Reviews For Bon Appetit Magazine

I have been reading Bon Appetit off and on for the past five years or so, and I have been comparing them to Gourmet (subscribe) and Food & Wine. I have seen the quality of the content diminish over the past years. The Recipes Request section has frankly begun to offend me- swooping too low.

However, I keep some of the old issues around- especially, some of the holiday recipes for the day when I actually will have to cook a turkey and I can't reach my parents. But my parent's stuffing recipes are better, anyhow.

If you want something for everyday, no-hassle cooking, this is probably the best choice. Pretty straightforward. Unlike Gourmet, this mag lacks helpful "the how-to" to supplement their recipes. For example, in the back of Gourmet, if they have a merigue recipe, they include a Julia Child step by step instruction.

I would also agree with a previous reviewer, who noted that sometimes it is hard to distinguish the articles from the ads. That speaks loudly.

I have subscribed to several cooking magazines over the past few years, and have to say that I have been disappointed with Bon Appetit. The magazine is high in advertisements. From my Oct. 2008 mag, about 50 of 150 pages were full page ads. There were approximately 20 pages of recipes. However, I have yet to try any of these. Therefore my review isn't based on the quality of the recipes.

There are usually several articles related to food travel, which I am not interested in. The food photography is good, but I find some of the recipes to be too extravagant/trendy for my lifestyle..nice to look at, but frankly I will never use these recipes.

I have most enjoyed Cooks Illustrated and Cook's Country. These are ad-free and rich with recipes that I actually have tried and used over and over again. Bon Appetit is more of a lifestyle mag that doesn't seem to fit my lifestyle. I won't be renewing my subscription.

... but not so good I would subscribe to this.

This magazine is much like Gourmet. Same ads, though not as many, same layout. It's almost like another version of Gourmet.

However, I enjoyed the articles more as well as the recipes than Gourmet. There were a few that I am intrigued enough to try. The recipes themselves were more fancy than say, Everyday Food.

Then again, I like Everyday Food more because that's the type of food I eat.

If you're looking for something a little more elegant without so many ads this isn't a bad one. I do think that Fine Cooking might be more your cup of tea. With fewer ads and more recipes.

Bon Appetit is a good Foody magazine for both meat eaters and veggies alike. But if you want to give it as a gift, be sure and order your subscription about 2 months in advance. You seriously don't get the first issue until about 2 months later (which I don't really understand.)

Bon Appetit is a beautiful magazine to look at, but that is almost all I really use it for. I have had a subscription for the past year to this magazine and have found only one issue that was really useful. Bon Appetit has some good recipe ideas, but I never seem to have consistent results when trying them. They do have a great feature that lets you write in requesting the recipe for a dish at your favorite restaurant.

The magazine is chock full of recipes, but the organization seems haphazard and finding the recipe you want is quite difficult. It is much better suited to casual browsing or scanning. As is common to many glossy cooking magazines, it is occasionally difficult to tell the difference between editorial content/recipes and ad content/recipes.

... If you just want something that will look pretty on the coffee table or has pictures you can drool over and perhaps one great issue a year, "Bon Appetit" is the magazine for you.

Spent quite a few issues comparing Bon Apetit to Gourmet and Food & Wine and I felt that Bon Apetit was by far the third horse in this field. The writing is mediocre and the pictures show food the way you've seen it a million times. Very little special, what tried to be editorially special read more pretentious to me. I know it's been around for a long time but I didn't find much to give me any interest to buy it again.

This magazine has vivid pictures and great recipes as well as a question answer section where the subscriber can send in cooking questions in a Dear Abby type format. As I mentioned in my title this magazine caters to the mainstream of the cooking world (repetive information quite a lot)and sometimes can be over the head of a common homemaker. I would suggest ordering Gourmet or Cooking Light magazine rather than this one. If however you are looking to buy or for info on top brands and top resturants in major cities this is your magazine.

Spent quite a few issues comparing Bon Apetit to Gourmet and Food & Wine and I felt that Bon Apetit was by far the third horse in this field. The writing is mediocre and the pictures show food the way you've seen it a million times. Very little special, what tried to be editorially special read more pretentious to me. I know it's been around for a long time but I didn't find much to give me any interest to buy it again.

Bon Appetite used to be my absolute favorite cooking magazine in the world. I have read it for many years. Lately, though, the magazine has become overly commercialized.

They have a lot of what I call hidden ads. These are ads for products masquerading as articles. The last issue that I looked at seemed that this kind of advertising took up almost half the magazine.

Now I understand that subscription prices are not the money maker for magazines, and I am all for free enterprise, but when I pick up a magazine that is supposed to be about cooking, I want to find something to cook in it.

It also seems lately that some of the recipes contain ingredients that I cannot even find. What good is a recipe that I can't even make.

I have become increasingly disappointed with Bon Appetite, and am no longer a subscriber, opting instead for magazines that better meet my needs such as Cooking Pleasures.

If anyone has a recipe from Bon Appetite from about 10 years ago for pasta with scallops, and green beans I would sure love to have it.


Recommended:
No

Recommended For: Hobbyists/Enthusiasts

I subscribed to Bon Appetit for two years and enjoyed the reading. The travel section was great, it just never helped me out! I was never able to take advantage of that section. Maybe one day!

The recipes were not much help to me either. Don't get me wrong. Everything sounded great. They were just really involved. I don't have that much cooking time on my hands!!! There were very few (if any) recipes in each issue that I was able to take advantage of. The November issue of each year was my favorite! It helped me cook our Thanksgiving meals! Most of the recipes sounded too expensive to make also. Cooking on a budget was not in their recipe collection!

I think there are better magazines out there for those people who want to spend their money on a cooking magazine. If you have lots of time and money then this would be a great magazine for you. I on the other hand, don't have enough of either to want to keep my subscription to this magazine!


Recommended:
No

Recommended For: Hobbyists/Enthusiasts