weather | : | partly cloudy | |
outside | : | 10.2°C | |
mood | : | ... |

Two things I've learned from the few times we've tried to follow other peoples' recipes:
1. People are generally pretty retarded about what constitutes "one step" in a procedure.
One step means one action. One verb in the sentence. One. Not seven. One. Do ONE thing and that is ONE step. Don't call it an "Easy Three Step Process" if I'm doing six things in each "step". This is actually a very common and widespread problem. Technical writers, software QA folks who write bug reports, recipe writers... All across the board, I see people consistently unable to correctly count to ONE. Boggle.
2. Baking recipes use WAY too much sugar than necessary.
I always halve the sugar in all baking recipes I get. The sugar content is too overpowering if I use the amount that is written. I find that the flavours of the other ingredients are actually stronger and have more depth if there is less sugar.