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Use Memory Chunking to Help Recall Recipes

Mentally group ingredients together and start cooking

By

Staying Sharp

Updated May 06, 2024

Updated May 06, 2024

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Quick Win

Chunking may help you to stay organized and keep track of your recipes.

Try This Today

Don’t memorize an entire recipe. Break it down by using numbers and groups, such as three spices, two dairy items, two vegetables and one canned good. This technique is called memory chunking.
Use the first letter of each item to make up a phrase. If you need apples, flour, butter, cinnamon, eggs and sugar, say “Amazing, fast, baked cake. Eat soon.”
“Chunk” each cooking step into its own group. For an apple pie, chunk the prep (peeling apples), then the mixing, then the filling, and so on.

Why

Chunking is a way to help us remember large pieces of information easily by grouping them into “chunks.” Strategies “designed to improve event segmentation” — another term for memory chunking — “have resulted in memory improvements for both young and older adults,” according to a 2019 review article in Open Psychology.

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