Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links to products I used in my recipe organization.
I recently posted on my IG stories about the progress I was making in organizing my recipes. Since that post, I’ve received many questions about how I organize my recipes. Here’s the scoop on the process…
Organizing recipes in the early years
When I was first married (almost 40 years ago) a small vintage wood recipe box was all I needed to hold the handful of recipes I had collected from my mom and mother-in-love, friends, and other family members. Within a year or so I had collected enough recipes that a larger wood box was needed to hold my collection of tried and true recipes.
Several years later I picked up a vintage metal recipe box at a garage sale which gave me even more storage for the recipes in my growing collection. I still use this recipe box, which fits nicely in a kitchen drawer. Some of the recipes in this box are duplicates of the recipes in the binders. The duplicates are mostly recipes that have been handwritten by my mom, grandma, mother-in-love, friends, and family members. I also have some recipes that I have written and am keeping. Using a handwritten recipe is a little connection and memory of the person who took the time to write it.
If you want to go to an all binder and/or digital recipe collection, you could scan and print/save the handwritten recipes to add to a binder. I have done this when making recipe binders for family members.
Benefits of recipe binders
As my recipe collection grew I began using 3-ring binders to organize my recipes. At first, there was only one binder, then two …. and you can see where I am now! This binder system works really well for me for several reasons.
1. When planning meals for the week or for an event, I pull the recipe I plan to use from the binder and put it in a clear folder with my week’s menu. When I’m done with the recipe, I simply put it back in the proper binder.
2. When we take a trip where I will be cooking, I pull the recipes I plan to make from the binder and bring them along.
3. There is room to write/type out the recipe on 8.5×11 paper. No more cramming all the information onto a card and it is easy to write notes about the recipe. Another benefit is most recipes fit on one side of a typed sheet of paper and you can format the recipe in a way that you prefer.
Steps to organizing recipes
Step 1: Sort through your loose recipes and purge any you no longer use or will make. If you’ve collected magazine clippings over the years and haven’t made the recipe, do yourself a favor and toss it. Next sort through the recipes in your recipe box, drawer, wherever you stash your recipes.
Step 2: Sort the remaining recipes into general category piles: Entrees | Sweets | Salads & Sides | Appetizers | Bread | Breakfast | Beverages. A sticky note with the category helps. Place the sticky note on top and slide the recipes underneath it. Next, use a large paper clip, binder clip, or folders to gather the recipes in each category. This will keep the categories separated while you work on them one at a time.
Step 3: Choose a pile to work with and set aside the others. For instance, if you choose Entrees to sort first, set aside all other categories. Now you can begin to sort the entree category into sections that are intuitive to you.
Within each binder, I use tabbed sections using these tabs or these index dividers for easy recipe location. For instance, in this entree binder, I broke the sections down by protein (pork, beef, seafood, poultry), the main ingredient (pasta), or type of entree (sandwich, soup, tacos, pizza). No rules here! Just divide how you cook! We really like tacos and pizza here and make them often so they get a category of their own!
When you complete a category, move on to the next one.
In my salads and sides binder I put dressing recipes in the front, then separated sections by salad type: pasta, Jello, potato, rice, lettuce. and then by side dishes: starch (i.e. mac & cheese, polenta), vegetables. I might end up combining some of these, but for now, I’m giving these tabs a try. Sometimes it takes using the binders to get the categories and tabs the way you like them, that’s where the sticky tabs come in nicely.
Continue this process with each of the remaining category piles.
If you are like me, your recipes could be on scraps of paper, napkins, and cards, or torn from magazines and newspapers. To combat this in organizing; first, only keep the recipes you use, then either type the recipe or make a copy so you can keep an 8.5 x 11 paper copy to fit in the binder.
Step 4: Make binder spines in an easy to read font.
Digital Recipe Organization
Most of the recipes in my binders are also saved as digital files on my laptop, using the same file system as the binders. If I try a recipe from a website and we like it, I print the recipe and place it in the appropriate binder. Many websites have a print recipe option that allows saving the recipe, which I think helps in preparing the dish since I’m a paper girl more than digital and preparing a dish from a device isn’t as easy. FYI, the recipes I share here on the blog like our favorite chocolate chip cookies also have a printable option. By saving digital copies of your recipes it is simple to send a recipe to a friend when requested. Below is how I save my digital recipes, which is the next recipe organization I’ll tackle!
I happen to have a cabinet to store my binders, but I get it that you might not. If you only have limited space for binders, combine more categories! You might also consider purchasing a few larger binders to combine categories.
Think outside the box for a place to keep your binders!
It took me a week of working on my recipes on and off – but I have a lot of recipes! Taking the stacks in small chunks of categories makes the process more manageable. I still have my computer files to sort through, which I’m saving for an upcoming road trip, to give me something productive to do.
I’d love to see your organized recipes! Please tag me on my Instagram account or Facebook so I can celebrate with you.
Sources: Printable binder spine labels | 3-ring index dividers | repositionable divider tabs | economy binders |
Need help with typing recipes? I can help! Send me an email! cheri.dietzman@gmail.com