A recent post on a Cooking Light Forum says:

My parents are coming to stay with us for a week in August. We see them maybe once a year or so, and even less often do they actually get to stay in our home so I can cook. Often throughout the year I say "Wow, my father would love this...." and then it's time to put together a menu.....and I've totally spaced on what it was that my father would have loved.   -  Jewel.

Jewel you are not alone!  I'm always finding the perfect recipe for this or that but then can't think of anything when the actual event happens - like dessert for dinner parties. 

Jewel's post continues:

I've got to learn to write these things down! 

I have a different suggestion for Jewel and everyone else who wants a way to organize their recipes to fit their lifestyles and their own personal needs.  I'm talking about Tagging. 

If you've tried Project Foodie Recipe Track & Tag you know it's an easy way to keep track of recipes from multiple cooking magazines (and soon other types of publications).  But Tracking is only half the story –  Tagging helps you organize your recipes based on your own personal needs so you have all the information in one place and so you can look at the recipes in whatever way you want.

Such as…

– Recipes for company? Tag - company
– Recipes for the holidays? Tag - thanksgiving or hanukkah or christmas or ...
– Recipes for the garden bounty? Tag - zucchini or tomatoes or garden or …
– Recipes the kids like? Tag - kidfriendly

The possibilities are endless since tags are not predefined – they are whatever word or word groupings you want them to be.

In Jewel's case she could add a father (company or WOW) tag to any recipes that she'd like to serve to her father.  Then when Dad actually comes to visit all she needs to do is click on the father folder at the left of her list of recipes she is tracking and voilà all the recipes she thought her father would enjoy are listed for her to choose from! 

Sure, all of the Track & Tag recipes already have tags such as main, sides, desserts and so forth but by adding your own tags you can personalize and organize the recipes so they are easy to find for whenever you want them...

I created Track & Tag to solve this and similar problems with finding recipes.  I've been using it for a while and although many more things are planned it's already really helpful.   I encourage everyone to try it out and once you have, let me know ( This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it ) what you think so it can be improved and made even better.