I think my generation may be the last one to have recipe boxes. I got my mine as a wedding shower gift in the early 1990s. I still use it – all the time.

For those who don’t know, recipe boxes are small, rectangular boxes with hinged lids. They can be wood, metal or plastic. When you flip up the lid, you see they are stuffed with index cards sorted into various categories with pre-printed dividers: Appetizers & Snacks, Soups & Sauces, Meat & Fish, etc.

In the olden days (before the internet), if you liked a dish your friend made, you would ask her for the recipe and she’d write it out for you (by hand) on a lined recipe card. What an act of love! The recipe card would have her name on it somewhere. For example, many recipe cards were pre-printed with the words “From the Kitchen of” at the top.

I’ve scanned and transferred some recipes to my computer, but they’re always hard to find when you need them. Plus, who wants their laptop on the counter while they’re cooking? The recipe box really was an ingeneous invention.

Here’s one of my favorite recipe cards from my mother. This very simple recipe for rice pudding was her mother’s. It’s a great thing to do with leftover white rice.