This Mind-Blowing BookTok Trend Will Change the Way You Use Your Cookbooks

My cookbooks are extremely important to me. I read them cover-to-cover like novels and display them with pride. I want to preserve them, but I also want them to be useful. For me, that means using them as a springboard, taking the ideas on the page and then making the recipe my own. And the best way to do that is with this recent discovery I learned about on BookTok, the literary-focused sub-community on TikTok.

I’m talking about transparent Post-It notes.

On TikTok, you can find dozens of examples of people using these notes to annotate books and planners, which saves the pages from being scribbled on. Unlike opaque Post-Its, you can still easily read the text under the note — making them perfect for any cook who likes to interact with their cookbooks but, like me, still wants them to be kept in good condition. They could be especially useful for home cooks preparing their Thanksgiving menus, noting ways to scale up recipes for a crowd or how to make recipes allergy-friendly for certain guests. 

Once I got my hands on my own pack of transparent Post-It notes, I sat down with a few of my favorite cookbooks and started brainstorming. As ideas came to me, I gleefully added them to the pages. They worked perfectly.

The sticky part of these Post-Its is a bit bigger than on the typical opaque notes, but that didn’t affect the process because the whole thing is transparent. I simply peeled off one note and added it to the page, writing my note right in the book but not actually on the book. 

Obviously Post-Its have become synonymous with all sticky notes, but there are other brands out there making transparent sticky notes, including these cute pastel ones that I’m excited to try next.

When it comes to writing on the notes themselves, I found that using a pen like the Pilot Acroball or a permanent marker like a Sharpie has the best results. If you’re using another type of pen or a highlighter, it may be necessary to wait a few seconds to allow the note to dry so it doesn’t smudge. 

Buy: Post-it Transparent Sticky Notes, $14.73 (originally $18.97)