Handy-Dandy Tip for Organizing Recipes

   Maybe you have a few cookbooks that you only keep around 'cause there's one or two good recipes in them...and that big 'ol book is taking up space in your kitchen. Maybe you have a pile of those holiday entertaining magazines that you hang on to 'cause there was an interesting dip recipe or cookie you think you'll make for company ( fat chance) . Perhaps you have a stack of misc. envelopes and scrap papers that you've jotted down recipes from some show on the food network on or snatched out of a dentists office magazine. Then there's your recipe box....perhaps you have a few recipes you use on a regular basis, but you've got to thumb through the 1000 other recipes for duck pate and some weird jello salad to find them. Sometimes the hardest part about cooking is figuring out what to make and then finding the recipe in all that mess and getting started.

   Listen up kids, I'm about to change your life. Slight exaggeration....OK, maybe it won't change your life, but it will certainly change that mess of recipes in your cabinets!

   This is so simple you'll wonder why you didn't think of it before. My dear friend Danna liked it so much, that after I told her about mine, she had me come on over and help her do hers. She is a Cancer, so she is always looking for ways to organize and simplify her life. (Hi, Danna!) I wonder if she has kept it up.....

   OK , here's what you need....click on the link above and get yourself a cute vinyl covered three ring binder with a fun print or get one that matches your kitchen decor. One that has a wipe able surface will be best, 'cuz lets face it, you are a messy cook.  Also, pockets on the inside covers will be good to have. Then go to Target or someplace like it and in the school supplies aisle get a bunch of those plastic sheet protectors with the write on tabs.  Take all this stuff home ...oh wait, don't forget to pick up some milk while you're there cuz you're probably out. OK, now, go home and pull all those cookbooks, magazines etc. out of the cabinet and stand there a few minutes overwhelmed by the horror.  Remind yourself that this is the last time you will have to feel this way. Resist the urge to drink all the cooking sherry you had stashed behind the cookbooks. It's going to be all better soon.

   Start by figuring out which "categories" you use most, or would like to keep handiest....limit this to less than a dozen or you'll go crazy trying to over organize. For example categories/sections might include: desserts, appetizers, casseroles, meats, and family favorites. Maybe you need an entire category for weird jello salads cause you make them a lot....whatever. Write those category/section names on those tabs and attach them to the sheet protectors . If they are different colors this will make it easier to flip through once it is done.

Stick the labeled sheets in the binder with a few of the unlabeled sheets behind each one and put the rest of the sheets in the back for adding to sections later.

    Now you're ready to really get it together. Face the mess of recipes on your kitchen table and dive in....take those cookbooks and find the one or two recipes you actually use or would like to use if you can ever find them  and either tear out the page or photocopy it. (I do not advocate ripping up Betty Crocker, Martha Stewart or Julia Child. Have some respect! Photocopy those pages but do not desecrate the integrity of those fine books!) Stick pages in your binder in the appropriate place. Go through those magazines and tear out the pages you want to keep. For goodness sake, throw the rest of the thing away. I found an issue of Better Homes and Gardens from 1984  in all mine. (The ads were hilarious by the way). Dig through that recipe box and pull out the few you use and slide them into the pages of your binder. Get that stack of misc. papers/envelopes you jotted recipes on and stick them in too. I also had a bunch of loose papers printed from the Internet...I'm sure you have printed out all my blog postings and have a special category just for those, right?

   Load up all those cookbooks and crud leftover and either pitch it , or put it in storage out of your kitchen. It's taking up valuable cabinet/shelf space .

   As you collect recipes in the future, you can simply stick them in the pockets of the inside covers in the binder to file later on. Every time you use your binder remind yourself to file a couple of these and you'll stay on top of it.  This thing is much more practical than standard cookbooks because its tailored to YOU and additionally, those wipe able plastic pages keep the recipes protected and clean . I have some written in family members handwriting that have since passed on and now that they are protected and I don't feel like I'm damaging them every time I use them.

   Protect this book with your life because inevitably some one will try to steal your secret recipes once they know you have them all together in a convenient place. It's probably that hag from the office that brings those crappy burnt cookies to the office holiday party and gets bent out of shape when people rave about yours and eat 'em all up. You know who you are , Lady.