Where do you keep your cook books

happy chick

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 7:00 am

Yes, I know it super important erev pesach, but I'd like to relocate them from their current headquarters. I keep them in a kitchen cabinet, but it's taking up prime real estate. No space in the seforim book cases. I'm looking for somewhere practical.

Amarante

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 9:04 am

Not the answer you are looking for but I have almost no cookbooks and the few I have I keep for sentimental reasons like my Bubbe's Settlement Cookbook - The Way To A Man's Heart; my mother's Joy of Cooking.

I got rid of all of my cookbooks because I couldn't find recipes I wanted to use because they were scattered in too many places and it was impossible to remember where they were.

All of my cookbooks are digital and in fact I generally go through a digital cookbook and then save the recipes I want to make. When I make a recipe I print it out. in LARGE FONTS and stick it on the refrigerator when I am cooking.

If I like the recipe enough to think I will make it again, I put the digital copy in a file on my computer that has subfolders - and I then can search by various criteria including ingredients; method of cooking or events like holidays.

Tzutzie

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 9:41 am

Above my fridge right next to the tablecloths.
But you need to be tall enough for it to be easily accessible.
My kitchen is pretty small. So it was the best option.

Eta, it also depends how often you use your recipe books.
Most of my family favorites I know by heart. Including cakes and cookies.
I don't use any cookbooks on a daily basis.
I mostly use my book with collected recipes (it's a loose-leaf type book w plastic sleeves for index cards)
And then I have 4 more. The others I purged last year. My rule was, If I didnt use it in the last 3 months it has to go. And so out went many of them. Those that had a few single recipes I used I just saved them, wrote them into my own recipe book.
Now it's just these few well used books and my own.

Last edited by Tzutzie on Thu, Apr 18 2024, 9:59 am; edited 1 time in total

MiracleMama

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 9:44 am

Amarante wrote:

This is really motivating me to purge. I have probably close to 40 cookbooks taking up prime bookshelf space. And majority have not been touched in years.

happy chick

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 9:55 am

Digitizing is prob the best way to do it, but I'm a little old fashioned. I like looking at real books.
Also, it's a good shabbos night/afternoon activity to look for interesting recipes. I don't have so many books, but it's taking up the whole cabinet over my stove.

Tzutzie

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 10:02 am

happy chick wrote:

Yes. Nothing like a regular book/paper. Also it's easier. Having to run down to pouring out a recipe is another added step to cooking.

amother

Powderblue

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 10:59 am

Tzutzie wrote:

Yes. Nothing like a regular book/paper. Also it's easier. Having to run down to pouring out a recipe is another added step to cooking.

Most recipes are online, I save them to my cooking library on Alexa. She’ll even read me the ingredients list and instructions step by step while I cook

Goldengoose

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 11:41 am

try to get creative. is there anything that can be moved out of the kitchen to make room for the cookbooks?
they need to be in the kitchen so that you actually use them.

Rutabaga

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 12:19 pm

The cookbooks we use regularly are on a shelf above a sink that's not very useful for anything else. The cookbooks we only pull out once in a while are on a shelf in our den.

Bnei Berak 10

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 12:34 pm

In one of my book cases. There's no way I have space for them in the kitchen.
Ideally they should be located where you use them put that is also a question for debate. Browsing through receipts when you are in bed as quiet entertainment or when you are about to start to cook?

AlwaysCleaning

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 12:50 pm

I keep them on a high-ish shelf. Not wasting real estate that's within reach, but it's low enough that DH can reach or I use a stool to get one when I need.

I try and meal plan so I'll take down a few on Sunday, snap Pic of the ones I want for the week and then put them back

amother

Ivory

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 12:52 pm

Tzutzie wrote:

Yes. Nothing like a regular book/paper. Also it's easier. Having to run down to pouring out a recipe is another added step to cooking.

Same I still prefer books over digital

zaq

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 1:52 pm

I have two kinds of books: Clean ones to read for entertainment, and the stained, egg-spotted, overloaded and broken-spined notebook I actually use. The first kind has pride of place in the living room bookcase, while the latter lives in a kitchen cabinet together with booklets on checking produce, hafrashas challah, and related topics.

zaq

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 1:59 pm

Does the word "f-l-e-c-k-e-d" have a vulgar connotation of which I am ignorant? The Imamother censor, bless its heart, changed egg-f-l-e-c-k-e-d to egg-messed. The substitution doesn't remotely convey the intended picture of tiny flakes
of dried egg stuck all over the pages.

Sunny Days

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 5:00 pm

zaq wrote:

This is very funny actually LOL

Who knows? In todays world…

LovesHashem

Thu, Apr 18 2024, 5:25 pm

Tzutzie wrote:

Yes. Nothing like a regular book/paper. Also it's easier. Having to run down to pouring out a recipe is another added step to cooking.

I agree but at the same time if I want to make a cabbage salad based on what I have in the house I'll just scroll online until I find one that I have all the ingredients for.

If I'm craving something I can just Google it. In some ways it's easier. There's really only two cookbooks I go back to and the peas love and carrots and table for two. All my others ones are barely used.