Source transcription
Ingredients and method are preserved from a page-cited public-domain source. Historical timing and yield estimates are labeled as estimates; food-safety assumptions remain clearly marked as unverified.
Provenance before volume
Every recipe should tell you where it came from.
Production now contains 918 recipes with visible citations: twelve measured WorkLife adaptations, 888 faithful historical transcriptions from Fannie Farmer and Marion Harland, and eighteen international public-domain recipes selected from Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Spanish, French, and Italian sources. Non-English recipes are presented in English with the original title, language, and locator preserved. The synthetic prototype catalog remains outside production. 18 public-domain books are now in the editorial source registry. An automated audit of 11 source editions found 14,670 structural extraction candidates, but an entry does not become a live recipe until its title, method, citation, and rights record pass review.
Kitchen tested
Prepared by a human tester, checked for yield and timing, and paired with an image of the finished version.
Nutrition estimated
Nutrition shown before independent testing is an estimate. It remains separate from the historical citation and will be recalculated against USDA data.
Photography is a separate rights question.
Even where a recipe method is public domain, modern photographs and expressive prose may still be copyrighted. WorkLife uses original generated imagery only when its asset and prompt record are stored. Remaining archive entries keep a branded citation card until their unique food image clears the generation and review queue; copied publisher photography is never used as a shortcut.
Public-domain foundation
Historical cookbooks selected for editorial review
These books are useful starting points, not automatic publication feeds. Older recipes still require modern food-safety review, measurement normalization, and duplicate detection.
The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book
Fannie Merritt Farmer · Public domain in the United States
Primary candidate for measured recipes, foundational methods, and source citations.The Whitehouse Cookbook
F. L. Gillette and Hugo Ziemann · Public domain in the United States
Historical American dishes, menus, preserves, breads, and household cookery.The Century Cook Book
Mary Ronald · Public domain in the United States
Broad recipe coverage with useful technique and menu context.Good Things to Eat
Rufus Estes · Public domain in the United States
Historically important American recipes with clear creator attribution.Science in the Kitchen
E. E. Kellogg · Public domain in the United States
Plant-forward preparations, grains, fruits, breads, and household food guidance.Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers
Elizabeth E. Lea · Public domain in the United States
Regional American food history and source material for carefully modernized adaptations.The Book of Household Management
Isabella Beeton · Public domain in the United States
A large, structured British cookery corpus for recipe-level extraction and historical comparison.Marion Harland’s Complete Cook Book
Marion Harland · Public domain in the United States
Nearly two thousand structured headings spanning everyday American meals and household cookery.A Guide to Modern Cookery
Auguste Escoffier · Public domain in the United States
A large professional reference whose entries need extra home-kitchen and food-safety adaptation.The International Jewish Cook Book
Florence Kreisler Greenbaum · Public domain in the United States
A broad source for Jewish culinary history, with cultural review required before adaptation.Hand-Book of Practical Cookery
Pierre Blot · Public domain in the United States
American and French preparations with technique-rich source text.Modern Cookery for Private Families
Eliza Acton · Public domain in the United States
Detailed household recipes suitable for citation-first extraction and later modernization.Chinese Recipes
Nellie C. Wong · English · Public domain in the United States
Chinese home cooking recorded in English, with a book-level yield of six servings.日用惣菜家庭料理 (Everyday Household Side-Dish Cookery)
Japanese · Public domain; digitized by the National Diet Library
Japanese household dishes translated editorially into English with original titles and page locators preserved.The Khaki Kook Book
Mary Kennedy Core · English · Public domain in the United States
Indian recipes recorded for English-speaking home cooks; historical omissions remain visible.La Mejor Cocinera, Recetas de Cocina
Saturnino Calleja · Spanish · Public domain in the United States
Spanish household recipes translated into English with section-level citations.Traité Général de la Cuisine Maigre
Auguste Hélie · French · Public domain in the United States
French vegetable and meatless cookery translated into English without filling unstated quantities.La scienza in cucina e l’arte di mangiar bene
Pellegrino Artusi · Italian · Public domain in the United States
Italian household classics translated into English while preserving original measurements and recipe numbers.Open-license candidates
Useful when every obligation is preserved
Recipe Commons
License declared per recipe book; the project and examples use CC0
Promising Git-native format for recipes whose individual provenance and license pass review.Wikibooks Cookbook
Generally CC BY-SA 4.0 and GFDL; page-level review and attribution required
Community-maintained recipes that can be used only with complete attribution and ShareAlike compliance.USDA FoodData Central
CC0 / United States public-domain nutrition data
Preferred source for ingredient nutrition calculations, with USDA citation.Not approved for bulk import
Large does not automatically mean legitimate
RecipeNLG
Its published terms limit use to non-commercial research and education and disclaim non-infringement.
Scraped publisher datasets
A repository license does not necessarily prove that the uploader had rights to republish scraped recipe prose or photography.
Unlicensed recipe APIs and GitHub dumps
A public repository is not the same as public-domain or commercially licensed content.
Publication workflow
Source → normalize → safety review → cook → photograph → publish
- Capture the original title, author, year, URL, rights status, and page reference.
- Normalize measurements while preserving a visible adaptation record.
- Review temperatures, canning, raw egg, meat, and storage guidance against modern standards.
- Kitchen test the yield, active prep, total time, substitutions, and leftovers.
- Use a unique commissioned or properly licensed image and store its rights record.
- Publish the citation, adaptation note, test date, and reviewer on the recipe page.
This policy describes our publishing process and is not legal advice. Cultured Spirits, LLC should have counsel review the final licensing and contributor terms before a large commercial import.
Browse the cited production catalog