About as simple as it gets on my iMac: I don’t even drag Word into it, just use TextEdit. Open a document, and if it’s an online recipe I copy/paste into the doc. Otherwise I just type it in. When I’ve got a few lying around on the desktop I just drag them into Recent Recipes, sitting in a general Will Stuff folder.
If there’s something really special about it I’ll copy it into the Recipes folder on the backup drive. I’m about to have to do a lot of that pretty soon, as this elderly G3 is about to get replaced. That will actually be a good thing, since the backup-drive recipes folder is divided into categories (Meat, Fish & Seafood, Pasta, Casseroles etc.), and my lazy ways have let me pile up maybe 100 or more at random into the desktop folder. It’s just going to be a lot of work … OTOH, there will almost certainly be some that get weeded out. Especially fancy meat dishes, as we’re eating mostly vegetarian these days.
As for using them, I just print’em out. One good thing about that is it allows me to make notes if there’s something I want to change, and then I can go revise the document. If there’s one I use a lot – Pad Thai, for instance – I’ll just stick it on the fridge and use it until it gets smudged up.
I love Paprika. It’s so easy to send recipes to people from it. And I like being able to edit recipes I pull from other sources. I use it on my iPad in the kitchen and I like how it doesn’t shut off when I have a recipe up.
I also use 3 ring binders. One of them is just for sausage recipes - I teach sausage making classes and it’s handy to just bring that to class. I let the students take photos or copy anything they want from it.
I use Plan To Eat , which is a paid subscription, but I’ve been using it for 3 years and find it to be worth the money. What I like about it is I can import my recipes or put them in manually, and then I drag and drop them into the weekly planner and it generates a grocery list for me. I access the list from my phone and never have to worry about forgetting the list. It also keeps track of how many times I’ve planned a recipe, and you can save entire weekly menus, which comes in handy when you don’t have a lot of planning time.
I also use a stand in my kitchen for my iPad. My dude attached a small metal lazy susan base to my slanted knife block, drilled a couple of holes in the back of it, then screwed in a pair of cabinet knobs. The gap between the knife block and the business end of the knobs made an ideal bracket to hold my old 1st gen iPad. Only drawback? I had to spin the block to get at my knives. But it was a cheap fix that took up zero new real estate on my island. The only pair of cool knobs we had lying around was a pair of brushed nickel Mickey hands we were given as a gift and that was ok by me. They added a touch of whimsy to my contemporary decor.
I’ve since abandoned that set-up for a new sleek brushed aluminum stand that I was offered as a review item on Amazon. It’s perfect for my iPad mini because the bracket to hold the tablet is elevated about 3" off the counter. Best part, I can grab the stand and tablet in one hand and move them anywhere in the kitchen. And it has a feed hole in the bracket for my power cord. I seldom use that feature, but it’s nice to have for a marathon cooking session when my iPad is always on with Paprika.
Paprika has a similar function, it lets us bundle several recipes together into a Menu that can be slapped into the planner for a meal’s worth of recipes. It won’t save a whole week’s worth, though, that’s pretty cool.
I use it for those recipes that I always make together, like mashed potatoes with pan-roasted chicken and gravy. Don’t laugh about the mashed potatoes, that recipe includes my pressure cooker timing, which I can never remember.
I’ve designed some custom menus using notes, like Pizza Night, with the number for our favorite delivery service. Dinner out is another that I use for any night we’re not eating at home.
Take a look at Pinterest. I find it the simplest way to store my favorite recipes plus find new ones without Googling.
You can make different categories and just save things you come across on EatMy Books (a handy website) or
find anywhere on line with rare exceptions.
Pepperplate also has a weekly calendar where you can import recipes for the month if you are so inclined. Also auto-fills the shopping list and syncs between laptop PC, Android phone and ipad and has a “cook now” function to avoid auto shut off.
I’m also a Pepperplate fan. I like the way most recipes can be directly imported from websites, and if not, they can be added manually, along with a photo. I remember reading a post on CH where someone was concerned about what would happen to her P’plate recipe file if P’plate somehow vanished. So I’ve gotten into the habit of copying my P’plate recipes to a PDF format and storing them in a file on my laptop. That’s also helpful when anyone asks me for a copy of one of those recipes. Instead of having to send them a link to the recipe, I can send the PDF file, which is nicely formatted.
Unfortunately, EYB does not show the recipe. It gives you a list of ingredients included in the recipe, but that’s about all. Still, EYB is very useful when you’ve amassed a large cookbook collection.
EYB does show recipes. One has to click on a certain thing that says online recipe. Some
have links to Pinterest and other’s don’t. That’s the whole point of looking at it for me.
Interesting question. I have a folder of clippings I’ve amassed over the years, but I’ve since stopped collecting these clippings. They seem to stay in the folder and never get referred to, but I don’t have the heart to toss them.
I look mostly online these days. If a recipe proves good and I will re-use, I actually save it to a Word doc and save it on my PC. I’ve had experiences where websites die, and recipes and links die with them.
I’ve never thought to write down my own recipes, and tried for the first time last year. Someone was asking about how I make my Thanksgiving turkey. That took way more time and thought than I expected, so much kudos to the folks who do this for a living.
I use a three ring binder with plastic sleeves for the pages. With that, I can store cutout pages, printed pages or photocopied recipes.
The pages are in plastic so I can just remove the page attach it to my cooking area. I use a magnet against a cabinet handle. The plastic keeps it clean around the kitchen.
You can arrange the pages anyway you like and it’s worked for me for years. If you want to make an electronic cookbook, make a pdf and keep adding to it as you go.
I use a special system for recipes called SLOTH. Most of my recipes are in a drawer in the buffet. In no particular order. Some are on the puter & some are in stacks under magnets on the side of the refrigerator. Some are in cookbooks. Some are only in my head.
Those are my favorite. Ever try to write those down for someone. I have a relative that has to have a recipe for everything and follows them to the letter. Even for Kahlua and Coffee - you heard me! I wrote out one for her, but I could not give her exacts. I don’t know how she managed!
I use Pepperplate for recipes I find online. And I’ve got a ton of cookbooks, so I use EYB to look up things. I’m pretty old-school: If I make a recipe that I know I’d make again, I write it down on an index card. I love riffling through the cards when I’m out of ideas. Of course I’ve too many cards now. I’ve recently decided that if something only gets a “Good” rating, it won’t make it to a card. “Quite Good” only if it is super easy, quick,or has something else to really recommend it. So many recipes out there!
