How to Create a Custom Family Cookbook – A Unique DIY Gift Idea

If you’re looking for a meaningful, creative gift idea for those family members who are the hardest to buy for, keep reading!  A custom family cookbook is easy to make and is something that will be loved and cherished through the generations!

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Unique Gift Ideas for the Ladies Who Have Everything

Family Gifts. Ugh. They can be some of the hardest to choose, right? I mean, these are your people. They’ve been through all of the celebrations, defeats, and hard times with you. 

You want to get something meaningful for your mom or cousins or aunts, but not sure what will be special to her? What do you get for your sister that has everything? The daughter who seems so hard to buy for?

Well, I think I have an idea you’ll love.

What about creating a family cookbook?

You can do it easily and expertly at The Family Cookbook Project. 

Why I Chose to Make a Family Cookbook Project

A printed custom family cookbook is a fabulous gift idea (and hopefully I’ll convince you why). But I have to admit, creating this was a little more selfish.

You see, I’m honestly one of the lucky ones who has a set of grandparents who are still alive and kicking in their 90s. I’m talking about the World War II generation.  Many times, I thought of the stories, the memories, and yes, even the recipes, that could possibly die with my grandparents. How sad would it be if I didn’t have anything to pass down to my kids?

I’ve already gathered some stories. We have pictures and mementos. But there’s something so timeless about the smells and tastes that connect us to our families. Science tells us smells and taste are some of the strongest memory associations. What better way to leave a legacy for our kids than to pass on those old recipes from our families? 

Why A Family Cookbook is So Special

A printed family cookbook is such a great idea for a few reasons.  Let me tell you why.

Family Favorites All in One Place. Forever.

Have you wanted to make Grandma’s pizza for a family get-together but didn’t have the recipe? Or wished you knew just how to make your mom’s challah bread? My sisters and I have texted back and forth trying to get these very recipes from each other. 

You have all these little scraps of paper, a few texts on your phone. For us, we even had an uncle who was tight-fisted with Grandma’s pizza recipe. But finally, with a family cookbook project, all of these beloved and cherished recipes came together and were finally bound in one place.

Unique Family Recipes

Second, a family cookbook is SOOO personal because the recipes are so unique. Some of these recipes are original creations, many without real measurements – a fistful of flour or a few sprinkles of salt. You won’t find recipes like these family treasures in a store-bought book or online.

Family Stories

Finally, you can tell STORIES in these cookbooks. Is there a sentimental or even funny memory associated with a particular recipe? Here’s a place where you can preserve it forever, for future generations. 

When gathering recipes for my family cookbook, my sisters and I were remembering how my mom used to make her challah bread for communion at church. When the service was over, we’d sneak back in and take the leftovers to eat in the car on the way home. That is a story I don’t want to be lost – and the cookbook is the place to preserve it. This cookbook may one day become the family heirloom that is preserved and passed down. 

So many family memories are made around the table. This is a fabulous way to let those times live on forever. You can even include pictures of those memories, too.

How to Create a Family Cookbook

Create an Account for Free

If you are loving this idea, let me steer you to The Family Cookbook Project. This is a super-easy way to get all of these recipes in one place, published in a book, and then given as a gift (don’t forget to make one for yourself).

This is such an easy interface to use – let me talk you through some of the details.

First, you go to www.familycookbook project.com and open a free account to get started. If you want to have access to all of the premium features, you can upgrade to a full membership at any time! 

 

Recipe Entry

The easiest way to push ahead is to just start typing in those recipes.  You’ll see in the header menu  “Add Recipe.” Click it and you just start typing in the recipe info!

There are a lot of great features to this besides the basic categories (appetizer, main course, dessert, etc), the ingredients, and directions. You can add symbols to indicate lots of different things, such as “Kid-Friendly,” “Favorite,” and “Time Saver.”  Not only that, there’s a place to add a personal story, if your family loves the ‘story behind the recipe.’

You can also invite others to be contributors, so you don’t have to do all the heavy lifting yourself. To help with the tedious part of recipe input, you can also recite the instructions as a voice note and then just copy and paste!

 

Layout Design

Once you’ve got your recipes inputted, here’s where you get to make it really unique and personal. You get to choose the title and subtitle, the cover image, the divider images, and how you want the recipes laid out. There’s also the option to upload your own photos or images for both the cover and the divider as well as into the recipes! You choose the fonts as well!

You can also write an introduction, a dedication, a forward – all of those things that would really make it a one-of-a-kind project.

As far as the size goes, you can choose an 8.5 x 11” or a smaller 5.5” x 8.5”, laminated or unlaminated. 

Throughout the cookbook, there are also helpful tips pages mixed in, which are pretty handy.

As you go through the layout and design process, you truly can customize this book to look exactly how you want it to. I love that there’s a page (Tips & Tricks in the Layout and Design Center) where you have all your book options in one place, so you can just scroll through and choose your options.

There are a ton of helpful tips and hacks on the website to make this whole creation a super-simple process, where you get amazing results.

Publishing and Pricing

The creation and publishing process is really very intuitive. You do not need to be a computer whiz to use this. The features that are offered here are beyond comparison when you look at other create-your-own cookbook projects. 

Before you place your order,  you can open up or download a PDF version of the book in its entirety to review. You can even self-print at home if that’s the way you wanted to go.

I’m sure you’re wondering about the publication cost. Well, a lot will depend on how many pages, how you set it up,  which add-ons your book includes (which honestly are so cheap to upgrade). There’s also a calculator on the site where you can figure out exactly how much it will cost. You can adjust your upgrades depending on your budget!

My cookbook with 60 pages was under $50. That’s an amazing price for a custom gift!

End Result: The Completed Custom Family Cookbook

I wanted to share a little bit of my cookbook with you, so you can see how one really looks.

For the cover, I chose this family tree, because this book is all about family. In the book, I included all of the family favorites we could muster up as well as some new family favorites that we’ve enjoyed in recent years.

I opted to have my recipes NOT continue from page to page, for easy navigating. So, you can see that each page ends with a complete recipe.

I also chose the larger 8.5 x 11” book, laminated, because, first, my eyes need as large of a font as I can get! This is the size of most bigger cookbooks, so I love that it will fit on a book stand or easel on the counter very easily.

Second, I went with laminating because you know how it goes in the kitchen – a splash of sauce, a mixer goes a little haywire… I wanted the book to be as protected as possible.

I also included some extra blank pages in the back because I’m sure more recipes will be added to this going forward.

A Meaningful Unique Gift for the Person Who Has Everything

This was such a fun project to take on. Not only was it amazing to collaborate with my family as a true bonding experience, but now we have all of these recipes in one place forever. I’m so excited thinking about making my Grandma’s sauce or my mom’s Christmas cookies. 

As someone who cherishes nostalgia and is sometimes wistful for the ‘good old days,’  I love that this cookbook has been created. It’s a perfect gift for someone who has everything or that hard-to-buy-for person. It’s a great gift for the special ladies in your family! For any special occasion.

If you’re looking for a Mother’s Day gift, there’s still time to get it done! Start creating today, get your order in by Friday, April 23, and it will be delivered in time for Mother’s Day!  Just click here to get started!