Kitchen Notebooks

[LaurieB]

I've seen a couple of references to folks keeping kitchen notebooks, to document what and how they've cooked something when not using a specific recipe. I started doing this myself a couple of years ago, when I got tired of people asking me for a recipe and having to reply "Uh, I really don't have one written down". Or, worst yet, trying to re-create something I cooked that came out really wel and then trying to later remember just what I put in it.

So I began my notebook. I love it. Not only can I go back and see just what I did, but it's almost like a little diary, reminding me when I look back for something, of what I cooked, and when, and for whom.

Who else has their own personal kitchen notebook? More than one? If more than one, how long have you been making notes?

Laurie

[fifi]

You know... I have never thought of this. I make notes while I am cooking specific dishes so that I can write them up as an actual recipe for family and friends but I have never thought about a notebook. I am thinking that what you are talking about is more like a cooking diary, with specific instructions. What a fantastic idea. I can't tell you what I would give to have something like that from my mother, grandmother and great aunt.

[LaurieB]

You know, I'm not really sure exactly what my notebook is. All the recipes are ones I don't have in cookbooks or in my recipe file. If I'm doing something without a recipe, I make notes and then record it in the notebook. All notations are not successes. Some contain notes such as ''this sucked", "need to add more lemon", "try to fix this", etc. But then I go back and make notations when I do it again.

In the past year I've also started to add occasional notes on very special meals I've cooked for friends or family (one friend, who could pretty much go anywhere in the world for his birthday dinner, asked me to cook him his 60th birthday dinner) so that's where it becomes almost like a diary.

In my recipe box (and it's huge) I am lucky to have my mom's, grandmothers, aunts and other relatives' recipes, in their own handwriting. The notebook, though, is all me.

Laurie

[annexk8]

I do something like this, but I don't write everything down, just what I made for guests or special meals like birthdays. That way I can keep from repeating things for the same people (I write down the date, the occasion, and the guests as well as the menu) and someday we'll be able to look back at all the great parties we threw in the first year of our marriage. I use my great-grandma's system for noting whether particular dishes were good - "vg" (very good), "g" (good), "ok," and, sometimes, "no," and I'll add a note if there is something I would do differently.

[Really Nice!]

I keep mine on a roledex. Very basic stuff like:

How long to cook a chicken at various temperatures using various methods.

How long to boil or poach an egg.

What goes into a homemade poultry seasoning. (equal parts thyme, sage, marjoram, rosemary, and 1/4 part black pepper, and nutmeg)

Ingredient list for puff pastry (I've read Julia Child's version so many times (8 pages) that I know the steps, I just need to remember the ingredients.)

International flavor profiles.

Pasta ingredients (flour to egg ratios).

The five mother sauces and their derivatives.

What goes well with a particular wine varietal.

The important thing to make this work (at least for me) is to just list the bullet points. It's sort of a personal version of Le Repertoire de La Cuisine.

[bloviatrix]

I do something like this, but I don't write everything down, just what I made for guests or special meals like birthdays.  That way I can keep from repeating things for the same people (I write down the date, the occasion, and the guests as well as the menu) and someday we'll be able to look back at all the great parties we threw in the first year of our marriage.  I use my great-grandma's system for noting whether particular dishes were good - "vg" (very good), "g" (good), "ok," and, sometimes, "no," and I'll add a note if there is something I would do differently.

←

I keep a notebook like this as well. I write down the date and occasion. Then I draw a little diagram showing seating arrangement (I know this sounds anal, but once you get a request from a guest not to sit next to another AGAIN, the seating chart comes in handy. Plus, if we're hosting couples, you're not allowed to sit next to your spouse) as well as the menu. I also write notes about about things that worked or didn't as well as observations about guests' preferences. We hosted friends for a meal last week and for some reason the notebook came out -- I got razzed about it, but I'm not embarrassed.

I also use the notebook for jotting down holiday related things like who we gave Mishloach Manot (Purim) to, who sent to us and what was in the basket.

I should probably start a notebook with my recipe creations.

[Richard Kilgore]

Great ideas! I particularly like the rolodex because you can insert an addendum anywhere, but also like the idea of a more or less chronological notebook. Seems like both could be useful as described in the same kitchen.

[intraining]

i have a word document that's basically a menu, albeit very detailed. the only items appearing are the ones a recreate the same and as good or better. i should keep up to speed with them all though but not practical.

[snowangel]

While I can't say I have a kitchen "notebook", I have something similar. A few years ago, my mother gave me the recipe box she got from her mother, who got it from her great grandmother. There are not a lot of recipes, but there are a lot of cards indicating what was eaten on which special occasion.

For many years, we lived in Thailand, and my mother did a lot of entertaining. As was the above-mentioned tradition, after every party, my mother noted, on a recipe care, who attended, how much and what she served.

I now do the same. I have an undercabinet mounted recipe box (very deep) that is ugly harvest gold. I'm going to need another one soon, and have no idea where to get one.

I love having this record. Not to mention that the cards at the front of the recipe box are written in that spiderly, fountain pen ink of my grandmother and great grandmother. Less recipes than guidelines.

I should also add that whenever I cook from a cookbook, I mark it up. What worked, what didn't. Make it again or not. Add more of this or that. If you were to inherit one of my cookbooks, you would know what I had tried and what I would think of said dish.

I have thought about the notebook idea since you mentioned it, Laurie, but realize that unless I hid it so well I couldn't find it, it would be fodder for phone messages, "remember to get light bulb" messages for the other occupants of this domicile.

Edited to add: Between EG and that calendar on the wall at The Cabin I manage to keep a far better record of what we eat with who Up There.

Edited October 14, 2004 by snowangel (log)

[andiesenji]

I keep mine on the computer. However what I do while I am cooking, prepping, measuring and testing is dictate what I am doing then transcribe it later.

I have one of these

which records everything I say. I then play it back and transcribe it later.

This way I don't have to stop to write things down and lose my train of thought.

There are cheaper ones, and some that are a lot more expensive but I have found that this one works best for me.

This way I don't leave anything out - don't forget a step or an ingredient.

I edit out all the swearing.............. naturally.

[lovebenton0]

I also keep a notebook. Lots of recipes, notes and dates, including my garden notes on which variety and the quality of vegs and herbs I want to remember to grow or use again in certain recipes. Same for quality of peaches, grapes, wild onions, garlic, etc that we have as bounty annually.

I used to keep everything in handwritten journals -- that advanced from keeping a file of loose sheets. (I still have a very large, overstuffed envelope of those that I need to transfer.) But now that my vision and my handwriting are not as consistent I find it easier to make bare notes in the kitchen then do the real writing in a word doc. I learned the hard way when the old computer died an ugly death to save the file on a disc or CD, and to print out on a semi-regular basis.

[jsolomon]

Dear me... I have to keep a lab notebook at work. I need to have one at home, too?

Ack, no wonder I don't entertain. Well, that and being a confirmed bachelor My idea of entertaining is a 12-pack of iced Bud Light, lawn chairs, and a grill in my parking lot.

All joking aside, though, Really Nice!, I'm very curious about your international flavor profiles. I'll contact you offline about those.

[AmbrosiaFood]

Does keeping a dedicated laptop computer for recipes count as keeping a kitchen notebook?

That is what I do. I had a notebook before, and for me, this works much better. It is an old old Compaq laptop, not fit for internet access, but perfect for storing and categorizing recipes.

When I replace this laptop computer, [the one I am typing on now], it will become my recipe computer.

[MichaelB]

I wish I did. My wife keeps a little book with notes on dinner parties -- who, when and what we served. It also has a few cross references to pastry recipes she likes that appear in cookbooks or magazines.

I also have a tiny little book that I can carry around. I bought it to keep notes on things I ate and enjoyed, wine names, etc. I also have a few recipes written in a sort of shorthand -- things people have asked me how to cook. Trouble is I mislay the book so often; I don't think I have seen it since February.

I wish I had the discipline to keep a notebook of things I try in the kitchen. I cannot tell you how many times my wife has asked me to cook something "again." Even after her describing the dish in some detail, I don't remember having done it the first time.

[Anna N]

I don't keep a notebook as such but scribble alongside recipes (yes, even in my recipe books!). I have started a number of kitchen notebooks but never kept them up. I also tried the round-the-neck memo maker but usually left it on until the battery ran down!

[marie-louise]

I have what I refer to as My Cookbooks-for the last 16 years I've had computerized recipes for all the things I like to cook. I'm constantly revising them. Most of them have a Master Recipe, then lots of Variations. I also have a lot of information I've scanned or typed-anything from the best apples for cooking to a page on my favorite temperatures for each kind of meat. I have about 200 cookbooks, but I like having all my most important information in one place.

I just started a little notebook to write down menus-not for every day, but for special multi-course meals. I'm trying to teach myself more about menu planning for multi-course meals, and I think it will help me to write down what I made, with comments on what worked and what could be improved. I also think it will be fun to look back over the years at what I cooked for my friends & what wines I served.

[Smithy]

My kitchen notebook comprises scraps of paper stuck to the refrigerator with magnets! Eventually I get around to writing things in a slightly more organized fashion, and a few of those have arrived in my looseleaf binder of tried-and-true recipes. But in general, around our house, the notes about our breading mixture for chicken, roasting times for chicken or pork, outstanding pasta dishes that I threw together and want to re-create and tweak, all go onto the nearest scrap of paper at hand, into the general kitchen clutter, and eventually onto the side of the refrigerator.

I used to keep my cookbooks pristine, but about 10 years ago I took to treating them like a lab notebook. Every dish I try has a notation: date, results, what I might change, how others liked it. (It's telling, isn't it, when everyone says "ooh, this is good!" but nobody asks for the recipe?) Those few cookbooks I don't want to mark up are littered with comments on Post-It™ notes that can be removed someday.

[Suzanne F]

Wow, and I thought I was well-organized! It's all I can do to keep my list of freezer-and-fridge contents, and my calendar with what we had for dinner, both up to date! What great ideas from all.

[snowangel]

My kitchen notebook comprises scraps of paper stuck to the refrigerator with magnets!  Eventually I get around to writing things in a slightly more organized fashion, and a few of those have arrived in my looseleaf binder of tried-and-true recipes.  But in general, around our house, the notes about our breading mixture for chicken, roasting times for chicken or pork, outstanding pasta dishes that I threw together and want to re-create and tweak, all go onto the nearest scrap of paper at hand, into the general kitchen clutter, and eventually onto the side of the refrigerator.

←

You'll note I'm only "slightly" more organized. Those scraps of paper go right into the recipe box (which barely closes). My kids did not have baby books. THey had baby boxes, also filled with little scraps of paper.

[lovebenton0]

In addition to my own recipes I also keep a doc file on "recipes from" -- recipes I have been given by friends and family, or found around. When I do the (inevitable) variations I add those also.

[little ms foodie]

I also write in my cookbooks. I love to make notations on how things turned out or notes on tweaking recipes.

I've just been keeping a word doc on my computer over the last year to keep track of dinner party guests, menus, etc. My list also has dietary restrictions (aka picky picky) of our friends and family. They all know this and talk about who has the most "won't eats".

I like the notebook idea though, being able to flip through it and read it like a journal. I'm going shopping for a pretty one!

[Chris Amirault]

Great topic! There are cultures where these sorts of notebooks are very common (the post-war US south and the courts of Thailand in the late 19th century to name two with which I'm familiar), but not in contemporary life, I'd bet....

I'm one of the notes-in-cookbook types, but I have to say that I'm swayed by many of these ideas. I was struck by fifi's comment,

I am thinking that what you are talking about is more like a cooking diary, with specific instructions. What a fantastic idea. I can't tell you what I would give to have something like that from my mother, grandmother and great aunt.

←

I think that this is right on. After all, if you're on eGullet, chances are that your cooking life is important to you and would be important to family members who love you.

Thanks, everyone!

[NewYorkTexan]

I keep a notebook dedicated to smoking meats. I am still trying to get better at smoking and I find it invaluable to keep track of the details every time I put a hunk of meat on the smoker.

This allows me to keep track of the difference in timing and flavor when I change up the woods or preparation methods. I am going hunting in a few weeks and love the fact that I can revisit my notes from last year to tweak and improve the smoked game this time.

[torakris]

I actually have a couple of notebooks.....

My main one is my menu planning one, I try to plan 3 to 7 days of meals at a time and in the back of it I keep running lists of the items I have in my freezer and vegetable drawers. I also make notations of pantry items that are near an expiration date and need immediate consuming. I also order food from a local co-op and I write down everythingthat was ordered for teh next week, so I can plan my menus accordingly. I am also so anal about this that I write everything out in script except for in paranthese I will write the name and page # of the cookbook the recipe comes from or in capital letters I will write the ingredients from that dish that I don't have on hand and need to purchase before making.

My next notebook is a list of dishes/menus that I want to prepare for my cooking classes or for my cooking days with friends.

The 3rd notebook is my recipes, these are recipes I have completely created or adapted enough to call my own. In the back of it is my ideas page where I jot down ideas for combinations as they come to me.

I also write in all of my cookbooks, from simple yucks to wonderfuls to page and a half of how this recipe can be improved, changes I made, etc.

[Misa]

I really like the idea of a "cooking diary." I've also considered keeping track of my groceries - what I purchase at the beginning of the week, what I use daily, and what is left at the end.

Never been motivated enough, though.