Personal Recipes Collections

[Hjalmer]

I am new to Egullet and I have found this to be a amzing group of people that are very through and dedicated to the love of Food. I have got to the point now where I am having several people ask me to make dishes again that I have made in the past (Remeber that one you made it was a SouthWestern Asian fusion chicken dish). I cook 95% of the time with what ingredients I have in the fridge and then I create amazing things. I have my Manic moment like a mad artist, most of the time I am very consious of what I am cooking other times it is a blur. My problem is that I never write anything down, I have tried using mini recorders but I have no experience dictating as I cook and I feel that it interupts my zone that I am usually in. Most of the food that I make is like a great Jazz performance, it is never the same performance but it is always amazing. I need some ideas as far as recording recipes as they cook. I am very open to any ideas. What does everyone use to store a finalized copy of the recipes?

[handmc]

I have a similar problem but it also includes issues of scale. I can tell you the proportions to make 15 gallons of squash soup but no idea what to tell those who just want to cook up a small batch what amount to use.

[bleudauvergne]

Kitchen diaries. I write it all down. The books are filled one by one. I paste the map of the place I live when I start the book on the outisde. Each dish gets a number and every week or so I update the contents which are in some blank pages I leave at the beginning of the book. As the seasons roll by, I then categorize the contents into the yearly seasons with brackets.

For me, the important thing is to write it down right after dinner, or the next morning. Definitely make it a point to remember what you are doing! Just kind of replay in your head what you did, most of those blurry moments will come back to you if you try! I now serve a lot of things that just came to me as flashes of inspiration with what we had a long time ago. Just make it a habit to write it down while it is fresh in your mind! Write down things you think will be easy to remember, too, and also dates and variations, because don't worry, you'll forget them if you don't write them down. Don't forget to write detailed notes on your ingredients too, because if what made a dish great was a certain type of sage sold at the market that day, you want to remember that! Take pictures and paste them in. That reminds me, I have to write something down in my book...

Hey, Welcome to the forums, btw! Great topic!

[Chufi]

I have a little writing book that I carry with me, always. It's more a book of ideas than a book of recipes - when I am at the market, and see something interesting, ideas will start to form but that may not neccesarily be the right time to buy that certain item - so I write down my thoughts. I usually spend my lunchbreak in the botanical gardens near my office, with my notebook, musing about past and future meals

When I am thinking about a certain dinner, for instance a dinner party with friends that I have planned, I will write all my ideas about it in my book - and when the dinner's over, I write down what I did, how it went, and what should or could be changed.

In the notebook I refer to recipes that are written down elsewhere: in books, magazines, on the internet, or in word files in my computer. A recipe on the computer only gets printed out when I am cooking it, and then it goes into a binder I keep in the kitchen, with notes added.

I'm not as organized as I would like to be though. Sometimes a week goes by without recording anything. But then I can always check out the Dinner! thread to remember what I cooked and what it looked like

Edited December 17, 2005 by Chufi (log)

[jgm]

I am still a very recipe-bound cook, so I don't even begin to have the problem you're having.

Do you have enough room in your kitchen to have a tray or bowl into which you can put a reminder of what you used? At the end you might have an onion peel, or part of one, 3 jars of herbs, a few pieces of chopped pepper--just enough to identify it, etc. Then after the meal, as you go through the bowl or tray, you could write down what you used; you'll surely have a pretty good idea of how much you used at that point, and then you could put away what needs to be put away, and throw out what needs to be thrown out. If dictating and writing as you go won't work for you, that's about all I can think of, outside of setting up a video camera or asking someone else to watch you and take notes as you work.

[Pam R]

I've had to train myself to take notes as I try recipes. Like you, I'm one of those throw this and that into the pot and see what I come up with. That didn't really work when I started working on my book.

I keep a notebook in my kitchen at home and one at work. I gather my ingredients and write them all down before I start cooking. I fill in the quantities as I go. Then I try my best to make notes of techniques, cooking temps and times as I go.

While working on my book, more than one recipe had to be tested several times - not because I wasn't happy with the flavour, but because I couldn't read my quick notes or I completely forgot to write some things down. I'm much better at it now, but it took a quite a while to get here.

[Ktepi]

I keep an idea book with me, too -- a lot of times I'll think of a flavor combination but know that it's not something I'll do anything with that week, or not know what exactly I want to do with it. I jot down what we order at some restaurants, too.

I often blog what I made for dinner, lunch, whatever, after the fact -- but not for the sake of a recipe, per se, and since I measure hardly anything if I'm not baking or curing, my recipes are often going to be wrong in those specifics. I can almost always remember how I made what I made -- but nine times out of ten I'll forget that I made it until I'm reminded. Tell me "the carrot pancakes with the ginger" or "that duck on the rice noodles" and I'm fine, but ask me for something to do with duck and I'm more likely to think of something new than to remember what I've done with it before. Keeping a record of the highlights makes things easier, and most years I print up a cookbook on CafePress to give to family.