News

03rd May 2011

Belling Launches Twitter Campaign to Create World's Shortest Recipe Book

Delia Smith is Britain’s wordiest TV chef – analysis of the UK’s bestselling celebrity cook books show her roast beef recipe to be almost three times longer than her celebrity chef counterparts. 
Research by UK cooking manufacturer, Belling, declared the cooking stalwart the industry’s biggest pontificator after making a meal out of explaining how to cook a simple roast beef dish. The study saw Delia, peak at a word count of 872, with Nigella (not so express) at 787 and Jamie (it takes 30 minutes just to read the recipe) at 773, not far behind.
The analysis, which delved into the UK’s bestselling celebrity chef cook books, as well as home cooking legend Mrs Beeton, found that despite the fast paced nature of today’s family life, the average word count for a roast beef dinner was still a lengthy 430 words, with the longest recipe taking over five minutes just to read through.
At the opposite end of the scale, home cooking pioneer Mrs Beeton came out on top as the most succinct chef taking just 156 words to explain how to cook a perfect roast sirloin of beef – mainly because she avoids wordy introductions preferred by most of her modern day counterparts.  Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall , James Martin and Gordon Ramsey also fared well in the brevity stakes with 254, 288 and 304 words respectively.
Now Belling is campaigning to remove recipe ramble from UK kitchens and has turned to Twitter cookery innovator @tinyrecipes  to show that there is another way.
A pioneer of 140 character recipes (or twecipes) @tinyrecipes has a cult following on twitter thanks to the simple and to the point nature of its dishes. Working together Belling is bidding to bring twecipes to the masses, by crowd sourcing what could be the ‘World’s Shortest Recipe Book’.
The world’s Twitterari is being asked to tweet their favourite recipes in just 140 character recipes using #Tweetpie (or a www.belling.co.uk). The best recipes as chosen by Belling and @tinyrecipes will be included in a book which will be published and sold in aid of FoodCycle, a charity that redirects edible surplus food thrown away by food retailers, to create nutritious meals for people affected by food poverty.
That’s not all, ten entrants will also be drawn at random to win a Baby Belling Black – a new black version of Belling’s iconic table top oven.
Need some inspiration? Delia and gang could have cut their word count down dramatically if they’d opted for this for their roast beef recipe …
Rst bf - Rb beefw/ salt,ppr&olvoil. Sear in r/tray on hob, tfr 2 oven 240° 4 20min, rdce heat 2 190°, 30min pr k 4 rare, rest, crv #tweetpie
Spag Bol - Fry garl, onion, brwn mince+thyme, gls rd wine, tin toms, msrooms, sson, simr 40 min. Boil pasta 10 mins. Srv w/parmsn #tweetpie
Risotto–Sftn onino, garl & celry in olvoil+rice, tn up heat+splsh wine, stir,+stock, stir, rpt till cooked+butter & parmsn, srv #tweetpie
A full glossary of Twecipe terms, hints, tips and twecipes from the experts is also available at www.belling.co.uk/news.
Steve Dickson, Commercial Manager for Belling, said: “Our research is a bit of fun but it certainly demonstrates the gulf that is starting to appear between traditional chefs and online cookery pioneers. The twecipe format is ideal for people who are short on time but still want to create a home cooked meal. Who knows, maybe some of the UK’s celebrity chefs will take heed of our findings and will soon be producing their recipes in twecipe format!”
Craig Dugas from @tinyrecipes said: “140 character recipes are tiny cookery adventures. An entire dish can be created by someone that may have never tried it before, all from a recipe that's about the length of one sentence.
“One day you can share with someone how to create instant cake using a few ingredients, a coffee mug, and a microwave, while another day you can provide instructions to make an elegant brushcetta pasta. I look forward to seeing what you can come up with – you’ll be surprised!”

ENDS
Notes to Editors:
The analysis was conducted based on WHSmith.co.uk’s food and drink bestseller list (as of 14th February 2011) and Mrs Beeton’s Book of Household Management:
• Celebrity chefs chosen for inclusion were based on the WHSmith’s food and drink bestsellers as of 14th February 2011
• The term celebrity chefs refers to chefs who have a TV profile
• The highest placed book was chosen from each chef
• Each chef only appears once in the analysis even if they have numerous entries in the bestseller list
• Only generic cook books were included – e.g. any book specialising in one type of cooking was omitted (pasta, gluten-free, Slow cooking, etc)
• The analysis was based on a roast beef recipe with accompaniments as described in each book
• If no roast beef recipe was included the book was not included for analysis