Most-Googled Pandemic Recipes!
June 2, 2020
The entire world – not just the U.S. – has been cooking more, thanks to the stay-at-home guidelines issued by various leaders. That has led to some clear winners in the category of most-Googled recipes during the planet-wide pandemic! Google recently released the most popular meals searched for on the internet, and we’re bringing them to you!
If everybody you know is baking bread, it’s with good reason. Culinary art therapists (yes, it’s a vocation), have revealed that baking brings comfort in times of uncertainty. Bread, cookies, pancakes, pretzels and muffins may not be the best thing for your waistline, but carb cookery is one of the ways we’ve found to cope with these crazy COVID times.
The top searches for recipes include banana bread (Number 1!), pancakes, pizza dough and brownies, according to Google Trends. And because we’re as much a fan of creative carbs as the next home chef, here are a few of the most popular and most appetizing recipes!
Celebrity Carb Cravings
From her cookbook Cravings: Hungry for More, Chrissy Teigen, the famous model married to singer-songwriter John Legend, has a recipe for Banana Bread that is among the top five recipes for home chefs. We THINK the secret ingredients are the box of vanilla instant pudding mix and shredded coconut, but then Chrissy also adds chunks of a dark chocolate bar, instead of semi-sweet chips.
We also think that 12,000 positive reviews for this Good Old-Fashioned Pancakes recipe from All Recipes qualifies it as one of the most popular in the breakfast department. Home chef poster Dakota Kelly, says she found the recipe card in her grandma’s recipe book and judging from the shape it was in, the pancakes became a family favorite. And not just with Dakota’s family! And if you’re looking for a really heavenly maple syrup, try either Anderson Pure Maple Syrup, or Coombs Organic Dark Maple Syrup –both researched, tested and recommended by The Spruce Eats, and available from Amazon.
While pizza dough grabbed a lot of eyeballs as people searched for the perfect meal to make from scratch, we found this Facebook post from celebrity mom Jennifer Garner, who decided kids would like pretzels just as much!
And as for brownies, we crown the salted caramel brownie recipe from Something Swanky as the most popular – at least on Pinterest. Author, photographer and dessert enthusiast Ashton says she’s making the world better one chocolate chip cookie at a time and you have to believe her. Just get a load of what she can do with a bowl of icing and a pastry bag! Her recipe has been saved over one million times and that’s a lot of home chef-endorsement in anybody’s book!
For more brownie ideas (like Speculoos-Swirl Skillet Brownies, Fudgy Hazelnut Rye Brownies or S’mores Brownies) head over to The Kitchn for chocolate overload!
Popular Savory Searches
On the savory side, both chicken and meatloaf made the most-Googled cut, a sure-fire indication that we want and need our hot comfort foods! When it comes to meatloaf, classic or otherwise, we like it when the words “best” and “moist” come up in a keyword search. This recipe by registered dietician, Amanda Finks, at The Wholesome Dish promises to be both. The trick with meatloaf, Amanda says, is to use lean ground beef – which you might think would get dried out in baking, but not with this recipe. With ½ cup diced onion, ½ cup milk, and a beaten egg, the moisture isn’t sucked out but sealed in. And the secret sauce – ketchup, brown sugar and red wine vinegar — makes a great condiment, baked on top.
For a little different approach, click on this Martha Stewart recipe with a how-to video starring chef Sarah Carey. Sarah combines ground beef chuck, ground pork and ground veal for an amazing combination of hearty flavors.
And among the most saved Food Network recipes, you’ll find Ree Drummond’s Chicken Fried Steak and Gravy (okay it’s not chicken, but what could be more comforting with a side of mashed potatoes?) Of the real chicken recipes, keep scrolling for Chicken Thighs in Creamy Mustard Sauce, Chicken Tortilla Dump Dinner, and Chicken Marsala.
Kitchen Comfort in Southshore
Comfort food just tastes better made in the brand new kitchens you’ll find throughout the master-planned community of Southshore. Home chefs love the spaciousness of both the culinary space, and the neighborhoods, tucked into the only lakeside community in Aurora. Schedule a tour of the brand new homes from Taylor Morrison, Richmond American Homes and Toll Brothers for a taste of Life at the Lake. These ranch and two-story designs are priced between the $400s and the $700s.