Give credit when it's due

There are tonnes of recipes available online (and offline) to pick when you need to bake a cake, or a brownie. Many times when you google, you will go straight into the first few links because that would probably be the safest choice. But very often, these recipes goes in cups instead of grams, or they use very specific ingredients that aren't easily available in Singapore.

Most of the time I find that recipe from the United States are generally sweeter. So when I adopt their recipe, I will go easier on the sugar. Or when I find a recipe that originates in Singapore. I will use the recipe wholesale because that would probably suit our local taste buds.

With the same few ingredients required in baking, it's very common that the chocolate cake recipe from Author A will have 90% of the same ingredients as Author B. But if you're adapting a recipe from another author, it's always best to credit them. These people may have taken time and effort (and of course money too) to perfect their recipe via many attempts. They may not have come up with the recipe from scratch, but it's important to note that the perfected recipe comes from their efforts.

I notice that it's very common for food bloggers to credit others for the recipe. They will go "adapted from author a", or "adapted from recipe at bbc.com". As a reader, you would have the full transparency to click on the link and compare how the recipes differ and which suits your taste buds better. You can also figure out where the tweaks were made, and if you need to tweak it further.

The above example is great. The author shared how she baked the cake and at the end of her post, she credited Hershey's.

This is even better. His printable recipe straightaway credited the lady whom he took the recipe from.

The reason why I brought up this issue is because I notice a local food blogger who is currently a little famous for the beautiful photos she take of her bakes (or cooked food). In her food blog, she shares various recipe ranging from cooking to baking. But I've noticed quite afew of her recipes were copied from another baker I know. She copied them wholesale, made no amendments to the recipe, and in some cases she even made them in the same design (e.g. cartoon cookies) as the original recipe. Other (e.g. cornflake cookies) end results look exactly like the original recipe because the entire recipe was taken in full. She made no credits and even share them on her blog as her own recipe.

At least she has the decency to take her own photos.

I am appalled because some of these recipes are adopted from popular websites with their own followers. Some can be easily found on the first page when you google it. And she makes these disclaimer on her posts not share any part of her photos/recipe/website without permission.

Now that's a little ironic don't you think?