How do y'all make a recipe yours before you use it and sell it to the public? I know it's okay to use a recipe for your family and think nothing of it. My hubby suggested adding, subtracting or altering a small something in the recipe to make it mine before selling it to the public.
Thanks!
Just MY opinion - but I think IF you are planning on SELLING a recipe - then it should be something that you have developed yourself
I know there isn't too much NEW out there - but I think it needs to be a lot more than just substituting a few ingredients to make it 'yours' - especially IF you plan to gain financially from it
By developing it yourself otherwise it's not yours. There's nothing wrong with selling cake baked from a recipe you found in a cook book in my opinion. As long as you and your customers like it. Now if you were selling the recipe itself, then changing one or 2 things doesn't make it yours and it won't be okay to sell it as your intellectual property.
What I do, is determine what I want to bake, then find several top rated recipes for that item. I read through EVERY review-what people liked, didn't like, changed, etc. Then I make notes and combine elements from all of those recipes. For example, last night I baked a pan of caramel apple cheesecake bars. I combined four different recipes I found on the web. I ended up deviating from the original recipe (Paula Deen) entirely. I have some good solid recipes that I found in cookbooks or on the web to which I have only made slight changes. Unless you know baking science well, it will be difficult to develop a brand new recipe from scratch. I don't know many people who do that.
What I do, is determine what I want to bake, then find several top rated recipes for that item. I read through EVERY review-what people liked, didn't like, changed, etc. Then I make notes and combine elements from all of those recipes. For example, last night I baked a pan of caramel apple cheesecake bars. I combined four different recipes I found on the web. I ended up deviating from the original recipe (Paula Deen) entirely. I have some good solid recipes that I found in cookbooks or on the web to which I have only made slight changes. Unless you know baking science well, it will be difficult to develop a brand new recipe from scratch. I don't know many people who do that.
I totally agree. One more thing I suggest which I did was to read baking science textbooks that explain the 'why.' Understanding bakers ratios also helps A LOT. Once you know the function of each ingredient, and how to balance different quantities of it relative to the other ingredients to get a specific result, creating your own recipe would be a lot easier.
Another important aspect of recipe development is the method. How is it put together? That makes a HUGE difference in the result you get. Many times the recipe isn't as important as the method. I've heard that one can post a recipe but the method/instructions would be 'privileged' information. Knowing when to add what, how to add it, for how long to mix, and at what temp to bake etc make such a difference that two bakers can use the same recipe and end up with different tasting results. This happened once in class (I'm in Pastry school); same recipe and each group had different cakes.
Thanks guy for the ideas! I was thinking along the lines of Annie Cahill does and use several recipes to end up making mine and making my notes, etc. when I'm doing one for my family. There is a baker who isn't around anymore and I love the sound of her recipes (my fil swears by her cakes) and I wanted to use some of those. I might take her recipes and look for updated versions, etc. and make my own. 
I'm not big on the science part of baking, lol. I'll have to really study that- I've often wondered why I must do x first then add y. Maybe I just need to experiment more.
By developing it yourself otherwise it's not yours. There's nothing wrong with selling cake baked from a recipe you found in a cook book in my opinion. As long as you and your customers like it. Now if you were selling the recipe itself, then changing one or 2 things doesn't make it yours and it won't be okay to sell it as your intellectual property.
You might tell that to Martha Stewart, who has made her reputation doing that (AND profiting from it.)
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