More on organizing recipes

I also use ring binders, and clear plastic page protector sheets when I want to carry recipes into the kitchen. I can put one recipe on each side in a protector and splash away in the kitchen without ruining the recipes. When done, the recipe comes out of the page protector and goes back in the binder.

I have 3 huge binders - one I started when I was little (I won't say how long ago that was!) and it contains old family recipes such as English plum pudding in my great grandmother's handwriting... Another is my main current working binder which has tried and true recipes, and a third binder has recipes which I haven't tried yet. If I try them and the family gives a thumbs up, they get moved to the good binder. Otherwise they get tossed.

I have thousands of recipes and probably a hundred cookbooks. I print many out on my word processor. Many are newspaper or magazine clippings. The project I started six months ago isn't finished but is starting to reap benefits. I'm making a computer index of my favorite recipes (but not of the binder full of untried recipes. That I just browse through for ideas when I'm in the mood for something new). This to me is better than typing them all up, unless I scribbled them down in a hurry and need to make them legible. Which binder has that wonderful citrus salad dressing? Which book has my favorite tart dough? I got so tired of scrabbling through trying to find recipes I'd made before and loved - but often couldn't remember if it was in a binder, or in one of my many cookbooks??? So the index listing where my favorite recipes are is really starting to help - if I could just finish the job! The index is on the computer, and contains title of recipe, book and page number or which binder and section, and sometimes a brief note about the recipe. I haven't printed it out yet. Originally I thought I would, and stick it in front of my main binder. But the computer index is working great so I'll keep it simple and stop with that. My computer is in the family room, not far from the kitchen but not visible from the kitchen. So I need my recipes in print format, not screen format. I'm trying to beg my son's old laptop from him that he doesn't seem to use much any more. Wouldn't that be great in the kitchen!

I have to confess I'd rather be cooking recipes than organizing recipes, but computer indexing has proved to be the way to go, for me.