Your kids who live with their Dad or your grandkids are coming for two weeks this summer, and you want to keep them engaged with a different kind of project that will be fun and memorable. How about making a recipe book for kids using your Matilda’s Fantastic Cookbook Software?

A recipe book for kids can be a great keepsake of their summer vacation, and a great show-and-tell when classmates or teachers ask “what did you do on summer vacation.” (Not many children will be able to show their own personalized recipe book for kids.) Read the rest of this entry »

Call me old fashioned, but I like to write my menu planning ideas on a sheet of paper using my favorite pencil or pen of the day. Sometimes I feel guilty using a whole sheet of paper to jot down menu planning ideas. (Guess my green conservative ways leak out now and again.)

To curb my penchant for “give an inch take a mile” scribbling, I used to fold a whole sheet of paper in half, and then write my menu planning ideas on the vertical half sheet of paper. (By writing my menu planning ideas with the half-sheet positioned vertically, I felt I had more room to be creative.) Read the rest of this entry »

Have you ever wanted to travel back in time to see how life was in ages past? How about traveling forward in time?  Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could press a button and be able to time travel at will?  Well, what if you could turn a page in your family cookbook instead?

In your family cookbook, you might see your great grandmother’s photo and her recipe for blueberry pie right next to cousin Adela’s avant garde secret recipe for blueberry-strawberry extract that is destined to become a mainstream nutritional supplement in 20 years.

In your family cookbook, you might see a personal collection of recipes that were saved when a family member wrote them down on paper instead of using the tried and true “show-and-tell-method” to pass along cooking wisdom and family cooking secrets. 

In your family cookbook, you might also find stories about your family that you never imagined, like the time Uncle Arthur ran away to the circus and married a chimpanzee (or so the story goes). Or, you might find the story about little Jimmie who dreams of finding a solution to harnessing the energy of nuclear waste.

A family cookbook is a time capsule of the present captured on paper (or CD) for generations today and in the future to enjoy the fruits of their ancestors’ past. A family cookbook truly is one of the few things that spans the past, present and future all at once. Make them; cherish them; use them.

Happy family cookbooking,

Matilda

Generally, when we entertain we serve fresh food to our guests, preferably food we have made ourselves with help from our family cookbook. Serving leftovers to guests isn’t part of our normal thinking, even though our ancestors didn’t think twice about serving leftovers to guests.

But what if friends drop by unexpectedly and you have an abundance of food in the house that you really would like to consume because you are leaving town for a few days?  What if they arrive late at night, and no store is open for buying groceries? Would serving leftovers to guests be a problem for you (or your guests)? Read the rest of this entry »

Ruth came over the other day to see our lovely recipe box assortment that I was bragging about. “Crowing was more like it,” Ruth wisecracked as she turned over the recipe box we aptly named Chicken with Checkers to inspect its interior and exterior.

After her examination and seal of approval, Ruth said she really liked all the pretty recipe box designs, and as usual, came up with a wonderful suggestion. Read the rest of this entry »

Every so often I like to use applesauce instead of butter or margarine (or oil) when making baked goods such as cookies or muffins. In addition to cutting down on my fat intake, the texture of the cookies or muffins made with applesauce tend to be no different than those made with butter or margarine.

Also, I found there really is no appreciable taste difference between cookies or muffins made with applesauce vs. cookies or muffins made with butter or margarine (or oil). To my mind, opening a can or jar of applesauce is easier than melting butter or margarine (no oily mess in the measuring cup to clean up). Read the rest of this entry »

We got a lovely note about family cookbooks at family reunions from our software user Colette Surovy of Canada. Colette’s family reunion was held July 3-5 with a grand 165 people attending from all over Canada and the United States.

Colette made a family cookbook for her family reunion using Matilda’s Fantastic Cookbook Software. She collected recipes from family members approximately four months in advance and had a wonderful response from her enthusiastic relatives. Read the rest of this entry »

I was so elated the other day when our new shipment of recipe card boxes came into the office. Even though we all have specific jobs around here at the Cookbook People, I just had to tear into the shipping boxes to see the 15 pretty new recipe card storage boxes we have added to our beautiful original collection.

Since I was involved in the selection of these recipe card boxes, I hope you can appreciate my excitement and glee when I unpacked one after another and found them to be exactly as ordered, so I know you will be delighted, too. Read the rest of this entry »

Sometimes I feel like an Iron Chef, going into my own kitchen stadium to prepare tonight’s “Battle Family Dinner” without the faintest clue about what I’m going to make.  Somehow I always manage to best express the unique qualities of some secret theme ingredients in less than 60 minutes that satisfy the family palate and win the Battle Family Dinner with points to spare.

I certainly don’t have a master kitchen of over 500 ingredients that The Chairman funds, or a gourmet cupboard that is previewed by my Challengers (hey, if YOU wanna be Iron Chef Matilda tonight and do Battle Family Dinner, the job is yours). Read the rest of this entry »

The year 5,000 BC was a pretty significant one when it comes to food, according to the
Food Timeline, a fun website that traces the history of food since the beginning. 
 
The Food Timeline tells us the year 5,000 BC brought the world:

- Olives & olive oil
- Cucumbers & squash
- Chili peppers, avocados & taro
- Potatoes
- Milk & yogurt Read the rest of this entry »

No matter where you are in the Northern Hemisphere during the summer months, the hottest days can make you wish for a cold winter day again.  Iced beverages and lighter meals are the order of the day, and cool summer salads that take the heat off in the kitchen fit the bill perfectly.

Lettuce is the mainstay of most summer salads, although it isn’t a necessity to have lettuce in your cool summer salad. For example, I like the nutrient properties and the taste of raw spinach. Here are some of my favorite greens for making cool summer salads 7 days a week: Read the rest of this entry »

Let us know which of our cookbook templates you used for your cookbook here. It’ll help us focus on which templates we should expand on in the future.

Besides, aren’t you curious to know what everybody else is using?

 Loading ...

Feel free to suggest other designs we should consider.

After years of keeping recipes on recipe cards and on scraps of paper, I have found that one of the best ways to keep recipes is in a cookbook binder.

Cookbook binders are great because they are so versatile. Unlike a hardbound book, cookbook binders can be altered or updated at any time. You can write on the pages, edit them later on your computer, print a new page and exchange it for the old one, and voila, you have fresh new recipe content pages in your cookbook binder.  (That’s how we envision updates to be done at The Cookbook People, anyway.)

Best of all, with a cookbook binder you have the flexibility to change the order of the pages, add or delete whole tab sections, or customize anything else you like. Read the rest of this entry »