A Little Black Book… Of Recipes?

I like to collect recipes.

I guess that’s just my Chef-ley-ness kicking in, but I love to collect every recipe I see.

Chicken recipes are a favourite of mine to keep, so are Desserts and Cakes (Pastry Chef, doy). I even collected Seafood recipes, just in case my Husband/Wife to be happened to be a fan of the stuff. Looks like I can throw them all out, James is not a fan at all. Win.

But as good as collecting a whole lot of recipes are, only a select group are hand written into my Little Black Book.

Oh yes. The elusive few that are a complete success. That work every time. That are a hit with every person I feed.

Including me. It has to be delicious to me, otherwise it’s straight out of there and into the regular scrap book with a dinosaur on the front, full of magazine cut outs.

My Mother, my Grandmother, my Aunt, they all have recipes that are kind of… their speciality. But they never really wrote any of them down, and that kind urks me a bit. I was never really taught to cook, its more a skill I developed myself after I found out that food wasn’t as bland as I was given as a child. Thank you very much, English Heritage.

So, I want something I can show to my children. Something that I can continue adding to for the rest of my days. My own little handbook of the recipes I have worked so hard to work and tweak to perfection.

I think this week, when I get my pay, I’m going to buy myself a nice big Moleskine book notebook. I have been told they last the test of time. And with the few tried, tested and perfect recipes I have, I’m going to start that little dream of mine.

Do you have a recipe file? A little book? A scrapbook full of special recipes? What about recipes that are handed down? 

What do you do with your little culinary secrets?