It reads on your phone
The pages come from a scanner screen or your photo picker, and text recognition runs on your device with a model built into the app. For a clear card, that is the whole job — the recipe never leaves your phone.
The recipe box, rescued
Scan Grandma's recipe cards. Keep them forever.
Point your phone at a handwritten card, a cookbook spread or a magazine clipping — up to three pages — and Sorrel types it up into a real recipe: ingredients, steps, times. It reads on your phone first, and asks before a stubborn page ever goes to the cloud.
On-device first · Asks before the cloud · Keeps the original photo
- Reading the page
- Typing it up
- Ready to check and edit
A preview of the real thing — nothing leaves this page.
How scanning works
It asks before the cloud
If a page is faint or the handwriting is a puzzle, Sorrel asks whether to send the scan — the photos, or just the recognised text — to its server to read. Nothing is sent unless you say yes, and the pages are discarded as soon as they are read.
It keeps the original
The photo of the card is saved with the recipe, so you always have the original in the hand you remember — alongside the typed version you can search, scale and cook from.
The handwriting stays. The squinting stops.
A recipe box is a lovely thing and an unsearchable one — faded ink, splattered cards, one copy that could burn. Scanning gives every card a typed twin you can find, scale to feed a crowd, and cook from in huge kitchen type, while the original photo keeps the hand that wrote it.
More than a photo in an album
It becomes a real recipe
Not a picture you pinch to zoom — a recipe with separate ingredients and steps, so you can scale it, add it to the plan, and send its ingredients to the grocery list.
It's private by default
Reading happens on your phone; the cloud is opt-in, per scan, and keeps only the finished recipe, filed under a fingerprint of the scan rather than under you. Sorrel doesn't hold camera permission — the scanner hands it the finished pages.
Three pages at a time
A recipe that runs onto the back of the card, or across a cookbook spread, scans as up to three pages into one recipe — so nothing gets cut off at the fold.
Other ways to save a recipe
Questions
Does it really read handwriting?
Yes — handwritten cards, printed cookbook pages and magazine clippings. Clear handwriting reads on your phone; for a difficult card, Sorrel offers to send the scan to its server to read, and asks first every time. You see what it read and fix anything before it saves.
Do my photos go to the cloud?
Only if you agree, and only for a page your phone couldn't read on its own. Then Sorrel sends the photos or just the recognised text, discards the pages as soon as they are read, and keeps only the finished recipe — filed under a fingerprint of the scan, not under you.
Is scanning free?
Scanning is part of Sorrel Pro, because the cloud fallback runs on Sorrel's servers. Your library, web import, planning and groceries are free forever. There is a free trial on the annual plan.
What if it makes a mistake?
You get the recipe in an editor before it saves, with the original photo beside it, so a misread amount is a quick fix rather than a surprise at the stove. Nothing is set in stone.
How many pages can one recipe be?
Up to three — enough for a card written on both sides, or a recipe that spreads across two cookbook pages, gathered into a single recipe.
Get the recipe box off the shelf.
On-device first · Scanning is part of Sorrel Pro