8 best recipe files to keep all of your favourite dishes in one place
Whether you find yourself daydreaming about dinner parties, tearing out delicious-sounding recipes from the Sunday papers or earmarking dishes you’ve seen online to try later – there’s a good chance your foodie thoughts are getting a little disorganised.
Well fear not because it’s nothing that a good recipe file can’t help you with. A dedicated space for you to collate all things foodie, a recipe file can help plan everything from mid-week meals, to more special one-off occasions and also chart your experiments and findings in the kitchen along the way.
When thinking about what recipe file is right for you, consider how much space you need and whether you’re happy with the sections provided or would rather customise your own. Some have sheets allowing your book to grow and refill, whilst others come with a predetermined amount of pages.
As well as space to write down your favourite recipes, it’s also a helpful place to store the recipe cards you’ve been keeping from your weekly recipe boxes.
Family favourites and memorable meals deserve to be documented and although we’ve all got an endless stream of recipes available to us at the click of a button, this is a great way of collating your culinary successes. Many also include lots of clever extra features such as splash-proof plastic covers, conversion charts and stickers to make you smile.
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Moleskine are the authority when it comes to analogue note-taking and this pillar-box red hardback notebook is designed in its signature style. The first few pages are very thorough, covering everything a chef would need – food calendars to tell you what’s in season, nutritional info for a wide variety of foods, pan and knife types and their uses, cooking methods, meat temperatures, egg textures, vegetable cuts, cake slicing and a glossary – it’s very comprehensive.
It’s split into sections for appetisers, first courses, mains, sides and desserts with room to record ingredients and preparation, as well as wine pairings and cooking processes – you can even rate the difficulty of each dish attempted out of five. At the back, there’s room for you to create your own contents table and in true Moleskine style, red and grey stickers including thumbs up and down, smiley faces, hearts and more.