Privacy policy

Who is responsible for your data?

The website recette-de-cuisine.be (« La Cuisine d'Axelle ») is a recipe blog run on a personal basis by Axelle, in Belgium. For any question about your data, or to exercise your rights, write to axelle@recette-de-cuisine.be.

What data is collected, and why

• Member account (optional): email address, username, optional profile photo (shown with your reviews), password (stored only in an irreversibly encrypted form), sign-up and last sign-in dates. It lets you sign in, save your favorites and post reviews.
• Reviews: username, text, optional rating and date, published after moderation. Your email address is never published. Each new review is emailed to Axelle for moderation, with your address so she can reply to you.
• Favorites: the list of recipes you save.
• Security: on each sign-in attempt and with each review or rating, the site records an encrypted fingerprint of your IP address (never the address itself), to block spam and attacks.
• Server logs: like any website, the server records each visit (IP address, page requested, date, browser) for security and troubleshooting.
• Visit statistics: to count its visitors, the site itself records the IP address of each browser that views a page, with the country of connection provided by Cloudflare and the dates of the first and last visit. This data stays on the site's server, is shared with no one and is used only for overall figures (number of visitors, countries).
• Submitted recipes: your first name, your email address if you give it (never published), the text and photo of the recipe, and a fingerprint of your IP address, to publish the recipe and let you know when it is online.

The site displays Google AdSense ads (see « Advertising » below). It uses no third-party audience measurement and no social network trackers: the share buttons are plain links.

On what legal basis?

• Account, reviews and favorites: performance of the service you request by signing up (Article 6(1)(b) GDPR).
• Security and server logs: the legitimate interest in protecting the site and its readers (Article 6(1)(f) GDPR).
• Visit statistics: the publisher's legitimate interest in knowing how many people visit her site (Article 6(1)(f) GDPR).
• Advertising cookies and personalized advertising: your consent (Article 6(1)(a) GDPR), which you can withdraw at any time.

Cookies and browser storage

• The site's cookie, ca_sess, technical and essential: it keeps your session (sign-in, forms, protection against fraudulent submissions) and expires after 30 days at most.
• Local storage: on a recipe, the ingredients and steps you tick off are remembered in your browser so you can pick up where you left off. This information stays on your device and is never sent to the site.

These two uses are strictly necessary for the features you use: they do not require consent.

Google's advertising cookies, however, are only set with your agreement: see below.

Advertising (Google AdSense)

To cover its costs, the site displays ads provided by Google AdSense (Google Ireland Limited, Dublin).

• Your choice: on your first visit, a window lets you accept, reject or choose in detail how advertising cookies are used. Rejecting is as easy as accepting and doesn't stop you from using the site.
• If you accept: Google and its advertising partners may set and read cookies or identifiers on your device to show ads tailored to your interests, measure their effectiveness and fight fraud. They then process your IP address, information about your device and the pages you view.
• If you reject: non-personalized ads may be shown, chosen based on the content of the page and your approximate location, not on your browsing.
• Changing your mind: at any time, using the « Privacy and cookie settings » button on the site's pages. You can also manage ad personalization in Google's My Ad Center.

Learn more: how Google uses information from sites that use its services.

Service providers

• Cloudflare (Cloudflare, Inc., United States): all the site's traffic goes through its network, which protects it and speeds it up. Cloudflare processes your IP address and the technical information of your requests on behalf of the site. This transfer outside the European Union is covered by the EU–US Data Privacy Framework, to which Cloudflare adheres.
• Mailjet (European Union): delivery of the site's emails.
• Google (Google Ireland Limited; Google LLC, United States): serving AdSense ads and collecting your consent, as described in « Advertising ». Transfers to the United States are covered by the Data Privacy Framework, to which Google adheres.
• Meta (Facebook): recipes are published on the « La Cuisine d'Axelle » Facebook Page. The reactions and public comments on these posts are fetched every 15 minutes and displayed under the relevant recipe, with the first name and last-name initial when Facebook provides them. A comment deleted or hidden on Facebook also disappears from the site. The site loads no Facebook script: the share and « Comment on Facebook » buttons are plain links.

The site does not sell or share any data. Only Google, as the advertising network, processes data for advertising purposes, within the limits of your choice.

Emails

The site only writes to you to confirm your address when you sign up and to reset your password. No newsletter, no advertising.

Retention periods

• Account and favorites: as long as the account exists, erased as soon as it is deleted.
• Sign-up never confirmed: erased after 7 days.
• Reviews: as long as they are published. When you delete your account, you choose whether to delete your reviews or leave them published under your username, without your email or your IP fingerprint.
• IP fingerprints from sign-in attempts: 48 hours.
• Star ratings: as long as the recipe is online, with the IP fingerprint that prevents rating twice.
• Server logs: 14 days.
• IP addresses in the visit statistics: 13 months at most after your last visit, then erased.
• Submitted recipes: as long as the recipe is online; if it is declined, the recipe, its photo, your email address and your IP fingerprint are erased.
• Technical history of emails sent: 30 days.
• Facebook comments displayed: as long as they remain visible on Facebook and the recipe is online.
• Your choice about advertising cookies, and Google's advertising cookies: 13 months at most; you are then asked again.

Your rights

You can view and correct your information, or delete your account, at any time from My account (in French). You also have the right of access, rectification, erasure, restriction, objection and portability: write to axelle@recette-de-cuisine.be, and you'll get a reply within a month. Finally, you can lodge a complaint with the Belgian Data Protection Authority.

Last updated: September 24, 2026 (Google AdSense advertising added).

Newsletter

If you subscribe to the newsletter, we store your email address, the language you chose, the date you subscribed and confirmed, and an irreversible fingerprint of your IP address (proof of your consent). Your address is only used to send you the newsletter; it is never sold or shared, except with our email provider (Mailjet, hosted in the European Union).

To learn what interests you, each newsletter contains a tiny image and tracking links: we can see whether it was opened and which recipes you clicked. These measurements stay on the site's server.

Every email contains a one-click unsubscribe link. An address that is never confirmed is deleted after 7 days; an unsubscribed address is kept, marked as such, so it never receives the newsletter again, and is deleted on request.

Header illustrations

The large decorative images at the top of the sections (categories, seasonal recipes…) are illustrations generated by artificial intelligence. They are there as decoration and do not show the dishes from the recipes.