A headnote to a recipe on a blog states “Courtesy of Ina Garten.” What does it mean?
a) This recipe was taken from one of Ina Garten’s cookbooks;
b) This recipe is similar to something Ina Garten made on her tv show;
c) Ina Garten called the blogger up and said, “Please post my recipe on your blog. I really want it splashed all over the internet.”
For me, “courtesy of” means that permission is involved. Therefore (c) is the best answer to me.
Lately I’ve been seeing “courtesy of” all over the place. Sometimes it looks like permission has probably been obtained. For instance, if the blogger states that a review copy of a book has arrived and the book looks amazing I assume that permission for sharing a recipe came with the book. But without any back story, I wonder if permission has been granted at all.
Is it possible that some bloggers would choose answer (a)?
What do you think? Has “courtesy of” come to mean “taken from”? Is this an acceptable use of the phrase? Have you ever attributed a recipe with “courtesy of”? If so, what did you mean?
8 Comments
Interesting. I have never used “courtesy of” before, nor have I seen it. I will keep an eye out. I agree that it suggests some sort of direct permission was given to replicate the original recipe. In the situation where I review books, which isn’t very often I usually just use “recipe from”. I don’t adapt recipes from the books I review, although many times I would like to. I don’t think it is fair to the author and does not give an honest review of the book as many people who buy cookbooks are not at all comfortable adapting recipes.
Using “courtesy of” in a situation where the recipe was just basically “stolen”, well that is just wrong.
If I have received written permission from the author of the cookbook, I put “reprinted with permission”. Yes, I really do contact them and get permission.
If I have actually changed the recipe and the directions, I put “adapted from”.
If you don’t see either of those, it’s my own recipe.
I would think that some type of permission was granted if I saw “courtesy of”.
I’ve never used “courtesy of”. Like you, that implies permission. Even if I do have permission from the publisher or author, I’ve generally changed a couple of things for whatever reason, and say “adapted from” and make note of what I changed. Unless permission is granted, “courtesy of” is never acceptable. JMHO
I agree, obviously. And yet, I’ve been seeing it on so many recipes on blogs lately. Do you think the bloggers have obtained permission or is it more likely that they are mis-using the phrase?
I agree and I’d like to think that permission has been granted if “courtesy of” is used. But for some reason I’m not satisfied just assuming this is true. FOr some reason I want the blogger to come right out and say that permission has been granted. I guess that if “courtesy of” is being used correctly then that should satisfy me. But I guess i just am suspicious and am thinking that people are mis-using it.
I have never thought before about whether it is wrong to adapt recipes from books. I think you’re right though. If part of the point of your post is to comment on the book, then adapting the recipe doesn’t make sense.
I should have also specified in my comment that when I do review cookbooks, they come from the publisher with permission to publish specific recipes.
Yeah, that’s what I’ve noticed as well. My guess is that they allow the web-publication of the same set of recipes to all those who get a book. Then the result (in a perfect world) is that those few recipes are put on the web to publicize the book while the rest of the recipes are only obtainable if you purchase the book. When it works, it’s a win-win since the blogger gets a nice recipe to write about, the book gets publicized but the entire contents of the book do not get splashed all over the place.
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