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Creating an Heirloom: Writing Your Family’s Cookbook, was written by Wendy A. Boughner Whipple, and is based on a webpage the author created after writing her own family’s cookbook. When she was unable to find good sources to help her with that project, she forged ahead making mistakes and discovering shortcuts along the way. She put a webpage about it on her family’s genealogy-based website, DianasLegacy.net, which drew thousands of people to visit. The page outgrew itself, and became a book, with its own website. Creating an Heirloom: Writing Your Family’s Cookbook is available to order at a bookstore in your neighborhood, or through the publisher: PublishAmerica.com. 
Many people use recipes out of books and off packages for their own cookbooks. This is okay providing you rewrite the instructions in your own words. You see, ingredients are a method, and that is not something that can be copyrighted. The instructions are copyrightable. By copying word-for-word from a cookbook, you are infringing on the author’s copyright, commiting plagiarism, and stealing. Are the police going to come knocking on your door? No, most likely not, at least not for grand theft recipe. But please don’t do it anyway. Writers work very hard for their bread and butter, and that work is made much harder when their works are stolen. If you wish to have an official (US) copyright registration filed for your cookbook, visit the website for the United States Copyright Office. There you will find the necessary form you need for obtaining a registered copyright for your book. The cost is $30 for filing fees, and you must send a manuscript. You will need either the standard or short form TX (read the guidelines for figuring out which one you need). Copies submitted to the Copyright Office will eventually find their way into the Library of Congress. Please note that this site is copyrighted. Unauthorized use of the material at creatinganheirloom.com for inclusion in other media is strictly forbidden.
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