How to Digitize Your Recipes: Cookbooks and Videos

Old recipe notes in a drawer, cookbooks on the shelf, screenshots in the photo album, saved videos on TikTok — and nowhere a clear overview. Digitizing recipes solves this problem: you get all your recipes in one place, searchable and always accessible.

This guide covers all the ways to digitize recipes — from printed cookbooks to social media videos.

Method 1: Import social media videos

The easiest and fastest way to digitize recipes is AI-powered import from TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube. No manual typing, no screenshots — just copy the link and paste it into RealRecipe.

The AI automatically extracts:

• All ingredients with quantities
• Preparation steps in the correct order
• Cooking times and temperatures

Time investment: ~30 seconds per recipe.

Method 2: Photo import from printed cookbooks

With RealRecipe Pro, you can photograph recipes from printed cookbooks and digitize them directly. Optical character recognition (OCR) reads the text from the photo and turns it into an editable recipe.

Tips for the best photo import:

• Use good lighting
• Open the book flat for an even surface
• Keep the entire page in view
• Make sure the image is in sharp focus

Time investment: ~1-2 minutes per recipe.

Method 3: Manual entry

For recipes that exist neither as video nor as photo (orally passed-down family recipes, recipes on old scraps of paper), manual entry is the only option. RealRecipe provides a comfortable editing view for this.

How much time should I invest?

Instead of digitizing everything at once, I recommend the "immediately" strategy: every recipe you use in the future, digitize the first time you use it. Not a big project — just a new habit.

After a few months, you automatically have a collection of recipes you actually cook regularly.

Data privacy: where are my recipes?

In RealRecipe, all recipes are stored locally on your iPhone. No cloud, no server, no privacy risk. You can export your collection at any time: Settings → Export My Data.

Conclusion

Digitizing recipes is worth it — especially when you use the right tools. With RealRecipe, importing social media recipes is done in seconds, and cookbooks can be quickly digitized with photo import. Start today with 3 free imports.