Frequently Asked Questions

Technical

Q. What do I do if I forget my password?
A. First, try entering what you think your password might be. If that doesn’t work, you will be notified by an error message and a link will appear that will take you to a page where you can enter your username and email address. You will then be sent an email with a link to a unique url where you can enter a new password.

Q. Can I change my username?
A. No. If you would like a new username you will have to sign up again.

Q. What do I do if I forget my username?
A. If you forget your username, email us at , quoting the unique reference number that was emailed to you when you signed up. We will need to ask you for additional information about your account in order to find your username.

Q. How do I change my personal details?
A. Simply log in using the login box at the top of the page, then click on the link called "My Account". This will take you to a where you can update or change any of your personal details (except for your username). When you have finished, click the "Save Changes" button at the bottom of the page.

Q. How do I cancel my account?
A. If you really must, the only way to cancel your account is to not sign up again when your years subscription comes to an end. Any comments you made on any of the recipes will remain.

Q. Does this site use cookies?
A. This website does NOT use browser cookies, however, we do use session cookies. The difference is that browser cookies sit on your computer and can store information about you for any website that uses them. Session cookies sit on our computers and are deleted when you leave the site, so we can’t collect any information about your browsing habits (we wouldn’t anyway).

Q. What browser should I view this site with?
A. You can use any web browser you like to view this website, it has been extensively tested with many browsers on all the main operating systems. However, generally speaking, we recommend you use the freely available FireFox browser, because of its great security and excellent web standards implementation. (Note: You should not use Internet Explorer for the Apple Macintosh to browse this website, or any other website for that matter, use Safari instead.)

Culinary

Q. What do I do if I haven’t got an ingredient?
A. The simple answer is to either leave it out or substitute it for something similar (this obviously depends on the particular ingredient you are missing, if you are cooking, for example, roast beef and don’t have any beef, you may have a problem). Almost all the recipes will still be delicious, just slightly different.

Q. Can I suggest/request recipes?
A. Yes, you can, but we make no guarantees that we will cook them and put them on the site. If we receive a significant number of requests or suggestions for a certain recipe or a particularly interesting suggestion we will probably put it onto the site.

Q. What do I do if I want to cook for 100 people?
A. The easy part is simply multiplying the quantities of the ingredients to reach the desired number. The cooking times should remain the same if you a cooking a different number of individually portioned dishes (such as pork chops), if you are cooking a single large item that gets portioned after it has been cooked (such as a roast piece of beef) the cooking times are given by weight and can be easily calculated. The cooking temperatures will all stay the same. Also, we suggest you carefully plan the practicalities of how you’re going to cook it all and probably get someone to help!

Q. How do you determine your portion sizes?
A. Our portion sizes are based on what a typical adult should be eating, as well as being dependant on the portion a dish will naturally create (for example, we would suggest 1 lamb shank per person, because that is a natural portion for that dish).

Q. Should I trust my oven?
A. No. The built-in temperature probes in domestic ovens are wildly variable and often inaccurate. All the temperatures we give in the recipes are the actual temperatures, read using an oven thermometer. We strongly suggest you buy one (they are quite inexpensive) and permanently keep it in your oven. It can save you countless hours of wasted time and heart-ache.

Q. How do I change the units of measurement for the recipes?
A. First, log in using the login box at the top of the page, then click on the link called "My Account". That will take you to a page where you can edit your personal details. The table on the right of the page has all the different measures available, just select the units you want for the different categories and then click on the "Save Changes" button at the bottom of the page.

Other

Q. What do I do if I have a question that isn’t answered here?
A. Send us an email to . We are always happy to receive questions or comments and we will try and answer you as soon as we can.

Q. Can I buy a subscription for someone else as a gift?
A. Yes, Just sign up for an account yourself using all your information (but choose a username that the gift recipient might like because this cannot be changed). Once you have signed up, you will receive an email confirming your payment and you can then log in and change all the details to those of the lucky person receiving it as a gift.

Q. How do I subscribe?
A. Either click on the "Sign up here" graphic on the the home page or click here to go to the sign up form. Then you fill in your details, confirm your details, fill in your payment details, confirm them and, assuming everything is correct, you will have a fully paid-up, 1 year, instant access account. It hardly takes any time at all!

Q. Can I print out the recipes?
A. Yes, please use the "Print" button at the bottom of every recipe and choose whether you would like to print the recipe with or without pictures.