Christmas throughout the years have been sprinkled with my Dad's handmade works of art. This year was no different as he created this one of a kind recipe rack for my mom.

My dad is a talented man. He shares his knowledge about music and his original piano compositions at Piano Score. He has also started another blog for projects such as this recipe rack that he is sharing here today.

DIY RECIPE RACK - Guest Post

The following is written by Kurt Goodman.

My wife, Colleen, comes from a tradition of great cooking. In our family, over the years the cookbook or recipe card was placed on the counter amidst all of the ingredients. As a result, our cookbooks and cards are smudged with lots of character.

I have recently taken on cooking dinner and found I had to keep moving the cookbook or recipe card. Though I didn’t want another item on the counter, I felt we needed a recipe holder.

I lay awake one night thinking about a space saving cookbook/card holder and realized I could incorporate our angled knife rack as a support for a cookbook without increasing the footprint size by much more than the original knife rack.  

I love the challenge of building projects while optimizing available material. I began with a single sketch of a cradle that fit the back of the knife rack.

I scavenged 4 pieces of 8”x 8” vertical grain fir and laminated (glued) them together ending up with a block of wood 3”x 8”x 8”. That is not much material.  I jointed a flat face and working edge. One thing led to another and soon I had this holder that integrated with the knife rack.

Colleen loves it and it is one of the best Christmas gifts I have given her. It is conservative, elegant in design, and functional.  It provides value and satisfaction and cost me relatively nothing but my time. 

And the true test is how quick Colleen took to it. After using it we wondered how we ever did without it.