Open
Recipe
Box
Family history through shared recipes
The Project
Open Recipe Box is a project born from a postgraduate class in public history at SOAS. Inspired by my own love of cooking and the amount of knowledge passed down through the practice of recipe sharing. Open Recipe Box serves as a platform where users can share their own histories through food.
Open Recipe Box combines the structure of cooking blogs and online culinary magazines to create a collaborative, recipe-sharing platform that highlights storytelling.
Recipe sharing is not an active part of my familial culture, but food has remained a way for me to connect with and learn more about my family and friends. Beyond providing a repository of family history, Open Recipe Box is also a functional tool for anyone looking for a weeknight recipe or a dish for a special occasion.
About ME
After graduating from Dartmouth College with a BA in History and Middle Eastern Studies, I began the MA in History and Intensive Arabic program at SOAS in London. Open Recipe Box is the first interactive history project that I have engaged with.
I have hopes that this platform can help generate connection through food. Cooking, eating, and sharing food has been a cornerstone of my life ever since I grew obsessed with watching cooking shows and reading cookbooks tucked away in my kitchen drawers as a child. There is no comparison for the type of learning and knowledge involved in food. I have involved recipes in language learning, historical research, and my recent dive into public history.
About the Project
Blog
Upload your own recipes and related stories. Engage with other users in comment sections and by exploring other posts.
Recipe Box
Digitize your families recipe box and add in some new dishes by saving posts by other users. Keep a working collection of recipes and corresponding histories.
Map
Connect dishes to the map: where they originate, where you first tasted the dish, etc.
I have compiled a short but actively growing list of resources, including archival collections of recipes, cookbooks, and food related material as well as research guides put together by Libraries and Universities.
This list of resources is by no means exhaustive and inherently limited due to its over-reliance on English language material and Western institutions. Please read the descriptions of each resource and look out for the bias built into their structures. Some, like Ozoz Sokoh's Feast Afrique, overtly call out the racism included in archival materials and how that impacts research. Most, however, are not as clear.
Please send recommendations for resources to info@openrecipebox.org