Does the smell of chocolate chip cookies take you right back to childhood? If turkey and dressing is on the menu, does it just somehow feel like a holiday? Food plays a huge part in the shaping of our memories. The meals we eat at Thanksgiving, the kind of cake served at our birthday parties, or the snacks our families provided when we had friends over all help mold our early lives. To preserve this distinct part of your family heritage, document your mother’s recipes, pass along your own food favorites or begin to record the dishes served at your next holiday meal. With Studio’s templates, you have hundreds of easy ways to record your family food memories. Let’s look at some of them!
Popular Cookbook Format: 6 x 9 Wire-bound BookAlmost certainly the most commonly used format for recipes, our 6 x 9 wire-bound book is a handy size and comes with a wrap-around, wipe clean cover. The three shown here include space for both food and family photos along with text boxes for glimpses of life with family or friends, alongside the recipes. “Special Recipes” by Sandra Dovre is template 9136 and takes a whimsical design approach with lots of room for family stories. “Recipe's from Friends” by Michelle Bell, template 11440, preserves the recipes of lifelong friends, with room to journal about time spent together and the occasion the recipe was first enjoyed with the group. “Family Favorites” by Sharon Asher, template 19600, has a rustic, camping flavor with space to talk about family remembrances alongside cherished recipes. It would be perfect for a record of campfire and fishing food.
New 6 x 9 Booklet
Hijacked from the Heritage Makers business line, the inexpensive 16-page stapled booklet is proving a popular format for recipe preservation. Its inexpensive format and expandable size (up to 32 pages including inside and outside front and back cover, but in four-page increments) make it the perfect vehicle for neighborhood, school, church and other small group or fund-raising recipe books. Brooke Mehr’s “Family Recipes,” template 66228, is a perfect way to record the initial efforts at cooking of a newly married couple. With room to write about the recipe and how it turned out or was adjusted or received, the booklet also has room for photos of the people involved in this food journey. “Countdown to Christmas Cookbook” by Darcie Toom, template 65997, is the perfect way to gather traditional holiday food recipes into one place along with photos of the holiday event.
An Innovative Use of 6 x 4 Invitations
Recipe card boxes full of 3 x 5 index cards have been a kitchen staple for years. More recently, slightly oversize recipe boxes were introduced to accommodate newer 6 x 4 index cards. Piggy backing on the idea of this size card, Heritage Makers everywhere have turned to the 6 x 4 invitation to duplicate this new trend. We love the clear Lucite type recipe boxes for this size that let beautifully designed recipe cards shine through.
Here are five examples of documenting your family’s food favorites on our 6 x 4 invitations. “Chocolate Trifle Recipe” by Katie Ann Wilson, template 64891, is designed in the rich chocolate colors of the recipe itself. Ann Perry’s “Recipe Card,” template 64857, is delightfully feminine and floral, while “Recipe Card” by Kimberlee Riddle, template 65817, is designed in Christmas colors and would be perfect on top of a Christmas neighbor gift. Kimberly Keber had the same thought when she designed the “Recipe Card Gift,” template 66326, which serves as a gift in itself. Put it at the top of a couple of the templates “Recipe Card,” also by Kimberly Keber, template 66327, tie with ribbon and the stack makes an appreciated gift.
Food in Many Forms
Whether you’re documenting the bounties of your holiday table like Michelle Bell’s “Holiday Recipes” flip book, template 44911 or recording your camp cooking adventures as Angie Tudor did in her “Campfire Recipes,” square flip book, template 59046; Heritage Makers provides a variety of ways to record your family’s food culture. Robin Knutson used a 12 x 12 scrap page to memorialize a favorite recipe served in her home town, “Steel Town ‘Shrooms,” template 52250, tells the story and shows the food and family associated with it.
Sara Boster used a playing card deck to make copies of her favorite recipes in her template 6592, “Recipes.” Punch a corner hole and thread on a scrapbook-style binder ring and you have a handy reference or great gift. For an extra personal graduation gift, make your son or daughter a “Recipes from Home” swatch book, template 58390, as Lynda Angelastro did. Include approximate prices per serving and choose from the simpler of your recipes and your student is sure to be well-fed while far from home!
Food Templates of Every Type
Nearly every product type has templates for family food memory keeping, so get started today. When your grown child opens up a book of grandma’s carefully scanned recipes and says, “This is the best gift of my entire life,“ you’ll know your focus on family food is preserving a priceless legacy.
