Weekly Kitchen Insights - Recipes and Trends from Allrecipes.com

Hello! Here's a 'real time' update from the Allrecipes BI (Business Intelligence) team, AKA the data ninjas, reporting on what's been happening this week in American kitchens.

There was certainly a New Orleans influence going on, with Easy Cajun Jambalaya and Super Easy Mardi Gras King Cake among the top performing recipes. Even Stuffed Jalapeno Firecrackers include Cajun seasoning as an ingredient! Check out these hot, new recipes and Lessaiz les bons temps rouler! (That's New Orleans-speak for "Let the good times roll!")
           

Chicken and Wild Rice Slow Cooker Dinner was the most popular new recipe,  based on the number of recipe box saves.








       



Churros had the biggest increase in page views for the week.






                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         




It’s worth noting that Super Easy Mardi Cake had the second biggest increase in page views for the week.

 

Easy Cajun Jambalaya had the largest increase in printed recipes.

 

Stuffed Jalapeno Firecrackers had the biggest increase in recipe box saves.

- Post by Matt Decuir, Business Analyst

Read More

Weekly Kitchen Insights - Recipes and Trends from Allrecipes.com

Happy Friday! Here's the weekly update from the Allrecipes BI (Business Intelligence) team, AKA the data ninjas.

What recipes were actually popular for Valentine’s Day? Lots of desserts, including Chocolate Covered Strawberries, Sugar Cookies, Chocolate Cake, and a Chocolate Trifle. A lone lobster recipe, Broiled Lobster Tails, was also in the mix with the second most prints and the third most views week-over-week.

     

         Strawberry Cheesecake French Toast was the most popular new recipe

 

      Chocolate Covered Strawberries had the biggest surge in page views

      The Best Rolled Sugar Cookies had the biggest surge in prints

     

      Chocolate Lover’s Favorite Cake had the biggest surge in saves

-Matt Decuir, Business Analyst

Read More

Mardi Gras: Party Like There’s No Tomorrow

Tuesday, February 21 is our last chance to live it up before we give it up for Lent. Call it Fat Tuesday, Shrove Tuesday, or Pancake Day—it’s the feast before the fast.

And yes, I did say “pancake.” But what do pancakes have to do with Mardi Gras? Look at the ingredients: milk, butter, eggs, sugar—things folks would typically give up for Lent even way back in the Middle Ages. Whipping up a final feast of pancakes helped use up the good stuff before Ash Wednesday. To this day, pancake festivities are held around the world to mark the last day before Lent.

Hungry for pancakes now? You can read more about Pancake Week, get video tips showing you how to make light, fluffy pancakes from scratch and find yummy recipes for all kinds of pancakes.

Now for the rest of the goodies. We’ve pulled together our favorite recipes and party tips to help you kick up your heels with big eats from The Big Easy.

Recipe videos show you how to make Mardi Gras favorites like hearty gumbo and jambalaya.

There’s a colorful King Cake for your party centerpiece:

And a Hurricane cocktail worthy of Bourbon Street:

And a whole lot more to explore.

Think of it as food to fuel the fun, New Orlean’s-style.

Laissez les bon temps roulez!

~Vanessa Greaves

Read More

What’s the Most Romantic City in the U.S.?

Want to know the answer? We found out at Allrecipes.com! The most romantic burb in the U.S. is Salt Lake City, based on the number of Valentine’s Day recipe page views. Runner up is Des Moines, Iowa, and right behind are a cluster of Pennsylvania cities (Harrisburg-Lancaster-Lebanon-York) and (Wilkes Barre/Scranton). Omaha, Nebraska, is among the top five too. Sweet! Cooks in these cities must have cupid doing dishes in their kitchens.

Here at Allrecipes we love to slice and dice site information to see what recipes American home cooks are stirring, roasting and mixing in their kitchens. For example, the top Valentine’s Day desserts included red velvet cake and red velvet cupcakes (10 recipes among the top 100 overall recipes!), various cookies (7 recipes), chocolate cakes (5), brownies (3), strawberry tiramisu, and chocolate strawberries. There was one big surprise: pizza – Valentine Pizza – ranked #1 overall among the Top 100 Valentine’s Day recipes. Could you have guessed?

Top 20 Overall Valentine’s Day Recipes

Rank	Recipe	Valentine's Week % +/- 2011
1	Valentine Pizza	2348%
2	Strawberry Tiramisu For Two	2015%
3	Easy Valentine Sandwich Cookies	1960%
4	Chocolate Chip Cheesecake Brownies	1481%
5	Blue Cheese Crusted Filet Mignon With Port Wine Sauce	1411%
6	Spaghetti Pizza I	1106%
7	Parmesan Knots	1042%
8	Cream Cheese Cut Outs II	902%
9	Lobster Colorado	892%
10	Chocolate Strawberries	873%
11	Frozen Peanut Butter Cheesecake	834%
12	Egg And Cheese Waffle Sandwich	769%
13	Apple Glazed Pork Tenderloin	629%
14	Crab Stuffed Filet Mignon With Whiskey Peppercorn Sauce	621%
15	Scrumptious Shrimp Scampi Linguine	605%
16	Double Crust Stuffed Pizza	585%
17	Red Wine Reduction Steak Sauce	583%
18	Sexy Shrimp Scampi	567%
19	Easy Yet Romantic Filet Mignon	535%
20	Lobster Tails Steamed In Beer	515%

Valentine’s Day is also fun because of so many regional differences for favorite recipes. For example, home cooks in the Northeast love seafood and Italian dishes. Among the most popular Northeast recipes: Maryland Crab Cakes rank #1 and #2, Easy Chicken Cutlets, scallops, oysters, clam bakes, Seafood Piccata and Lemon Chicken Piccata, variations of French onion soup, Sausage-Stuffed Eggplant, and numerous pasta dishes were among the most popular recipes. Just two dessert recipes made the Northeast’s top 25 Valentine’s Day recipe list, both with ethnic overtones: Italian Love Cake and Alsatian Chocolate Balls.

In the Southeast, home cooks adore oysters, duck, and all sorts of Valentine’s Day desserts; 12 of the top 25 recipes for this region are desserts. Pralines are the #1 favorite, followed by Deep-Fried Oysters and Oysters Rockefeller, and four are for strawberry or cherry cakes.

Home cooks in the Midwest looked most for chicken dishes and French toast for their Valentine’s Day festivities. One favorite, Strawberry Pretzel Salad, the Midwest’s top recipe, was only 41% more popular than the U.S. average, compared to other regions where the most popular recipes were more than 2X higher than the U.S. average.

Strawberries, especially Real Strawberry Cupcakes, are Valentine’s Day favorites among Southwestern cooks—along with everything else, which includes Bacon-Wrapped Barbecue Shrimp, Cedar Planked Salmon, Boiled Lobster, Lobster Colorado, Tom Yum Koong Soup, plus a simple yogurt crunch dessert. Popular strawberry dishes included two versions of chocolate-covered strawberries and two strawberry salads, one with avocado and the other with feta. What’s not to like?!

As you might guess, home cooks in the West prefer lighter fare and more vegetables for Valentine’s Day entertaining. Bodega Bay Cioppino and two Swiss chard dishes pulled top rank for the top three recipes, followed by two asparagus dishes and Tom Yum Koong Soup. Cherry Balsamic Short Ribs, Coconut Curry Chicken, and tarragon chicken were the only meat dishes among the top 25 recipes for this region. All others were vegetables, seafood such as Lemon Rosemary Salmon, or desserts. Top dessert recipes included shortbread cookies, chocolate mousse, cream puffs, truffles, and éclairs, plus Love Letters, lemon-flavored sugar cookies folded to look like an envelope and sealed with a candied cherry.

What’s your special Valentine’s Day dish? Share it here, or tell us what new recipe you’ll try from the ones listed here.

Read More

What’s Cooking in American Kitchens?

If you’re wondering what was simmering, baking or being stirred in American kitchens last week, I’ve tabulated millions of pageviews in the past week to find the top performing recipes in the U.S. Looking at the numbers, I’d say a lot of people made a traditional football dip (Seven-Layer), and tried out a new one (Pizza Dip). And with the chocolate fondue recipe, maybe cooks are practicing for Valentine’s Day? Here are the new and top performers on Allrecipes.com from last week.






Amazing Slow Cooker Chocolate Cake was the most popular new recipe last week, followed by Easy Pizza Dip.





Seven Layer Taco Dip was the top performer across the board last week, the recipe with the largest increase in page views, prints, and saves week-over-week.






Ghirardelli Ultimate Chocolate Fondue had the second largest increase in views.

Baked Buffalo Wings had the second biggest increase in prints.

Hot Pizza Dip had the second biggest increase in saves.

More about the Seven Layer Taco Dip Recipe

We’ve been monitoring Seven Layer Taco Dip over the last few weeks because its popularity is very much tied to football games. In the last seven days, page views were up 38% comparing 2011 with 2012, which is impressive considering traffic for the recipe normally spikes during the week of The Big Game. Here’s a chart showing daily traffic, with a spike on 1/25/12 when I’m betting many fans started planning their party fare.

-Matt Decuir, Business Analyst

Read More

Allrecipes Measuring Cup Trend Report - February 2012

 

Meal-planning goes mobile as 43% of American families own smartphones, up 5% in the last six months of 2011*, while Allrecipes.com apps have 11 million downloads worldwide. 

INSIGHT 1: Shoppers are increasingly leveraging online technology at home and in-store to plan and carry out their purchasing decisions.
Smartphone use is surging as the home cook’s tool of choice for immediate access to product information, ingredients, recipe ideas, and shopping lists, based on findings from Allrecipes’ 2011 Grocery Trends Survey.

When grocery shopping, how do you decide what products and/or ingredients to purchase for your family? 

INSIGHT 2: 51% of home cooks use smartphones to find meal ideas while shopping in the grocery store.
42% also use their smartphones to refer to their shopping list while grocery shopping. Checking recipe ratings and reviews, and looking for coupons are also prime activities while shopping.

How have you used your mobile device while grocery shopping? 

INSIGHT 3: Younger cooks (aged 44 and under) are more likely than cooks over age 45 to use smartphones while grocery shopping.
Smartphone use trends higher for younger consumers in all major meal planning and grocery shopping activities: searching for recipes, looking up product information, and creating digital shopping lists.

Home Cooks Using Smartphones To Search for Recipes
While Grocery Shopping (by Age) 

INSIGHT 4: Recipe sites continue to be the preferred recipe resource for family meal planners, but mobile use is on the rise—up 75% YOY.
Although relatively small when compared with dedicated recipe sites, mobile usage is surging ahead of other online resources.

Which of the following resources do you use most often 

when looking for recipes online? 

About Allrecipes.com 
Allrecipes, the world’s largest digital food brand, receives 750 million annual visits from home cooks around the world who discover and share food experiences through recipes, reviews, photos, profiles, and blog posts. For 15 years, the Seattle-based site has served as a dynamic, indispensable resource for cooks of all skill levels seeking trusted recipes, entertaining ideas, everyday and holiday meal solutions and practical cooking tips. Allrecipes’ global, multiplatform brand provides insights into the kitchens and cooking passions of home cooks everywhere with 17 websites, 9 mobile apps, and 13 eBooks serving cooks in 23 countries and 11 languages. 
For additional information about Allrecipes, please visit allrecipes.com. 

Please Contact: 
Stephanie Robinett 
Director, Communications 
206-708-9271 
stephanier@allrecipes.com 

*Source: Nielsen, November 2011 
The 2011 Allrecipes Grocery Shopping Trends Survey was hosted on Allrecipes.com in March 2011, with participation from 2,500 U.S.-based Allrecipes’ community members. No incentives were used to reward or encourage participation. 
The Allrecipes Measuring Cup Consumer Trends Report is derived by analyzing the site behaviors and search data from more than 750 million annual visits to Allrecipes.com, along with survey data from Allrecipes’ online surveys.

Read More

Twitter Giveaway | Five Days of Sweets for Your Sweetie

Love is in the air! We’ve launched the Valentine’s Day page and the talk of flowers, chocolate desserts, and dinner plans are in the air at the Allrecipes.com office. Have you started planning your special day yet? If you haven’t (we won’t tell), this Twitter giveaway will give you the kick start you need!

Every day this week, we have a great dessert-inspired goodie bag to giveaway. A big thanks to Whole Foods for the delicious chocolates and drinking chocolate you’re about to drool over. Below are the details, tweet @Allrecipes or leave a comment if you have any questions. Good luck, Allrecipeeps!

For those who are not on Twitter, you can start an account here: www.twitter.com
All giveaways are open to U.S. residents only.
Winners will be announced shortly after 2 p.m. PST each day.

Giveaway #1 – Monday, 2/6/12
Between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. PST, tweet your favorite chocolate dessert to be entered to win the giveaway. You must also include @Allrecipes and #ValentinesDay in your tweet.

Stumped on which chocolate dessert you want to tweet? Check out the Top 20 Chocolate Desserts on the site to help narrow down your choices.

Example:
Too Much #Chocolate Cake is my go-to chocolate dessert! Happy #ValentinesDay, @Allrecipes!

Giveaway #2 – Tuesday, 2/7/12
Between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. PST, tweet your ideal Valentine’s Day dinner to be entered to win the giveaway. You must also include @Allrecipes and #ValentinesDay in your tweet.

Perhaps Valentine’s Salmon or Beef Wellington is on your menu? Have a favorite restaurant in town? This giveaway may give your special someone a hint or two on what to plan for next Tuesday.

Examples:
My ideal #ValentinesDay dinner is the @Allrecipes Macadamia-Crusted Sea Bass.

@Allrecipes, I would love to go to @mattsinthemarket for #ValentinesDay (hope my husband sees this tweet!)

Giveaway #3 – Wednesday, 2/8/12
Between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. PST, tweet your favorite breakfast in bed recipe. You must also include @Allrecipes and #ValentinesDay in your tweet.

What does a sweet start to your day taste like? Are you a Crème Brulee French Toast fan or will the classic breakfast dish of eggs, bacon, and toast put a smile on your face?

Example: 
On #ValentinesDay, I’d like to wake up to @Allrecipes Orange Pecan French Toast and freshly squeezed OJ!

Giveaway #4 – Thursday, 2/9/12
Between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. PST, tweet your favorite Valentine’s Day cocktail. You must also include @Allrecipes and #ValentinesDay in your tweet.

Is champagne your go-to romantic drink? Tell us what you like to sip on while celebrating!

Example:
My #ValetinesDay drink of choice this year will be ginger champagne from @Allrecipes, candied ginger on the side!


Giveaway #5 – Friday, 2/10/12
Between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. PST, tweet what you’ll be doing to help your kids celebrate Valentine’s Day. You must also include @Allrecipes and #ValentinesDay in your tweet.

Will your kids exchange Valentine’s Day cards? Sending them to school with mini Red Velvet Cupcakes? Tweet what you’re doing with your kids for a chance to win!

Example: 
#ValentinesDay cards are set to go; kids will also be taking heart-shaped cookies to school. @Allrecipes

Read More

My Hungry Valentine

Vanessa Greaves
Senior Editor, Allrecipes.com

Could anything be as romantic as my husband making Valentine’s Day dinner for me? I’ll never know because the dear man claims he can’t cook. There is a silver lining, though—I do the cooking and he cleans up after me.

What will I be making for Valentine’s Day dinner? It just might be Valentine’s Salmon. It’s got that WOW factor, but this video shows you how easy it is to pull together. And I love that it looks gift-wrapped!


Or I might go for a simple shrimp scampi. This recipe clocks in at less than 30 minutes—a plus since Valentine’s Day falls on a weeknight this year, and who’s got a lot of time anyway? Besides, there’s something kind of sexy about eating with your fingers.

For dessert I’m thinking mini cakes with warm, chocolatey centers or classic chocolate-covered strawberries.That’s right—I like to say it with chocolate, and I’ll bet you do, too.

They say the way to the heart is through the stomach. I say that’s true no matter whose heart you’re targeting on Valentine’s Day—spouse, child, teacher, co-worker, BFF, hot date—you know who’s on your list.

We’ve put together a special Valentine’s Day feature packed with sure-fire ways to feed all your flames. You’ll find recipes, cooking videos, how-to tips, and plenty of ideas for sharing the love—from breakfast in bed to decadent desserts, and pretty adorable classroom treats for kids. (I might have to whip up some red velvet cupcakes for my son’s homeroom.)

Go on and feed your hungry valentines with recipes made from the heart. And if your sweetheart does the cooking, you can at least show some love by doing the dishes.

Read More

Game Day--Halftime Treats

With a full roster of NFL playoffs blitzing your TV screen this weekend, we’re proud to debut a special feature that highlights the very best football food on Allrecipes--we call it Game Day. Seth Kolloen, one of the editors who helped create Game Day, stopped by the blog to give a little tour.

Game Day--Halftime Treats

If anyone has room after eating all the dips, chili and wings, halftime is a great time to pull out some sweets. Your guests may not eat them right away--they’ll have their eyes glued to Madonna’s halftime performance, or, more likely, the Puppy Bowl--but they’ll start to pick at them as the second half progresses. I love, love, love the main photo on this page, a shot of cookies decorated in the colors of every single NFL team. You’ve got to check it out.

In addition to cookies you could ice and decorate, we’ve got a few more ideas for Game Day treats:
--Sweet party mix
--Pretzels, sweet or salty
--Classic cookies
--Brownies
--Cake

The only thing sweeter than these treats would be seeing your team win the Super Bowl. Good luck with that--my Seahawks will have to wait ‘till next year.

Read More