Recommendations have never been on-topic here. Not recipe recommendations, not book recommendations, not recommendations of brands of mixers or knives.
But now the recommendations tag somehow got created, and a new user got mislead into asking a question using it. I had to close this question, which is never pleasant, but seems especially hostile from the perspective of a new user, who does not know that it isn't a cruel punishment created to haze newbs.
If the tag was blacklisted, I'd like to think that he would have noticed that, if the tag is off-topic and there are no other appropriate tags for his question (I couldn't come up with any), he'd have given up posting the question, resulting in less frustration for him, and less work for mods and reviewers.
Update While we are at it: the same user who created recommendations also created local, and a new user asked a question about local ingredients from Seattle, tagging with local and preparation. "Local" is always a sign for a big list, and at least 90% of the question on this site would be about food preparation. Can we bundle the two new tags in the blacklist request? Please comment if I should open separate Meta questions.
