‘Leave a comment on a recipe.’ And the comment might be ‘I hate you.’ ‘You’re an asshole.’ ‘This is bad.’ And that’s helpful to no one. “The call to action was to leave a note on the recipe that helps make it better. “We made the conscious decision not to call them comments,” Sifton tells me. This might be because Cooking’s comments aren’t comments at all-they’re notes, a distinction Times food editor Sam Sifton emphasizes several times over the course of our conversation. Held up against Ortberg’s fictional-but-also-too-real responses, Cooking’s are genuinely additive, have a ready-made takeaway, and best of all, inspire downright bonhomie toward my fellow man. The posts attached to the recipes on The New York Times’ stand-alone Cooking site are everything the archetypal internet comment is not. While I generally go out of my way to avoid comments (including and especially on my own work) like the plague, one form of crowdsourced feedback has become an attraction rather than a repellent-as much of an attraction, even, as the original content it’s attached to. There is, however, at least one exception to this otherwise ironclad rule. Whether the topic at hand is border walls or beef bourguignonne, the tragedy of the commons is the same. Small wonder, then, that comment sections-designated areas for free-flowing discussion and principled debate-have become notorious for being anything but. The public shaming (“If you use olive oil for any recipe that’s cooked over 450☏, the oil will denature and you will get cancer. The total non sequitur (“ so this will make a great addition!”). It turned out terrible this recipe is terrible”). Store in an airtight container for up to 3 days at room temperature.In a satirical post for the now-defunct website The Toast, writer Daniel Mallory Ortberg once cataloged “All the Comments on Every Recipe Blog.” The results are funny, but also an accurate taxonomy of the species that populate the internet’s open spaces, food-related or not: the user error attributed to the original author (“I didn’t have any eggs, so I replaced them with a banana-chia-flaxseed pulse.Bake at 350✯ for 13, or until edges are just barely golden brown.Using a serrated knife, slice chilled dough into 1/3-inch-thick rounds and place them 2 inches apart on parchment-lined baking sheets.Chill for at least 1 hour, preferably overnight. Remove small handfuls or spoonfuls of dough from mixer and plop them down on the middle of a sheet of parchment or wax paper, creating a log about 1 1/2 inches wide and 12 inches long.On low speed, add the sifted flour mixture.Add the egg and vanilla and mix just until fully incorporated. Beat in the brown sugar and salt until light and fluffy. Using an electric mixer, cream the butter for about two minutes (the original recipe says "until a lemony color," but I never noticed a change in color).Sift together flour and baking soda and set aside.
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