Cookingfilter

January 4, 2008 6:31 PM

Are there any askmefi-like forums that revolve around food and cooking?

I have occasionally posted to a (self-described) elitist internet food forum with questions that rarely get good answers--if they get answers at all. Most of the folks on the site seem to be under the impression that everyone makes their own organic vegetable stock and only cooks Zuni recipes. Anyway. I am looking for online forums, listservs, blogs or chats where I could ask questions like:

"What dishes can I make with [x ingredient]?"
"I want to try making [insert non-traditional dish with few online recipes]. Any suggestions?"
"I am cooking for [family member] who only eats [X and Y] Help me feed them but still create a fun dish!"
"I want to try cooking a totally new cuisine - help me find one!"


And get informed, fun, and create responses.

I love to cook, but have no shame shopping at your average Safeway for normal ingredients--I need a more proletariat cooking site. Every time I post at unnamed-elitist-food-forum, I live in dread of snarky, pitying, or empty response pages. Help me combine my love of cooking with the internet!

posted by xaire to food & drink (18 comments total)

Actually, Ask MeFi itself tends to get good answers to those kinds of questions -- Matt and Jessamyn have remarked on it a few times in the podcast. Take a look at other posts tagged with cooking.
posted by danb at 6:37 PM on January 4

Er, creative responses. Not necessarily with perfect spelling and grammar.
posted by xaire at 6:37 PM on January 4

You could try the cooking forum on That Home Site.
posted by pammo at 6:45 PM on January 4

If the elitist site you're referring to is eGullet, I've always considered the Home Cooking forum on Chowhound to be the populist version of that sort of discussion environment, with an equal (or greater) number of active participants. They're very chatty and very tolerant of double posts.
posted by rxrfrx at 6:52 PM on January 4

You may know this already but on the Wiki there lives EatMe, collected and sorted food AskMes.
posted by shothotbot at 7:14 PM on January 4

Seconding rxrfrx, the boards at Chowhound sound exactly like what you're looking for.
posted by wuzandfuzz at 7:24 PM on January 4

If the elitist site you're referring to isn't eGullet, check out egullet.org. I've been reading there for years and haven't caught so much of that elitist vibe from the Cooking forum. The questions you give as examples seem like ones that would get pretty good answers there.
posted by Daily Alice at 7:28 PM on January 4 [1 favorite]

I like Cooks Talk, sponsored by Fine Cooking magazine, if that's not the elitist forum you're already disillusioned with.

http://forums.taunton.com/tp-cookstalk

It does require registration, but you can opt out of the marketing spam. I've been reading and posting there for more than five years, and have seen lots of good answers to questions like your examples.
posted by Bruce H. at 7:36 PM on January 4

Chowhound is the best.
posted by HotPatatta at 7:39 PM on January 4

The Home Cooking board on Chowhound, just to add a link for the previous recommendations.
posted by jacquilynne at 8:08 PM on January 4

Egullet is awesome.
posted by Ostara at 9:52 PM on January 4

MeFi was one of the direct inspirations for Serious Eats, especially the Talk section. SE makes a real effort to be inclusive (I've found it a lot less likely for newbies to be flamed than at, say, Chowhound or Egullet). My wife works on the site, so that's my disclaimer, but it's won a bunch of awards and recognition on its own anyway, so you don't have to take my word for it.
posted by anildash at 9:55 PM on January 4 [1 favorite]

I will definitely third eGullet. If it's not the forum you're talking about, it sounds like it's exactly what you're looking for. Chowhound is also worth another vote, if that's not the one you're talking about either.

One other place you might want to try is the Cook's Illustrated/America's Test Kitchen forums.

You may want to also check out ChefTalk, which is partly aimed at professional chefs/students, which gives it a different vibe and a slightly different set of knowledge.

Some of the bigger food blogs like 101 Cookbooks, Chocolate and Zucchini, and Cooking for Engineers have small forums.

Also, RecipeZaar has a forum, albeit a kinda clunky one, though it's probably as proletariat as you can get. It gets slightly less clunky as you click through. Both RecipeZaar and AllRecipes have search by ingredient, which can be a good way of just finding ideas.

Hope you find something!
posted by wander at 12:39 AM on January 5

AskMe has always worked well for me, as evidenced by the many additional and marvelous links here. Thanks OP and everyone else. More things to waste my time on line! Yay!
posted by nax at 7:26 AM on January 5

Believe it or not:
http://cooking.livejournal.com/
If you don't want to join LJ, you can always get an OpenID. (If those let you post to communities. I have no idea, honestly.)
posted by wintersweet at 9:57 AM on January 5

The Goons with Spoons forum over at Something Awful is quite good and as an added bonus, entertaining.
posted by lazywhinerkid at 10:33 AM on January 5

These are phenomenal - will keep me busy for awhile! I'm going to try them all, so no favorites. Thanks everyone!
posted by xaire at 2:58 PM on January 5

I like the forums at Epicurious, I'm surprised no one has mentioned that yet. Egullet, Chowhound, and Goons with Spoons are all great too.
posted by bradbane at 10:12 AM on January 6