At one time, people thought a photo or video told the truth. But not today. Even videos about cooking and baking are being faked.
YouTube baker Ann Reardon of How to Cook That, set out to prove one YouTube site posted fake videos of recipes.
She tested three recipes from one popular YouTube cooking site that has more than a 115 million views a month. That's a huge channel with 4 million subscribers.
But, while the channel is prospering, Reardon shows that at least some of its videos are fake.
One recipe video purported to show how to make ice cream into frosting by melting it and adding some flour. But when tested, Reardon only managed to make a liquid mess.
Another video claimed you could make dried basil by cutting up basil leaves and microwaving them. Reardon tried it. Again, she came up with nothing like dried basil, but instead damp, sticky leaves. When she tried microwaving the leaves again, the result was the same, except that her basil had lost all flavor and aroma. It appears the fake baking site actually showed dried basil from a bottle as the end product.
Reardon also tested a recipe that purported to be a gummy bear hack. Following the instructions, Reardon melted the gummy bears, refrigerated them and covered them with sweetened panna cotta, a pudding made with cream and gelatin.
According to the video, this resulted in a lovely dessert which could be eaten with a spoon.
However, in fact, the gummy bears, when cooled, remained too gummy to scoop out with a spoon. It was almost as if the video maker had actually used gelatin. And that, Reardon says, is exactly what happened.
Reardon says that the fake site appears to cut and recycle old bits of video. This is good for the YouTube algorithm, which then gives the site lots of advertising and high search ranking.
