Recipes

How we write and check our recipes

Every recipe on Old Timber is written by us for the species and cut it names. Here is what that means, and what it does not.

Who writes them

Old Timber writes each recipe from scratch with AI assistance, then reviews it against food-safety and culinary references. We do not copy other publishers' recipes.

Testing

None of our recipes has been kitchen-tested yet. We keep a record of every change to every recipe, and when a recipe is cooked and checked in a kitchen we will mark that recipe, and only that one, as tested.

Doneness

We match the method to the cut. Tender whole cuts like backstrap and tenderloin are written to a pink center, with the temperature to take them off the heat, how long to rest them, and how much they rise while resting. Shanks, neck, shoulder and legs cook slowly until tender, because tenderness, not a number, tells you a braise is done. Ground meat, game birds, bear, fish and wild mushrooms follow their own guidance.

Where a recipe's culinary target is below the federal food-safety temperature, the recipe says so once, below the method, with the reason and who should cook to the federal temperature instead.

Sources

Food-safety guidance comes from USDA, FoodSafety.gov, FDA, CDC and university extension services. Culinary temperatures and carryover come from published cooking references. Each recipe lists the sources it relies on.

Photos

We do not show photos of finished dishes we have not made. The few photos on recipe pages show the raw ingredient. Recipes without a fitting photo use a plain text card. Photo credits are on the About page.

Corrections

If something in a recipe looks wrong to you, trust your thermometer and your judgment first, and tell us. We fix recipes and record what changed.