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Recipes, cooking lessons, tips, tricks, food blog, and more.
Recipes, cooking lessons, tips, tricks, food blog, and more.
Nobody prepares a recipe the same way, even if the recipe is very precise. So why do restaurants and/or chefs obstinate themselves in keeping secret recipes or secret ingredients?
1 June 2010
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Loading ...Why are so many chefs or restaurants claiming secret recipes, or secret ingredients, I wonder? It's been "one of those things" that have been puzzling me for a very long time.
You get as many different results from one recipe as there are people cooking the dish. Even if the recipe is quite simple and specific. I wanted to demonstrate that to my students once, so I prepared a simple recipe for meatballs. I then asked them to cook that recipe, following it to the letter, without variation. There were 14 students in the class. I was presented with meatballs that looked 14 different ways and tasted 14 different ways. And none of them looked or tasted exactly the way my sample dish did! There were differences in sizes, shapes, how cooked the meatballs were, how crispy on the outside, how big/small the onions were cut, and the list goes on.
One of my first chef used not to share the finishing touches on his "signature" dishes. He would trust only one or two people in the kitchen. I became one of the trusted cooks after the "clog incident". I was shown all the so-called secrets. But the secret ingredients were really not all that much that they deserved such secrecy. In many ways I think it has more to do with the mystique of something "secret" than the actual secret. Ok, so putting a bit of cinnamon in the tomato & vegetable soup gave the soup a certain je ne sais quoi. But it wasn't worth locking up the secret ingredient in a box!
An old safe to keep the secret recipe.
Photo by il nostro uomo in francia License Creative Commons 2.0 by-nc-nd
I believe in sharing my recipes. I am comfortable enough in the knowledge that nobody will ever cook my dishes the exact same way I do. But even if they did, I'd be happy, because it would mean my dishes are making people happy. I believe in sharing my knowledge. The more people know how to cook, the more likely they are to cook more. That's good. We ALL win if we cook more, if we demand fresher ingredients, and more varied ingredients.
It occured to me that my thinking about cooking and sharing culinary knowledge is very similar to the world of Free/Libre Open Source Software (or FOSS). For those who aren't geeks, FOSS basically allows users to use, study, change, and improve the code, the program by making the source code available. Everyone benefits from that, as the software can be customised to one company's needs (a bit like you can adapt a recipe to be gluten free). Another benefit comes when improvement to the software are put back into the main program (a bit like someone saying "try it with blood oranges instead of lemons").
And here I am, still puzzling over the secrecy. Who gains from it? No one. Not even the person who keeps the secret, as they are continually worried that someone will steal the secret!
What do YOU think about secret recipes/ingredients?
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My doctor told me to stop having intimate dinners for four. Unless there are three other people. Orson Welles
I am with you 100% Nicolas; sharing is the way to go , there are no secrets, in the kitchen as well as in the studio. Share and it will come back to you.
Comment by: dario milano - June 1st, 2010 @ 20:35
You're obviously secure enough to share your recipes without worrying about others taking credit. Is that a rarity in your business?
Comment by: Dianne Jacob - June 2nd, 2010 @ 12:24
Hi Dianne, I think many people in the food service business are worried about people taking credit, yes. But unscrupulous people will take credit no matter what. The moment you put a recipe out there, it'll be copied, adapted, modified, and people will take credit.
I think it's healthy for the world of food to have people play with recipes. Of course I'd like credit/attribution given if someone reuses one of my recipes. But I think it's more important to share and take the risk of a few unscrupulous people "stealing" from me than to not share at all.
Comment by: Nic - June 2nd, 2010 @ 13:08
You are absolutely right! There is a great similarity with FOSS.
I really don't understand all this secrecy… and I’ve noticed it either with well known chefs or Greek housewife’s (well the older generation)…it is all about control ;-)
My grandmother never shared with anyone her secret "keftedakia" meatball recipe... What a shame...
Comment by: Myrto - June 13th, 2010 @ 13:18
Nic,
A quote that may support your point:
\"Don\'t worry about people stealing an idea. If it\'s original, you will have to ram it down their throats.\" ~ Howard Aiken
Carl Ingalls
Comment by: Carl Ingalls - August 20th, 2010 @ 11:52