If a well-known video game design company came to you and said “I want a new idea for a video game. Tell me what you want me to make, and I will do it and throw all my best developers, designers, and cashmoney at the project!” … what video game would you ask to be made? MMO, console, computer, iPhone – any platform you like.

I like to cook. I like to try new recipes.

I hate cookbooks.

These facts may seem mutually exclusive at first glance, but bear with me.

Why do I hate cookbooks?

• Even when I know exactly what recipe I’m looking for and which book it’s in, I spend too much time flipping through pages trying to find it.
• Most of the time, I can’t even remember which cookbook the recipe I’m looking for was in.
• I feel bad scribbling my recipe alterations in a shiny, purchased cookbook. Scribbles feel like me walking up to Julia Child and throwing her the z-snap while telling her I’m a better cook than her because I’m changing her recipe.
• Cookbooks may have three recipes I like and eleventy billion recipes I will never even try, but I have to flip through anyway because they are IN THE WAY. Recipe roadbumps are not my friends.
• Cookbooks typically have a flat spine, which makes it awfully difficult to keep them open while I’m reading the recipe. I have more than once had an open cookbook LUNGE at me from the counter, flip itself shut, and slam to the floor.

Like I said. I hate cookbooks. They obviously hate me, too, so I think that’s fair.

My Solution

My solution is simple, ridiculous, hodgepodge, and utterly fantastic.

I bought an empty spiral-bound scrapbooking book.

Every time I try a new recipe and it’s awesome, I make a copy of the recipe, cut it out, and glue it into my scrapbooking book, where I can scribble recipe alterations, notes, movie quotes*, and random doodles of green peppers, mushrooms, and tomatoes to my heart’s content.

The Black Book

The Black Book, as it’s called, is our repository for awesome recipes. I know that every recipe in there is one that is tried, tested, and loved. I have a few hand-written recipes from friends in there (hi, Jen!), various printouts from websites, and a lot of scanned copies from our three primary recipe books.

I don’t have to pain-stakingly hand-write recipe cards (they look amazing, but I am WAY too lazy for that). I don’t have to remember where the recipes came from, or remember that I added soy sauce and mushrooms to our favorite steak recipe.

The Black Book is messy, hideous, splattered with various sauces and foods, and I love it to bits.

You?

How do you organize your recipes? Do you have a dizzying array of cookbooks, a neatly stacked box of index cards, or a cluttered favorites folder for the internet?

* The meatloaf recipe has the original title scribbled out and the words, “MOM! The MEATLOAF!” inserted in its place. Similarly, the tuna and cauliflower casserole has “It’s a casserole, Sheila, it’ll keep!”. We refer to these recipes as “momthemeatloaf” and “casserolesheila”. Bonus points if you know what movies the quotes are from.

Assuming you did not kill every plant you come in contact with AND you had both the time to garden and the space for it …

What would you plant in your garden?