The Recipe Cookbook interface is basic but functional, with a selection of search and organizing functions. It comes with over 2,000 recipes from varying sources, and, of course, you can add your own creations to the database using the Recipe Cookbook templates.

The recipes that Recipe Cookbook already stores are a real mix. Some (but not a significant number) are in Norwegian and recipe types range from cocktails and dips to breads and hotpots. Some recipes have notes attached, offering background or hints. You can also add your own notes.

Recipe Cookbook allows you to sort through the recipes by language, country of origin, category and ingredient, and you can modify existing recipes or delete ones you don't like. The program also provides links to a variety of cooking websites and gives you the opportunity to add new sites or modify existing ones. Finally, Recipe Cookbook lets you print and email recipes directly.

Unfortunately, Recipe Cookbook has plenty of faults. The interface is old fashioned, and its search functions, the most attractive feature of the program, are hard to control. Lots of the configuration settings seem to be modifiable, but unfortunately we just couldn't figure out how.

Despite this, Recipe Cookbook has a certain charm. It contains lots of recipes that you would be unlikely to find elsewhere and, even if there is no telling how good they will be, it would be fun to test them out.

Recipe Cookbook is eccentric but interesting cookbook software where the recipes alone merit a second look.

Download Recipe Cookbook 3.0 in Softonic

Recipe software doesn't always have the best reputation - it can be expensive, hard to use and totally user unfriendly. No so with RecipeMaster, a great program for all your recipe organization. It comes with lots of content pre-loaded - including a few Jamie Oliver recipes!

Adding your own recipes to RecipeMaster is easy - there's a form to fill out, or you can import recipes in MealMaster, Compu-Chef and MasterCook format. RecipeMaster only exports in XML, which is a slight pity. Making recipe management even easier is the great search function and excellent measurement conversion tool.

RecipeMaster also has a wine management tool, so you can record your favorite bottles and pair them up with your food. Unfortunately, the Help section isn't complete and the app was very slightly buggy, but all in all, RecipeMaster should be your first stop if you're looking for a free recipe organizer.

RecipeMaster is an excellent piece of recipe management software.

Download RecipeMaster 2.0.2 in Softonic

At first sight Cookbook looks really simple, but it includes all the tools and options you would need in a recipe database. You can organize recipes in categories, create and edit custom menus, export your recipes to various formats and also print them out with several configuration options – which is quite handy, since cooking with the computer beside the saucepan is not a very good idea.

Each recipe in Cookbook includes ingredients, preparation, cooking time and servings. You can also rate them in terms of difficulty and how much you like them, and add a photo as well – though only one.

Cookbook also includes a powerful built-in search tool which lets you easily locate any recipe on your database. If you’re looking for a simple recipe app, this is it.

It may not be the most feature-rich recipe application, but Cookbook works great and includes all the basic tools you need to manage your recipes.

Download Cookbook 1.7.1 in Softonic

Professional Bartender allows you to add your own recipes or use one of the 251 that come pre-loaded. You can't import recipes in the trial version, but adding them manually is easy, with fields for categorization and room for directions and comments. Professional Bartender also has a good search function that allows you to sift through recipes using a variety of criteria - type of liquor, glass used, cocktail ingredients and even the ideal season to drink it.

Professional Bartender also allows you to modify and print any of the drinks it contains. The recipes are easy to browse through and there's a nice selection, with everything from classics like Christmas Punch and Daiquiris to fun shooters like Mudslides and Jello Shots!

Professional Bartender is a fun, accessible program for all cocktail fans.

Download Professional Bartender 2010 in Softonic

The thing that really marks Living Cookbook out from its competitors is the sheer breadth of features. It covers just about every aspect of home cooking, from browsing the Internet for new ideas to planning your meals, scheduling your cooking and designing your shopping lists. The whole Living Cookbook is contained in a simple-to-use interface that anyone familiar with the Office Suite of tools should have no problems navigating.

Living Cookbook has a great help file, as well as offline tutorials and a host of online tools to help you get the most out of the program. There are also examples in each feature area, so you know exactly how you should be using the program. It comes bundled with plenty of recipes, sample shopping lists, suggested websites (for use with the in-built browser) and nutritional values, but it goes without saying that you can add or modify any of Living Cookbook's multiple areas to fully customize it.

Living Cookbook's configuration options are also very complete, as are the fully customizable display options. Unfortunately, although the program gave me the option to change measurements into metric, the setting didn't seem to 'stick', and continued to show me recipes in US measurements and auto-suggest ounces and pounds.

Beyond this little issue, Living Cookbook was a pleasure to use, and is useful even if you never add your own material. The options are so varied that it might take you a while to truly investigate the program, but it a serious piece of software that any enthusiastic cook will appreciate.

If you take your cooking seriously, Living Cookbook is the program for you.

Download Living Cookbook 2011 3.0 in Softonic

Nutrition Facts consists of a large food database that you can browse or search in order to find all the nutritional data available for more than 7,000 types of food. You can enter your query by using general names (chocolate, cookies...) or entering certain brands.

Nutrition Facts’ search results are displayed in real time as you write your query. Simply select the food you're interested in and the nutritional information will be displayed on the right. The one thing we missed, however, was being able to copy, print, save or export the data in some way.

Whether you’re a calorie counter or just interested in eating healthfully, Nutrition Facts is a handy program to have on hand.

Download Nutrition Facts 0.9.4.0 in Softonic

At first sight Cookbook Portable looks really simple, but it includes all the tools and options you would need in a recipe database. You can organize recipes in categories, create and edit custom menus, export your recipes to various formats and also print them out with several configuration options – which is quite handy, since cooking with the computer beside the saucepan is not a very good idea.

Each recipe in Cookbook Portable includes ingredients, preparation, cooking time and servings. You can also rate them in terms of difficulty and how much you like them, and add a photo as well – though only one.

Cookbook Portable also includes a powerful built-in search tool which lets you easily locate any recipe on your database. If you’re looking for a simple recipe app, this is it.

It may not be the most feature-rich recipe application, but Cookbook Portable works great and includes all the basic tools you need to manage your recipes.

Download Cookbook Portable 1.7.1 in Softonic

If you are a person who likes to follow a healthy diet, then you'll know the importance of informing yourself about the nutritional content of your food - an application like Kelpiesoft Food File will allow you to do just this.

Type the food in question into the Kelpiesoft Food File Search box, restrict it to certain categories and the results are displayed in the pane on the right. Presuming Kelpiesoft Food File is accurate, it's a simple, clear way of viewing the nutritional content of your food and is especially useful if you're following a weight-loss diet.

One word of warning: the Kelpiesoft website does not work and it appears that the product is no longer being developed. Some of the food item entries have links to information online that is no longer available as a result and since the Help is also online, you won't be able to use it either.

It's a pity Kelpiesoft Food File is no longer being developed, as it is a useful addition to any healthy person's software collection.

Download Kelpiesoft Food File 1.0.0 in Softonic

Have a look at Easy Recipe Deluxe, as it contains some interesting servings divided by categories and style. If you need a secure place to write down and catalog your grandmother's secret recipes, try this well-organized database. It has some extra features that allow you to create shopping lists based on the dishes you are going to prepare and you can export your cookbook in HTML or send it by mail to a friend.

The list of Easy Recipe Deluxe categories is huge and ranges from Appetizers, Breakfast, Microwave and Puddings to Stir-Fries and Vegetable dishes. You can also choose a recipe based on the main ingredient, or the style of cuisine.

I liked Easy Recipe Deluxe's clear interface, the photo of the dishes and the possibility of adding personal comments to the instructions. What I found annoying is the impossibility of downloading new online recipes and the fact that there are no step-by-step images on how to prepare the meal.

Don't store your favorite recipes on paper when you can have them all well organized in a clear database like Easy Recipe Deluxe. Unfortunately, though, it's not a great source of 'cooking inspiration'.

Download Easy Recipe Deluxe 1.6.265 in Softonic

Cook'n Recipe Organizer has a large online community, so I was hoping that the program would be a little fancier than some of its competitors. Unfortunately, it's not - in fact, it's kind of ugly! This first impression isn't helped by the fact that Cook'n Recipe Organizer doesn't come with any recipes pre-loaded, which means that to see how it works you need to jump straight into the import process.

Cook'n Recipe Organizer can handle recipes from various sources. You can add your own manually, filling in all the relevant fields, or import in Cook'n's own recipe format, Mastercook or MealMaster files. There's absolutely no information already in the program, so you'll have to manually approve all the new ingredients and measurements. Bear in mind that Cook'n Recipe Organizer doesn't support batch imports unless you buy entire cookbooks from the developer's website.

Once you have added a few recipes, Cook'n Recipe Organizer turns out to be a good, standard recipe management program, but it's by no means impressive and doesn't have any features that I haven't seen elsewhere. Meal planning, grocery list and nutritional information are nice touches, but you'll have to enter a lot of recipes manually before Cook'n Recipe Organizer is really functional. Even then, it's not going to knock your socks off.

It takes a lot of work to get Cook'n Recipe Organizer to a usable state, and when you do, it isn't even that impressive.

Download Cook'n Recipe Organizer 8.209 in Softonic

As befits a cookbook, iCookbook looks impeccable. All recipes are accompanied by a great high resolution photo, and the search results (search is accessed via the charms bar, which in turn is accessed by mousing over the top right of your screen), look especially good. The search function is further improved by filtering options, and the Stir feature, which lets you "mix up" large groups of search results in the hope of further inspiration.

iCookbook makes following recipes very easy, with the recipe stats, ingredients and preparation instructions laid out in a very clear, informative manner. It's unfortunate, then, that the app doesn't support mouse scrolling or the left and right arrow keys, as we found this to be the most intuitive way to move through recipes.

iCookbook offers other features that will become useful as you use the app over time. There's a My Recipe collection, where you can collect your favorites, a set of kitchen tools like weight converters and baking tin charts, and a ratings feature, so you know what's worth making again. On the downside, iCookbook doesn't convert between cups and metric automatically, and there's no note-taking function.

iCookbook looks like a promising app. It's good at the moment, but needs a few improvements to be truly great.

Download iCookbook Metro App 0.9.0.9 in Softonic

Add another solid recipe catalog tool to the growing list of great options. Much like RecipeMaster and Living Cookbook, CookDiary is an easy-to-use program that in some ways is even more than just a library.

First, you'll want to add your favorite recipes into the program. CookDiary's interface is set up so you can create different categories of recipes, such as desserts, Italian food and breakfast items. These categories will appear in a narrow pane on the left side your screen. Once you've created the categories, then you can begin adding recipes to each one. CookDiary allows you to add a picture, a rating between one and three stars and even an icon to indicate if the recipe is spicy. Then, add the ingredients, serving size and cooking instructions and you're good to go.

It's the little features in CookDiary that make it really stand out. If, for example, you need to change the number of servings you need to make, you can do this easily and CookDiary will adjust the ingredients as necessary to meet your new serving size needs. In addition, there's a cooking instructions view that shows every instruction in large print for easy reading while you're in the kitchen. There's even a calendar and a feature that lets you create shopping lists.

If you want to store your cooking recipes on your PC for ready access, CookDiary makes it easy and enjoyable to do so.

Download CookDiary 2.2.1 in Softonic

Recipe4win shares the same layout and design as recipe4all - it's very basic and old-fashioned, and at times it is hard to tell what's a recipe and what's an ad.

The program is a very restricted version of the website, and when you consider that the website's not even that great, this way below average app doesn't hold much attraction at all.

Download Recipe4win 1.0 in Softonic

The streamlined interface gives you a clear view of all of your recipes, and browsing them by course is very easy. The only downside of the application would be the way you edit shopping lists. Although it's easy to add ingredients and amounts, it's not very simple to edit a shopping list after you've closed it or to erase one. Clicking "create shopping list" simply brings you back to your old list.

Behind an unassuming interface, Recipe Box makes for a handy way to keep track of all your recipe ideas.

Download Recipe Box 1.5 in Softonic

Now You're Cooking is very comprehensive program that goes far beyond just recording recipes. It also includes a fitness tool, nutrition data, a menu planner and even a shopping list generator. This might be more than some cooks are looking for, but if you want complete control of all your food-related activities, Now You're Cooking is the program for you.

Now You're Cooking isn't very slick - something that's often a problem with cooking apps - but it is configurable and flexible. Recipes and measurements can be added in American or metric, you can import and export data, email recipes, download new recipes from the Now You're Cooking website and even back up the program. Using it is easy, and it's full of quick tips and simple features to make adding and managing your recipes a piece of cake.

If you are looking for a food management program rather than a recipe database, Now You're Cooking is a great option.

Download Now You're Cooking 5.88 in Softonic

Unfortunately, Virtual WineCellar is uncomfortable to use and very old-fashioned. The interface is a multiple-window setup, and even though there are buttons to link between windows more easily, it's not the most user-friendly option. There are very few preference options or extras, and lots of the features mentioned on the website - such as digital label scanning - seem to be restricted in the trial version.

Virtual WineCellar doesn't make importing easy either. You can't import in the trial version, which means that you have no idea if the feature functions well, a major negative when you consider that adding your cellar is the central point of the program. If you have more than a few bottles, adding them to Virtual WineCellar in the trial version is going to be a major time-eater.

Virtual WineCellar allows for lots of detail about your wine, but is awkward to use and way behind the times.

Download Virtual WineCellar 4.6 in Softonic