THE PROCESS OF developing a recipe for Cook’s Country Magazine can take weeks or even months. Each recipe is assigned to a test cook or editor, who shepherds it through an Step one is research. What is the story behind this dish? Where does it come from? Was this dish invented in a specific place by an identifiable person, or did it evolve over the years in hundreds or thou-sands of home kitchens?
Next comes experimentation. If recipes for this dish already exist, the cook will prepare several of them, usually five or more, to get a feel for various techniques, ingredients, ratios, and results. The cook will draw up a rough working recipe based on these forays.
Then it’s time to grab a microscope and train it on every facet of the working recipe. Are the ingredient amounts just right? The timing? A quarter-teaspoon of salt here or there or an extra 10 minutes in the oven can make all the difference. After multiple tests, the cook shares the recipe with teammates; external professional testers; and, of course, our army of vol-unteer recipe testers across the country.
The reports come back. How did the recipe do? Did home cooks find the instructions clear? Did they identify any complications? Did they like it? Would they make it again?
It’s this last question that matters most to us.
If less than 80 percent of home recipe testers say that they’d make it again, the recipe goes back to square one.
Would you like to join the ranks of our home recipe testers? We’d love to have you. There’s no obligation—we’ll send you recipes every now and then, and if they interest you, you can cook through them and report back with your thoughts. If they don’t appeal, no sweat! We’ll try again with some new recipes in a few weeks’ time.
To sign up, visit CooksCountry.com and scroll to the bottom of the page. Click on “Be a Recipe Tester.” We’ll walk you through it from there.

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