Recipes For Disaster

For many of us, it’s our dirty little kitchen secret, darker and more terrifying than the green gunk on the cheese in the back of the refrigerator.

You come across it when someone asks for the dish you brought to the office potluck last year, or when the college kid calls home for the meatloaf you always make. It’s the war zone that is your recipe collection.

Some clippings are yellowed, some have been chewed by the dog. Others are missing ingredients, blotted out by spills. Still more are stuck together with fried chicken drippings and chocolate syrup from that birthday party 12 years ago. Most are folded, jammed and shoved into boxes, or into cookbooks you never crack open anymore.

Each week the piles and mess grow, becoming so unbearable that you wonder how you ever cook.

“It’s kind of like having all those coupons,” says Claudia Bryan, an executive development consultant in Irvine, Calif. “You clip all these coupons for stuff you know you’ll never buy.”

Thankfully, you can escape your recipe wreck by setting up a system - whether you write favorite recipes by hand or scan them into a computer, whether you race home from work to toss dinner on the table or have the time to give personalized recipes to friends.

So conquer your kitchen. Seize control of your life. Get your recipes in alphabetical order, at the very least, and cooking will seem that much easier. Here are some ideas:

Think before you clip: Save only recipes you know you’ll make. Who really needs 100 cheesecake recipes?

“The recipe has to hit a real hot point for me,” says Jean Kozar, a home economist with General Mills who has edited Betty Crocker cookbooks.

In an earlier time, she clipped out of guilt: “I saw all those categories (in a recipe card file), and they made me feel like I should be putting things in there.”

Now, Kozar mostly saves recipes for favorite foods, such as chicken or pumpkin, and pops them into file folders.

Try ‘em before filing ‘em: If you clip and save a lot, keep the recent recipes in a file folder labeled “new.” Give them a test drive before adding them to your collection so you know if they’re worth saving.

Sharon Corzine, an event planner in Santa Ana, Calif., only puts what has been tried into her recipe box. A recipe, she says, has to earn its way in.

Befriend the copy machine: Sure, certain recipes belong on recipe cards in nice handwriting, like the ones you give along with a loaf of bread at the holidays.

But you can save time by photocopying a clipped recipe or one from a cookbook. Punch holes in the photocopy and file it in a three-ring binder. Or, place photocopies in file folders, 8-1/2 by 11-inch envelopes, or an accordion file. Quicker yet, skip the copier and just paste or tape the recipe to a piece of paper and file it.

Try a photo album: Home economist Cathi Hofstetter is surrounded by recipes at her test kitchen business in Fullerton, Calif. Most are stored in computer files. But at home, Hofstetter saves recipes in a photo album, the kind with the sticky pages and vinyl covers.

“I like to pull out a page (to cook from), which is good, since it’s vinyl-coated,” Hofstetter says.

A photo album makes saving recipe photos convenient as well.

Be categorical: You may have some sort of system already - be it very neat, or more of a controlled clutter - but still stumble a bit when it comes to finding a recipe.

First, don’t feel bound by conventional categories. Create your own. If you mostly cook casseroles and cakes, set up a system with several types of casseroles, skipping standard themes such as appetizers and drinks.

Or, set up a system by how much time you have to cook.

Sally Peters, director of the consumer food and publications center for Pillsbury, stores some recipes in what she calls her “supper book.” It’s a three-ring binder full of photocopied or taped-to-the-page recipes organized by entree.

“They’re all things that can be made very quickly,” Peters says. “I don’t go there for Sunday dinner or entertaining; the reason I go there is to get dinner on the table.”

While not fancy or fat, the binder is full of recipes Peters says her family likes. If you tend to cook by what you’re craving, save your recipes in ethnic categories. Kathy Murphy, a catering company owner, once had a chef who stored recipes by cuisine category in file boxes - some 15 boxes in all. “She had a Greek box, an Italian box, a South American box.” That way, if you feel like “Mexican tonight,” you can head right to a certain stash of recipes.

If you’re into tradition, Pat McBride-Burris, an organizational consultant in Anaheim Hills, Calif., recommends these categories: Appetizers, beverages, breads, cakes, candy, cheese and eggs, cookies, desserts, main dishes, miscellaneous, pies, potatoes/rice/pasta, salads, soups/stews and vegetables.

McBride-Burris, who often is hired to better organize clients’ homes, suggests storing recipe folders or envelopes vertically to maximize space. If you do lots of entertaining, keep track of menus you prepare and store them in an entertaining file. You might want to note what you served to whom and when you served it. And if you have room, store the recipes alongside the menu.

Cross-reference: Homemaker Wendy Stark keeps a little notebook of recipe names arranged alphabetically, with information on where the recipe can be found.

“I’m always looking for something to make based on what I have,” she says.

So if she has asparagus, she looks under “A” for the ingredient, then is referred to either one of her many cookbooks, food magazines or a recipe stored on a file card in shoeboxes in her pantry.

If you have a bulging file folder or shelves of cookbooks, use your recipe box as an index. Record recipes by name (if you tend to remember them that way), by ingredient, or by type of dish, and file just the name of the recipe on cards alphabetically. You’ll save time by hitting your index box first, then going specifically to the spot where you keep the recipe.

Do what works for you: Cookbook author Elaine Corn keeps her recipes in a chronological order of her life. If she wants an enchilada recipe, she knows how far back to go in her 7-inch-thick recipe notebook to find the enchiladas she ate in Texas in the 1970s.

“I know when things appealed to me, what I was doing then, what I was eating then,” explains the author of “Now You’re Cooking for Company” (Harlow & Ratner).

Of course, it might take awhile to thumb through recipes, and Corn is slowed in her search by reading other old favorites, which often she is delighted to unearth. But her way works best for her, just as her friend’s way of organizing cookbooks by color works for her. To save recipes any other way, Corn says, “would ruin my whole nonsystem system.”

Finally, be tough: Obviously, Grandma’s recipes get saved, as do the ones with the stains lovingly spilled across them. But stay on top of things. Go through your files yearly, suggests cooking instructor George Geary of Anaheim Hills, and purge. “If you haven’t used it in a year, throw it out,” he says.

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: THERE ARE LOTS OF WAYS TO ORGANIZE RECIPES By Jennifer Lowe Orange County Register

Need more help organizing recipes? There are a number of things you can buy to sort them all out, including: Card boxes, index cards and dividers. Accordion files. Three-ring binders and dividers; some specifically designed for recipes are often carried at cooking stores. Hot Stuff Graphics in Massachusetts sells two sizes of recipe organizers that feature inlaid handcrafted copper tiles or hand-painted illustrations on the cover. Price range is $38-$48 plus shipping. Call (508) 487-6687. Recipe organizers, such as The Recipe Collector from Lusions Publishing, a spiral-bound book of 95 preprinted index cards on which you can specify how well the recipe was liked, whether it was easy, and how much time it took to make. The book is $7.95 plus shipping. Call (800) 382-2858. If you’re into computers, a recipe organizer allows you to input your recipes and categorize them a number of ways. With only a few keystrokes, you can call up a favorite recipe and print it out. Here are a few: Mangia, $49.95. Rated among the best of the managers by Consumer Reports, this program comes on diskettes. You can print in booklet or recipe card form, create shopping lists and menus. By Upstill Software, (800) 568-3696 or online at www.mangia.com/mangia. The Cook’s Palate, $49.95. You can generate shopping lists and menus, customize your cookbook, and exchange recipes with other Cook’s Palate users. On CD-ROM or diskette for Windows, by Better Lifestyles, (800) 278-5136. MasterCook, $39.95. Consumer Reports calls it the most powerful cookbook software it tested, but difficult for computer novices. The program will figure nutritional data for recipes, has a search tool that lets you look for recipes a number of ways, and prints in color. By Sierra On-Line, (800) 757-7707, or online at www.sierra.com.