Last spring, I used the photo book product from Snapfish.com to create a cookbook starring my oldest son (then 2 and a half) as Chef. The cookbooks were used as birthday gifts that year for the Grandmas, cousins and buddies (but they would also make great Mother’s or Father’s Day gifts, Christmas gifts, etc.).
Needless to say, they were a huge hit. And here’s how I did them:
1. First, I decided on the cookbook categories. I kept it simple: Breakfast, Snacks, Lunch & Dinner, Dessert, and Beverages.
2. Then my son & I came up with 3 or 4 recipes for each section. They had to meet 2 criteria to make the cut. They had to be some of his favorite foods & they had to be things he could easily help make. We made smoothies, no-bake cookies, pizzas, quesadillas with guacamole, roasted chickpeas, breakfast sandwiches, etc.
3. Next, we got to cooking and snapping photos. Over the coarse of several weeks we made all of the recipes for the book and took lots of pictures. Then, when I had some down time I edited them and picked out my favorites.
4. Then, I went to Snapfish.com (my favorite place for printing photos online; if you sign up for their e-mail list you can get some of the greatest deals). There I selected what type of photo book I wanted, customized the layout, put the recipes into the different categories, plugged in the photos & recipe text, put a little note in the very front from my son, made the cover… and Voila!
Here are some of the pictures I included in the inside of the cookbook & one picture of the finished product (down at the bottom):
