I Need Help! Simple Recipe Organization

Monday, August 31, 2009, by Leigh Anne & Sherra

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Photo courtesy of lepiaf.geo

We are changing things up for the next few Mondays. Instead of asking you a question, we are going to give you tips and ideas based on your great responses to our question from the first week.

Last week we gave you some cleaning out the garage and this week we are going to help you tackle all those great recipes you keep printing or clipping out of magazines!

We have both tried all different methods of organizing our recipes over the years. Being the paper people that we are we know that using the computer to organize our recipes just doesn’t work for us.

We need them printed out on paper.

The method that we both currently use is admittedly old-fashioned.

We print the recipes out onto 8 1/2 x 11 paper and then insert them into page protectors. Leigh Anne is a messy cook so having the recipe protected is very important!

We then insert them, organized by category into a 3 ring binder. Our friend Laura over at Organizing Junkie also uses the 3 ring binder method and has some great tips and ideas you might want to check out.

Sherra keeps duplicates of all her favorite family holiday recipes in a folder and adds to it annually. This has proved to be a real timesaver. She also has taken an old pocket photo album and filled it with recipes clipped from magazines through the years.

Leigh Anne keeps a folder of “Recipes to Try” and then files them in the appropriate place if the recipe passes the family test. She shares more tips on her recipe organization system here.

We both tear out magazine recipes, put them in a sheet protector and then throw away the magazine. After many years of saving the whole magazine, this has been a simple change that really saves space!

Real Simple magazine’s website has some other recipe organizing methods.

If you are more hi-tech than we are and you’d really like to organize your recipes on your computer, read about “The Pumpkin Rule”. She developed eChef software to help digitally manage her recipes just like her photos and music.

All this recipe talk has made us hungry!

To find even more great recipes here are a couple of great recipes sites:

Tasty Kitchen – A new favorite launched by one of our very favorite bloggers, Pioneer Woman!
All Recipes – An old favorite with seemingly endless recipes. If you set up an account you can save all your favorites in a recipe box online.

And don’t forget our personal favorite site filled with delicious recipes…
Your HomeBased Mom!

How do you organize your recipes – what is your favorite method? Please leave a comment and let us know.

P.S. If you feel like doing some quick and easy baking, check out
Pillsbury’s new cookies. “Simple…” yum-yum. Get a $1.00 off coupon!

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5 Comments »

5 Responses to “I Need Help! Simple Recipe Organization”

I only clip a few recipes, the ones that I know I will really make. I paste them to a small file card and I keep them in my kitchen drawers.

I use the binder method, but am desperately trying to get better organized. Since I was single for almost 7 years, cooking went by the wayside. . . . .But I’m trying to resurrect this art. THANKS FOR ALL YOUR INSPIRATION!

These are great ideas. Now if I can only DO them.

I’ve always loved to cook and collect cookbooks and read them like novels. These days though I do have to say that I use my computer for recipe organzation more than anything and love it. Over the years I have painstakingly copied all of our favorite family recipes onto a file with the idea of printing out a cookbook for family and friends. When someone needs a recipe I like that I can easily cut and paste it into a note and send it off. I can also access my recipes when I’m away from home, which is often!
When I see a recipe online I just send it to a file to try later.
If I can’t remember how to make a certain dish I just google it and up come several options! I’ve always liked combining recipes anyway, picking the ingredients my family might like best.
Thanks Leigh Anne for all your wonderful recipes and ideas.
xxoo Marti, married 49 years this month and still learning new tricks!

I use the 3 ring binder method. I also save my favorite recipes from Allrecipes.com to my recipe box.