Recipe organizing

When I moved out from my parents and began cooking (almost 10 years ago) my recipe collection consisted of 1 cookbook and a couple of handwritten notes. As my passion for cooking grew so did my collection. I would buy several cooking magazines every month and soon had no space to store them all. So I decided to keep only recipes and get rid off all ads and uninteresting (to me) articles. The pile of magazines shrank significantly but I was still not happy with the recipe storage solution.

Until I learned a neat trick of using 3-ring binders for recipe organization. I bought several binders and slid recipes in sheet-protectors. Binders got labeled: APPETIZERS, SOUPS AND SALADS, PASTA etc.

This organizing "system" served wonderful for several years until I began noticing that I do not refer to those recipes as often as I used to. Instead, I get recipe ideas while reading cooking blogs or going through the most recent issue of my favorite magazine. So this year I came up with a new organizing technique.

1. For online recipes I use my Pinterest "TO COOK" board. Recipes I've tried and enjoyed get pinned onto "TRIED AND TRUE" board

2. For paper recipes I still use a couple of binders, keeping only interesting ones that are not available online

3. Every month I make a list of seasonal recipes I want to cook and write down where they come from. Now, when I need a recipe all I have to do is pick one from the list and find it either online or in my binder ... Easy and fast!

If you like this organizing idea here are free printable cards I created this month. Each card measures 4x6 and could be printed out in colour or in black-and-white.