The Joy of Cyber-Cooking

Food sites are hugely popular on the Web. Fueling the growth: social networking tools that let home cooks share recipes, tips, and comments

by Catherine Holahan

The turducken mid-preparation.

Bonnie Bucqueroux is the Internet's own iron chef. Doubt it? Just watch the woman cook a Christmas turducken.

Ms. Bucqueroux, (pronounced "buck-a-roo" she says), wrestles with the meaty monstrosity in a homemade video on Epicurious.com, Condé Nast's online site for foodies. In the seven-and-a-half minute short video, Bucqueroux talks viewers through the proper preparation techniques to cook a deboned turkey filled with a deboned duck crammed, in turn, with a large-breasted chicken (deboned, of course). "It's enough to make the PETA people cringe," says Bucqueroux, a vegetarian who often cooks for her carnivorous extended family during the holidays.

As unusual as it is for a non-meateater to fix a multi-bird roast, it may seem even stranger that a home cook would bother to post a how-to film about it. But such user-participation is common for cooking sites. In fact, food sites are fast becoming the model for how content owners can integrate social Web tools to attract users and keep them on their sites.

The Social Chef

Online food destinations are some of the most popular on the Web. More than 58 million people signed on to food and cooking sites in November, says Nielsen Online, making it one of the largest categories on the Web aside from the social networking category itself. Helping fuel the popularity are tools enabling users to share their own content, such as recipes. Site visitors also can comment and rate contributions by others.

"I used to joke that recipe swapping was the first legal file-share that ever existed," says Deanna Brown, president of Scripps Networks Interactive Group (SSP), the parent company of cable's Food Network channel and its leading online food site. "We are all very social and taking advantage of what is now known as the social Web."

This year, many food sites further expanded their use of social tools, adding the capability to develop social-network-like profiles, upload homemade cooking videos, enter video cooking contests, and share recipe widgets on social networks such as Facebook. In July, Scripps significantly added to its user-submitted content features, acquiring user-generated recipe site Recipezaar for an undisclosed amount, reportedly near $25 million. Less than a month later, it purchased Pickle.com, a company that enables users to upload videos to Web sites.

Fifteen Minutes of Food Fame

Other food sites are building more user-generated capabilities. Yahoo (YHOO), which launched its food site in November, 2006 (BusinessWeek.com, 11/3/06), recently developed a widget for Facebook enabling users to share recipes. It plans to release similar applications next year. "The engagement is up, and a lot of that does have to do with the users and their loyalty to each other," says Maggie Nemser, senior editor of Yahoo Food.

In November, Epicurious.com launched a user-generated video contest. The contest ends on Jan. 2 with the winner receiving a $600 cookware set. Epicurious plans to unveil additional tools this spring that enable users to create home pages where they can write bios with their interests and upload recipes, photos, and videos. "What is so wonderful about people who love food is they really are generous of spirit and they really want to share," says Tanya Steel, Epicurious' editor-in-chief, adding that 95% of recipes on the site are commented on, rated, or reviewed by users. "We want to give them their 15 minutes of foodie fame."