31 Days of Resolutions Day 11
It’s easy to create and share a digital recipe file with your family or friends. The pay-offs can be huge, especially if you divide cooking responsibilities, or cook for someone on a restricted diet.
Let’s say your son-in-law is a devout vegetarian and you don’t have a clue about what to make for Sunday dinner; or your aunt is a diabetic but loves her special desserts.
You might be tempted to peruse Pinterest or your favorite blogs for ideas, but it’s risky to try a new recipe with guests. And it’s satisfying to make a meal that you know everyone likes.
Asking someone to send you a recipe works, but it might take time to get a response.
What if you could simply look up a recipe that your son-in-law or aunt added to a shared Google Doc, and do it while you are shopping at the grocery store?
Both my son and daughter use the digital method to share cooking and grocery shopping responsibilities. They include agreed upon, tested recipes. This cuts down on return trips to the market for forgotten ingredients and saves the back-and-forth of “What do you want to eat tonight?”
Make a List with Links
Your digital recipe file could be as simple as a list of recipes with links to the recipe pages.
Here’s how to make it.
Login to your Google account.
Choose “+ New” command to create a new Google Doc. Then, type the names of the recipes in a list.
If you don’t know how to do this, or you don’t have a Google account, you can find instructions here.
Highlight the recipe name, then click on the hyperlink command up on the toolbar.
Next, Open a new tab and search the Internet for the recipe. Copy the recipe page address from the address bar.
Go back to your new Google Doc open tab. Paste the recipe address into the hyperlink window and click “apply.”
Now, you have quick links to your favorite recipes.
And you can share that file with whomever you’d like. You can also decide whether or not you want others to be able to edit the list.
(If lemony lentil soup sounds good to you, you can find the recipe here.)
Make a Weekly Menu with Links and Shopping Lists
If you want to get a bit fancier with the digital recipe file idea, you can actually create standing weekly menus with links to the recipes and shopping lists.
Here’s one way to do it.
First, decide on your menus for the week. You may want to use the simple recipe list mentioned above for this step.
Use the Insert, then Table commands to make a 7 day table. I made a 2 x 7 box table.
Type the recipe name in each box. I put the days of the week in the first row, then the recipe name in the second row.
Add a hyperlink, as described above, to the recipe name to link the recipe page.
After you have the weekly menu established, Go back to your “My Drive” tab and create another new Google Doc called “Shopping List.” Keep this new doc open.
Go back to your Weekly Menu doc and click on each recipe link. Go back and forth between tabs and type out the ingredients you need onto the Shopping List doc.
You could make a shopping list for each recipe, a few days, or for the week, however it works best for you.
Link the shopping list(s) to the Weekly Menu file the same way you linked the recipes. Every Google Doc you create has its own unique address.
Share both the Weekly Menu File and Shopping List file with whomever you wish. For variety, create multiple weekly menu and shopping lists with distinctive names.
Now, enjoy a more organized new year!