Welcome to Long Live the Recipe Box

The next step in my commitment to helping people gather and preserve cherished recipes

I’m thrilled to be launching this new newsletter, part of a wave of new things I’m cooking up around this theme of preserving cherished recipes. The story of what got me here starts with the tattered recipe folder of my mom’s that has lived in my kitchen since she passed away over twenty years ago. It’s been a treasure for some time, but only in the last few years have I developed a desire to help others create and preserve similar recipe-collection treasures of their own. I want others to experience the joy, comfort, connection that these beloved recipes provide.

Just a taste of what's in my mom's and my own recipe folders; on the right, the very tattered, held-together-with-packing-tape folder of my mom's that I treasure so very much

A couple of years ago I taught my first workshop about preserving family recipes, which I’ve taught four or five times since then, with two more on tap in January. One will be at the Wood River Museum of History and Culture in Ketchum, Idaho, and the other at Hot Stove Society in Seattle.

What I’ll be sharing here will draw, in part, from research and readings I do in preparation for those workshops, highlights from the things I share in those classes, as well as reflections and anecdotes I have from the workshops themselves. Every workshop I lead is so unique based on the people who attend, the stories that they share, the examples of family recipes and collections they bring in for discussion and class exercises. I can’t say how much joy and inspiration I get from these classes.

I also have a radar keenly tuned to all things recipe box, family recipes, keeping recipe traditions alive, passing recipes along across generations…all of which will provide me with lots of ideas for things to share here. (Quick note: when I say “recipe box” it’s shorthand for whatever form a collection of recipes might take, be it a battered accordion folder like my mom’s, a 3-ring binder with pages of recipes and pockets for clippings and recipe cards, a journal in which recipes are written directly, that drawer in the kitchen were all the recipes are tossed, etc.)

There is no end to the potential richness of conversations around cherished recipes. I can bring the topic up in any number of random circumstances and almost without exception, someone will have a related story to share. It might be about a collection of recipes being put together for a mother’s 80th birthday (based on one such recent chat at a dinner), or the friend realizing she should reach out to her cousin who has the family recipe box to see about getting copies, or the friend-of-a-friend who recorded their great-aunt making her signature ravioli dish so the family would have that treasure to look back on (and learn her tricks by watching her cook through the recipe for them).

And I’ll be connecting with many here on Substack who also touch on the joy and value of cherished recipes. I was so happy to have met

Amie McGraham

here and encourage you to subscribe to her Cook & Tell newsletter. The book she put together, Secret Recipes: recipe card microstories, is such a fabulous example of how someone can take inspiration from a recipe collection and create something delightful, personal, engaging.

I could go on and on and on. And I will be doing just that over the coming issues I’ll be sending out.