BigOven Blog

Chicken Biryani, with Texmati® by Rice Select

Our friends and sponsors from Rice Select have contributed some great recipes to BigOven – they can be found here:  http://www.bigoven.com/user/RiceSelect. 

Sponsors like RiceSelect help keep BigOven free for millions of cooks.  As a home cook myself, I’ve been a long-time purchaser of their rices and grains (particularly Texmati®, a delicious basmati rice), and we here at BigOven are delighted to associate with them. 

I just enjoyed their Indian Chicken Biryani and wanted to encourage you to give it a try:

Indian Chicken Biryani: 

Ingredients:
3 tablespoons vegetable or light olive oil
1 large onion divided (half sliced thinly pole-to-pole; half diced)
1 (8 to 12 oz) chicken breast; trimmed and pounded flat to 1/3 inch
2 teaspoons curry powder; divided
2 teaspoons garam masala; divided
1 1/2 cups RiceSelect™ Texmati® Rice
2 1/2 cups water
1 cup frozen petite peas
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper

see the full recipe at BigOven. 

Link to BigOven and we’ll mail you two Reusable Grocery Bags!

Every year in the United States, over 200 million plastic bags are consumed.  Plastic bags can take up to 1,000 years to degrade fully, and they contribute unnecessary litter to landfills.  For this reason, many cities and states are now enforcing “bring your own bag” policies.  At BigOven, we’d like to support these efforts to cut back on plastic bag usage. 

You can help cut back on plastic bag usage with our sturdy, eco-friendly, reusable grocery totes.  

We’ll mail you two of these bags completely free of charge just for spreading the word about BigOven!

These totes are spacious and sturdy:

• Made from sturdy 80GSM non-woven polypropylene.
• 100% recyclable and reusable.
• Dual reinforced 20" carrying handles.
• Hemmed opening.
• 10" side and bottom gussets with matching covered cardboard bottom insert

Here’s how to get two bags free

Step 1:  Grab a BigOven badge and place it on your blog or website

Step 2:  Tell us where your link is via this form

After we verify your link, we’ll mail you two free reusable grocery bags.  Offer good while current supplies last.  (We’ll update this post when we’ve run out!)

 

Thanks, and happy cooking!

Refine your searches easily

We’ve just released a much-improved “refine your search” filter on BigOven.  By clicking the “Refine Search” bar found at the top of your search results, you can narrow your results with parameters such as:

• Photos only
• Only recipes I’ve added or Favorited
• Recipes with a particular set of tags
• Recipes with these word(s) in the title
• Recipes with these word(s) anywhere in the recipe
• Recipes including these ingredients
• Recipes excluding these ingredients
• Sort by quality (default), title, date posted, or rating

Watch our video to see how to easily refine your results:

BigOven lets you search within recipes you’ve added, restrict to photos-only and much more

The default search order for BigOven is "Quality." This is a calculated blend of factors, and it's not precisely equivalent to "rating".

That is, if Recipe A has a 5.0 average rating because it's only got one 5-star rating, it won't score as high in the default search results as a recipe that has a 4.8 average score from 200 different people (and which is on multiple cook's favorite list, has a photo, etc.) We think this is more reflective of the recipe's overall "quality"; there are other factors considered in the mix as well. You can always change the sort order by clicking "Refine my search".

Also, recipes that YOU add and favorite will rank higher in the default search. Changing the sort order to a different sort order will no longer reflect whether you've favorited, added, or try-sooned the recipe.

Thanks, Times of London

The Times of London named BigOven to its list of Top 50 Websites for Food and Drink.

Tips: New features added this week

1)  BigOven.com will now show you the last recipe you viewed right on the “Recipes” tab.

BigOven.com remembers the last recipe you were viewing and will show you it in the “Recipes” tab:

Just click the “Recipes” tab to find it again.

2)  When you add recipes to the grocery list, you can now review the new ingredients and cancel out of the add if you’ve changed your mind. 

One way to add a recipe to your grocery list is is to visit a recipe page and then click this button:

BigOven will let you review the items, or cancel out of the recipe addition:

Tip:  You can click on any of the fields (notes, name, department, etc.) and edit them before adding.  Press “tab” to commit the change.

3)  You can now add recipes to your Try Soon or Favorites list when browsing someone else’s “My Recipes” collection.

You can reach anyone’s “My Recipes” area from their chef page link, or directly via the URL.  For instance, since my username is “stevemur”, my chef page is http://www.bigoven.com/myrecipes/stevemur.  Simply hover over the recipe and you’ll see new buttons to Add to Favorites, Add to Try Soon.  This makes building up your collection easier than ever.

Look for these buttons: 

Add to Favorites: 

Add to Try Soon:  

RecipeLinks – Add or remove handy links to other recipes

BigOven lets you add, and now remove*, links to other recipes on any recipe page.  We call this feature RecipeLink™.  

RecipeLinks are handy ways for you to indicate things like:

• This recipe pairs well with another recipe -- also consider building a menu and sharing it with other cooks
• This recipe is a component of another recipe (for instance, this frosting is part of a chocolate cake recipe)
• This recipe references another recipe (for instance, Teriyaki Mushrooms requires the marinade in Teriyaki Chicken)
• This recipe makes good leftovers from this other recipe
• If you like this recipe, you may also like this other recipe
• This particular recipe is a variation of this other recipe
• … other options

*New feature as of today – you can now remove RecipeLinks that you post or that exist on recipes that you’ve added; this used to require a quick note to support.

How to create a RecipeLink

On www.bigoven.com, first find the recipe you’re interested in.  Down toward the bottom of the recipe detail page, just above the Reviews section, you’ll see a RecipeLink section:

How to delete a RecipeLink

Simply click the (red x) icon next to the RecipeLink.  You can delete a link if:

• You created the RecipeLink, or
• You posted the recipe page on which the RecipeLink appears

RecipeLinks are directional.  That is, you are creating a link from a master recipe to another recipe.  The second recipe doesn’t get a RecipeLink automatically; you need to provide it.

Clip recipes with BigOven–add them to grocery list, menu plan, and carry them with you

BigOven’s Recipe Clipper lets you capture recipes from your favorite recipe sites and food blogs.  Give it a try today!

Here’s a demo:

Readers Choice: Best Recipe App, 2013

For the third straight year, you’ve voted BigOven “Best Recipe App” in the annual Readers Choice Awards on About.com, with 89% of the total vote.  Thank you!

• 2013 Readers Choice Winner, Best Recipe App
• 2012 Readers Choice Winner, Best Recipe App
• 2011 Readers Choice Winner, Best Recipe App

In addition, we’ve received some nice recognition recently from these national publications:

• InStyle Magazine called BigOven a “Cooking App that Sizzles” in their March 2013 print edition
• Mashable called us “your best friend in the kitchen” in a great overview of our apps, and also put us on the list of Top 10 Android Apps for Your Downtime
• USAToday put BigOven #1 on their list of the only cooking apps you’ll ever need

BigOven is a community effort – your recipes, photos, ratings and product suggestions help us continue to design and deliver great solutions for home cooks everywhere.  We really appreciate the recognition – we’re working very hard to deliver to you the finest solution for recipe organization, meal planning and grocery shopping.  BigOven is available for free download for iPhone, iPad, iPod, Android, Android Tablet, Kindle Fire, Windows Phone and NOOK at www.bigoven.com/mobile. 

Mobile Phones: The new competitor for end-cap displays?

Bloomberg News has a fascinating story today on how we shoppers are increasingly turning to our mobile phones at checkout, and away from end-cap attention-getters such as magazines and candy. 

At BigOven, we’ve seen this trend in our data.  Mobile usage has grown dramatically year-over-year, very much including activity happening inside the grocery store itself.  BigOven’s mobile usage now exceeds our web usage by a considerable margin.  It’s clear that finding recipes, looking at your menu plan if you have one, and reviewing your mobile grocery list is something that’s a useful activity the grocery store.

To advertisers wanting to get their message to consumers at checkout or anywhere in the grocery planning cycle, we invite you to consider partnering with BigOven and getting your message where shoppers’ attention already is – on their smartphone.  With over 8 million downloads of our award-winning recipe and grocery list apps, we reach millions of shoppers on-the-go and at-home when they’re making their list or reviewing it in the store.  See our Advertise with BigOven section for more information.

And, in case you missed it, here’s a related, fascinating “then and now” photo from NBC News from Vatican City.  Reminds me of a time at Microsoft when I heard Bill Gates say that “in technology, we tend to overestimate what will happen in one year, but underestimate what will happen over the course of ten years.”  What a difference five years makes.

Photo credit:  Associated Press, NBC News

New Facebook integration makes it easier to connect with cooking friends!

You can now easily link BigOven and Facebook, letting you:

• Easily see which of your Facebook friends are on BigOven
• Get notified by email when they join BigOven, so you can swap recipes
• Sign into BigOven with a single click
• Get quick access to their favorites, try soons, and recipes they’ve added
• Easily invite other cooking friends to BigOven
• Share your favorites, try soons, and recipes you love on your Facebook Timeline

It’s all completely customizable; you’re in control of what you share.

See your Friends with the new Friends tab!

Introducing the “Friends” tab on BigOven:

This will show you which Facebook friends of yours are on BigOven. 

You get handy links to the recipes they’ve added, favorited, or marked “Try Soon”, making it easier than ever to share your inspirations with (and get inspired by) your cooking friends.

Note that this list will only include your friend if they’ve linked their Facebook and BigOven accounts; otherwise, BigOven won’t be able to do the matching.

From the Friends tab on BigOven, you can get easy access to recipes they’ve added, ones they’ve marked Favorite, Try Soon, and their profile page on BigOven. 

On the BigOven iPhone and iPad apps (4.1 and later), there’s a link to “My Friends”, which shows the list as well – you can see them wherever you go:

Invite Facebook Friends to BigOven

You can invite friends to share recipes on BigOven by clicking the “Invite” link.  Choose the friend(s) you’d like to invite, and they’ll receive a notification on Facebook which lets them easily join BigOven.

BigOven will email you when they join:

Linking BigOven and Facebook

If you’re brand-new to BigOven without an account, simply choose “I’m on Facebook” on the join page. 

If you’re already on BigOven, you can find the “Link to Facebook” option on your Profile area, which is accessible via the “My Profile” link at the top and bottom of any BigOven.com page while you’re signed in. 

There, you’ll see:

Click the “Link to your Facebook profile”, and log into Facebook.  BigOven will then ask you which information you’d like to share.  You can have BigOven update your Facebook wall when you rate a recipe 4 or 5 stars, add a recipe to your Favorites or Try Soon list, or when other Facebook friends join:

One-click Sign In

Once you’ve linked BigOven and Facebook, to sign into BigOven, all you need to do is click the Facebook login button in the upper right hand corner of BigOven:

BigOven Shares Your Best Cooking Finds with Friends

Cook together with friends!  If you’ve told BigOven to share your actions with Facebook, when you add a recipe to your BigOven Favorites list, BigOven will automatically log it to your Facebook timeline.  For example, when you add something to your Try Soon list, Facebook will update your Facebook Timeline as follows:

and when you Favorite something, your friends will see this in your Facebook activity stream:

Technical note:  At this writing, this only works via the BigOven website, but it will be soon incorporated into the iOS and Android apps.

Changing Your Settings

BigOven will respect any settings you adjust in My Profile. 

BigOven only sees the information you grant it access to on Facebook, and all actions adhere to BigOven’s strict privacy polices. 

Stay in touch with our latest updates

We’re making BigOven better all the time.  Got a suggestion?  Drop us a note.  Want to stay in touch with the latest news?  Join our Facebook group, or follow @bigoven on Twitter.