Cookbook declutter

Day 76 of 100

Yesterday I tackled my cookbook cupboard in the kitchen. I had been putting this off, as I I knew it would require some time and decisions. When I first got married, (20 years ago) if you wanted to learn how to cook/bake etc., you either asked an experienced cook or looked it up in a cookbook. WOW...things have changed! Now, if I need an idea or recipe, I go online and within an instant have hundreds, if not thousands of recipes available. I don't even have to print them out, as I can bookmark them.

That being said, I still clip recipes that I see in magazines and have ones given to me by family and friends. I particularly love the ones written in the hand writing of the person who gave it to me. This is especially meaningful when they are no longer with you.

Going through my cookbooks was time consuming but liberating! I scanned each cookbook and assessed it for several things: 1. Do I or have I ever used it? 2. Does it have several recipes I have used or plan to use? 3. Is it the type of food I want my fmaily eating? 4. Will I realistically make it, or do exotic, difficult ingredients or steps make this unlikely? If the answer was no to these, I got rid of it. 10 cookbooks to be exact made way to my goodwill pile. For a few, there was only one or two recipes I used so I recorded these and let the cookbook go.

I also went through the hundreds of recipe clippings that I had filed. I threw away at least 2/3 of these based on the above criteria. I neatly filed the ones that I plan to try soon, into separate compartments based on type of recipe. Once I try it, if it makes the cut, I will write it on a recipe card and file it in my cute recipe basket!

My cookbook cupboard looks great now! There is free space and when I take a cookbook out, nothing is going to fall and hit me in the head! I am about to go to the grocery store and will be getting ingredients for a few recipes I discovered while decluttering!

How does your cookbook/recipe collection look? Could it use some decluttering?