My parents are still very much alive and thriving, but my siblings and I are already tussling over who will be the child to inherit the family cookbooks when they pass. I’m not talking about the dog-eared, oil-stained Joy of Cooking (which is an artifact, to be sure), but the three-ring binder that is pulled down from the top of the fridge almost every single day.
This beloved, battered culinary grimoire is crammed well beyond its intended capacity, with recipes handwritten on index cards, computer printouts with notes in the margins, and pages hastily torn from magazines to take to the grocery store. It contains treasured recipes handed down from relatives long gone, as well as newer ones my parents discovered along the way.
Knowing what that disorganized mess means to us “kids,” my mom gifted each of us our own recipe books when we moved out, filled with our favorite recipes lovingly written on matching cards. My recipe book will be one of the things I would want to grab if my house were ever on fire, but it can’t hold a candle to the magical three-ring binder. (Come to think of it, that binder shouldn’t be anywhere near an open flame…)
Thankfully, we won’t need to divide the binder to divvy out recipes between us (sacrilege!), nor will we have to fight to the death for it. Several websites and apps offer solutions that will allow us to easily share our culinary inheritance while maintaining its sentimental value. Here’s how to start if you’re interested in creating this culinary keepsake.
Digitizing Kitchen Memories
The best way to digitize recipes is by using a dedicated recipe app with optical character recognition (OCR). This allows you to scan handwritten cards, import web recipes, and even categorize them, instantly. While most of these apps aren’t free, they’re not prohibitively expensive. (You could try to do this for free using Google Drive or something similar to store photos and PDFs of recipes, but that can become both time- and labor-intensive.)
Many of the apps and websites offer the same perks, such as the ability to generate shopping lists and meal plans, and various organizational tools. Most allow easy sharing of recipes and photos via email or directly through the app, and almost all of them come with OCR built in. (This not only will scan your recipe and turn it into text, but it makes that text searchable/taggable and editable. Although the digital version will be in a standard, easy-to-read font, these apps/websites have an option for including photos with each recipe, so that handwritten, food-stained, torn recipe can be preserved for posterity.)
Choosing which app is right for you will mostly come down to aesthetics, and which one you personally find to be most user-friendly.
Here are just a few of your options:
Recipe Keeper
Recipe Keeper is available across several platforms (iOS, Google, Microsoft), and allows syncing between your phone, tablet, PC and Mac, so no family member will get left out, no matter what they use. (And the companion desktop app is great for anyone who prefers to type on a regular keyboard instead of the dinky one on their phone.)
Additional perks include an ability to automatically convert to/from metric and standard measurements, and you can scale any recipe up or down based on how many servings you need (a boon for empty nesters who haven’t readjusted to cooking for two). Also, you can opt to convert everything into a PDF, if you want to create a physical, printed copy for friends or family.
Cost: Free with limited storage, or a one-time fee of $10-$20 (depending on platform) for Pro version. No annual subscription necessary.
Paprika
Paprika is another highly rated recipe organizer that lets you save, edit, categorize and sync recipes across devices, which is great for building your own digital family cookbook. Paprika has a neat feature that allows you to interact with a recipe as you’re cooking by crossing off items or highlighting the step you’re on in the directions. According to some reviews, the recipe organizational aspect of the app is top-notch, but it isn’t as great for meal planning.
Cost: Free with limited storage (restricted to 50 recipes and lacks cloud syncing), or a one-time fee of $5 for mobile apps, $30 for desktop versions (macOS/windows). One popular grievance is that licenses are separate for each type of device — so buying the mobile version won’t cover the app on your Mac, for example. In other words, while you can sync between devices, you have to pay separately to have the app on each device.
ReciMe
ReciMe went viral on TikTok, earning itself recognition for being great at translating social media cooking videos into written recipes. Like the other apps, it lets you save recipes from many sources, organize them, and build custom cookbook collections. Reviews say that ReciMe is great for people who don’t need a lot of bells and whistles in terms of added tools, mostly because the meal plan functions are frustrating to use.
Cost: Free version is limited to five recipe imports per week but includes access to their “smart” grocery list, meal planning and cookbooks features. Premium version unlocks unlimited recipe imports, private recipe storage and other tools, but costs $60 per year unless you manage to get it during a promotion. (Seniors 60+ may be eligible for a 30% discount.)
CookBook
CookBook is another smart recipe manager that lets you save and import recipes from any source, organize them into collections, and access your family cookbook across devices with planning and shopping features. Reviews say that CookBook has a clean user interface, and the OCR is surprisingly accurate even with difficult handwriting. Like Recipe Keeper, CookBook also allows you to scale servings, and the meal planning tools are easier than some other apps.
Cost: Free version allows you to store 20 recipes, use 20 smart imports and have two shopping lists with limited items. Monthly subscription is $6.99 per month with unlimited access, and an annual plan is $39.99 (which would save you $3 per month over the monthly plan).
Top image: Mechelle Brooks from Getty Images, via Canva.com
