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I am kind of known for my sweet tooth and would often bake cookies or cakes that kind of stuff for potlucks. There was a potluck at work one day, but I had been too busy to do my usual baking. I bought one of those premixed, comes in a pan ready for the oven, brownie mixes. I cut up the bownies and put them on a platter and brought them to work. One of my co workers raved about the brownies and bugged me for months for the recipe. I let her think that I would not divuldge the recipe rather then tell her it was pilsbury.

I have only two recipes that I will not share. The first is a yeast pumpkin bread recipe that I discovered ages ago. The main reason that I don't make that one is that it is a widely known fact that I cannot resist it, and have actually eaten the entire loaf (which, by the way, fills a full-size bundt pan easily) in a single sitting, resulting in some rather nasty side effects and I fear that people will make it and then I won't be ale to stop eating it, and make a total foll of a glutton out of myself.

The other is my greatgrandmother's recipe for a particular type of bar that has been handed down by the women to me. Traditionally, we only make it for people in the family (sons and husbands) who have been gone for a long time (our family are mianly farmers and military) and whoa re returning, as a welcoming back treat. I still make it for when my brother comes home on leave or back from a deployment. I have been considering giving the recipe to his new wife, but to be honest, I don't really care for her, she doesn't cook, and the whol situation is really strange and I even wonder if it will last. Give it a couple of years, when she has had to deal with him being gone and coming back, and then, yeah, I might give it to her....but until then.....

Otherwise, I freely give most recipes to people. In fact, as I have mentioned on this site before, a former boyfriend gave me two great recipes (one for a carrot and coriander soup and one for a spinach and chick pea dahl) that I love to gie to anyone, and everyone loves them! They were the only good things to come out of that relationship. :)

I share. Actually I'm in the process (at the request of my kids and grown up grands) of writing all the good ones down for a family cook book.

Black Catsup. This is a condiment that I make every other summer. I usually put up around 6 pints and that lasts for 2 years. It is spicy and mysterious and delicious. It is really a dark brown rather than black. The reason I don't share the recipe? My mother-in-law handed down this recipe developed by her grandmother. It is a family secret and is to remain so!

I'm definitely a recipe sharer. I don't have my own restaurant, I don't have my own frozen food line - what's to protect?

Okay, i have to have the dipping sauce recipe, @Pumpkinbear!

i cook for a living and i always share my recipes - like @professorchaos does -- nothing is written down and if you do give 2 people the same recipe it will be different for each person... so i'm happy to share my method and ingredients...except for my own special invention for:
GRANNY'S FANTASY BREAD PUDDING! that one i'm saving for mass production someday.

I always share. I can't imagine saying no to someone who pays me the compliment of wanting my recipe for something!

I have a friend who has a secret pumpkin pie recipe that... if he shares it, his grandmother will kill him. I still don't know the recipe and my friend is alive :-)

I don't tell my friends my cookie recipes...I need a reason for people to keep me around! XD

I mean, they know I have a blog, so if they're truly curious, they could look for it there...but I do weird things that I can't always explain, so I'm sure they won't turn out like mine do anyway :)

Only when it comes to a particular sister-in-law. When I first met her, I asked her for her recipe for Chruscikis (a wonderful Polish fried cookie), and she told me that it was a family secret - then she turned to the other sister-in-law and told her that because she was part of the family she would give it to her if she wanted it. So said sister-in-law has asked me for my recipe for brownies, brisket, red velvet cake, and some others before she caught on that everything she asked me for would be a "family secret."

The only recipies I do not share are the ones about which I am too embarrassed to admit that I make. And because I don't make those recipes for public consumption, I never get asked about those.

I freely share, even if I'm not asked: If I send over dinner or a piece of dessert, I include the recipe.

But. . .I have a "friend" from high school 40 years ago who, as she was writing out the cheescake recipe I requested, asked if I ever omitted or changed the amount of an ingredient when giving someone a recipe. Can you imagine? Then she swore up and down that she'd never do that to me. Right.

I have another friend who makes the world's best roasted peppers and a romano bean side dish: both are served room temp and both are bathed in olive oil, but they have different herbs and seasonings. I've tried to duplicate them, but I'm missing something and can't figure it out. Here's the thing: I grow those peppers and beans and share them with her! She gives me a token pint of each and keeps the rest for herself.

Dear Abby: Do I need new friends?

I'll share most recipes when asked, EXCEPT my spaghetti sauce recipe which my godmother developed and asked me never to share. she's since passed away and I don't know anyone except one of her daughters who has her recipe.

We have a family toffee recipe that's top secret, though everyone gets a little box of it around Christmas as a gift.

happily and freely.

I don't mind sharing, and when I do share I try to be as accurate as possible, but every time I make something it's a bit different, because I'm an improviser. Experience has shown that even those who try to make my specialties are unable to duplicate them exactly.

unpocojmoney, for your own "secret ingredient" for balsamic vinaigrette, try adding orange syrup. I found small bottles of pretty intense blood orange syrup and others in a local high-end grocery store... Monin (the company that makes syrups that cafes use for Italian Sodas) also has blood orange syrup. I really like making different citrus balsamic dressings... grapefruit white balsamic vinaigrette (use the juice and a pinch of sugar) is good on a salad that has bits of stilton cheese in it, for example. There I go sharing again too!

I don't share recipes because I never measure and rarely recreate them the same way twice. I wouldn't know how to instruct someone else to do it!

I do have a dessert catering business, however, and I refuse to share the recipe for my spicy Mexican chocolate buttercream. Usually I get by with telling people that I don't measure the ingredients, so I can't give them the recipe, but if they insist I give them the basics but leave out one or two key secret ingredients! :)

I do not share my great-aunt's recipe for macaroni and cheese with anyone except family.

I demand an equal trade for my recipes. Instant karma :D

I once had a recipe I wouldn't share. Then I moved house and it was lost in the process. Lesson learned.

I will never tell anyone my recipe for Greek Slurry. People love it, and the best part is it's just tomatoes, cucumber, feta, red onion, olive oil and a little lemon juice!....wait....Son of a BITCH!

My barbecue sauce recipe is a closely guarded secret. Essentially the only things I'll tell people are that it's a tomato base and that I use a lot of molasses in it. Beyond that, you're not getting anything from me.

Years ago I worked as a private chef in New York City. It was an exciting enough job-as I got to see inside many really fantastic townhouses and apartments-belonging to some of the wealthiest families in the world. One client in particular stood out. The agency didn't tell me, but as I found out later, the client was Leona Helmsley. I replied to an ad from the NYTimes. She wanted a new chef, someone to run her NY kitchens and follow her around, making sure she was well fed. It seemed like something I would have enjoyed doing had she received what she wanted from me on paper and NEVER RECEIVED-my great grandmother's matzo ball recipe. She had put in the ad that the applicant prepare their best matzo ball recipe and give it to the "taster".
She demanded, as only Leona could demand and did not get. I did not get the job either! No great loss to me.
http://www.wildriverreview.com/wrratlarge/?tag=warren-bobrow

I share every recipe but one - Italian cookies with buttercream icing that, after much tweaking, most closely resemble those my Nonni made, and whose recipe was lost because she would not share it. Mine is written down for my daughters, although neither seems the least bit interested in carrying on the tradition. I should mention I come from a professional baking family, and don't think the reluctance to share a big deal. I've tasted desserts that I am able to duplicate in my kitchen without a recipe.

@joeqboo & cookingbooks

I am with you in your dislike for those who do not share recipes. In a time where people use microwaves to make a frozen dinner for the family or hit the closest fast food joint, we need to spread the joy and passion for homemade food and cooking. I have many great recipes I have worked on myself and I will share any of them with anyone.

In the circumstance where the recipe is something you sell be it the recipe itself, a prepared product or a restaurant dish I can understand keeping it secret.

I share. I used to belong to a group that had a pot luck once a month and they went nuts for my bread pudding one time. I took another recipe and revised it. I am an improv cook as well. I have a shrimp spread that I mess with all the time. I change the seasonings out and give it a different flavor boost. And it isn't my recipe. I got it from a friend I worked with. There are no fancy family 'secret' recipes. The families I married into weren't vindictive about who got what recipe. The whole family knows the secret ingredients to everything.

Given how often I tweak my recipes, eyeballing ingredients along the way, even when I share I don't think my stuff's reproducible to a T ~ even by me!

@cookingbooks

I'm right there with you. For the most part, I find it tacky when people claim a recipe is a 'family secret,' or other such bother. I mean, really, if your repertoire is so small that you feel that you must guard every facet of it, you probably aren't the cook you think you are.

I share the love... and a list of the ingredients... I just never know exactly how much of each....

Yes, actually I do. The recipe isn't even anything all that complicated. In fact, just telling you the name is probably almost enough for you to replicate it. I will never publicize a recipe for my Dad's fried [redacted].

Dad's 100% Italian and he cooks a lot by feel. Luckily I have inherited his knack. So there's no distinct recipe to actually share, but more the technique that is private.

I won't share a recipe for a Filipino dessert my mom makes. It's these deep fried balls that have a soft, chewy interior with bits of coconut in the middle and drizzled in a brown sugar sauce that turns hard and crackly. It's quite addictive andusually the first thing to go at a party . People have begged, bargained, and pleaded for the recipe but I refuse to give it away because my mother will absolutely kill me and maybe someday I would like to market it and produce it for the masses after she dies :)

@warrenbobrow: was the taster that pet dog she left her fortune to?

A few years back, a friend gave me her special pizza dough recipe. She swore me to not share it. It was the recipe from her bed & breakfast. A few years back the B&B burnt to the ground but she made me swear never to share it. I make it about 3x a month and have never shared it. I am a member of quite a few food groups on the 'net and I have never given the recipe to anyone. It is a great recipe too.

i'm very protective of my recipes, so it's not that i won't share it at all so much as i'm very selective with who i share my recipes with. Because i plan on opening a restaurant someday, i don't want to pass around too many recipes; also, i'm kinda careful about who i give recipes to, because honestly, i don't want people to screw up my dishes and then say "well, it's his recipe...he must have made it wrong." i'll give recipes to close relatives and good friends, but that's about it.

I had a neighbor many years ago who was a health nut who added wheat germ to every dish and cut the sugar in half. There are very few recipes that can have those changes and come out edible. We all stopped sharing recipes with her as we were horrified to hear her say, as people were trying to find places to spit out the first bites, "It's so and sos recipe!"

C'mon now, where would Serious Eats be if we weren't sharing recipes or information with one another?

I share because that's the ultimate compliment. Someone enjoyed it enough to ask for the recipe.

I wouldn't be surprised if some of the "family secret" recipes weren't pulled from a 10 cent magazine article or shared by a neighbor or friend in the first place.

Recipes evolve over time and as a cook, adding your own twist and creativity makes it new every time.

Don't be insecure - SHARE!

I so love the name Grifola frondosa! and the sentiments as well!

I have a secret salsa recipe that I've spent a lot of time crafting. It gets harder to want to share with each person that likes it. Maybe one day...

@ MarvinDog, ha! I totally agree. I had a "friend" once who refused to share his steak rub recipe with me and I just thought it was tacky. I mean, come on, I can find another recipe. Get over yourself (to my friend, not to you)

I have recipes no one would want.