Tasty Traditions

photo by msbelleIt's that time of year when many of us try to recreate memories of our childhood. What better way than through the food we cook. Passing down family recipes and traditions is a wonderful way to bring a family together. For my family, this became even more important with the passing of my mother-in-law.

I recently took on the task of organizing and coming up with a cookbook for her many culinary specialties. This was to be both a memory book as well as a fully functional cookbook for many family members living in several different states. After lots of research, and trial and error with different web sites and software programs, I finally found the perfect solution. I created a cookbook at Tastebook.com.

Here are some of the features that I loved about using this service:

• First, all recipes are entered online. No software to download. The format is very user friendly.
• You can customize your book with photos or anything that can be scanned (e.g. handwritten recipes or notes)
• You can include a dedication page to your cookbook.
• You can collaborate with others when creating your book with its online share feature.
• It is very reasonably priced, about $40 gets you a custom cookbook with 100 recipes.
• If you are an online recipe gatherer, this service also links to about 30+ popular sites and lets you compile recipes into a Tastebook to use and share online or to print.

In my case, I wanted to give the cookbook to my husband's siblings and father as a Christmas present. So I didn't collaborate with anyone. Instead, I entered 60 of the most meaning recipes. I uploaded old family photos, created a dedication page, and ordered 5 print copies.

Now here, in my opinion, is the coolest thing about this service. I purchased the book to have 100 recipes - but like I said - I only had 60 at time of printing. So each book came with a credit for 40 more recipes to be added...whenever! Now, I can 'share' the book online and everyone can help enter the additional recipes. When we want to add the pages to our hard copy we just put in the print order and have them shipped. Pretty cool. For me, it was the perfect solution.  Because I am not an 'expert' on my mother-in-law's cooking, I was worried that I would miss someone's favorite recipe.  This way, my gift was just to get the ball rolling for the family.

When I received my copy I was pleased with the quality of the cover, graphics, binder and paper.

(Now, I must acknowledge one drawback to this and many other online cookbook services. When you enter the recipe it is saved in a proprietary format. What does that mean? You can't export your recipes and then try to save them on your hard drive or put them into something like a MS Word document. So if you don't want to use Tastebook.com anymore, the only way to take the recipes with you is to have a book printed from their service.)

But, for me, Tastebook.com was an great way to preserve some special culinary memories. With its flexibility and easy user interface I see lots of potential for other creative projects as well.