# Start a new recipe from a template

Shipped · October 10, 2026 · 1.52.0 · Standards and recipes

Mark a recipe as a template, and adding a recipe offers it as a starting point with its sizes, ingredients and steps already filled in.

![The Add recipe dialog asking where to start: a blank recipe, or the Latte template, listed with its category, Drinks, and its one size, 12 oz.](https://handbook.company/marketing/updates/recipe-templates.webp)

## What was asked for

A cafe owner wanted to make one recipe the starting point for others, so a new milk drink could begin as a copy of her latte rather than an empty form. The nearest thing was Duplicate, which saved a copy the moment it was pressed, so changing your mind left a recipe called (copy) behind to delete.

## How templates work

Any recipe can be a template: turn on Use as a template in its editor. It stays an ordinary recipe, so a latte can be on the menu and costed as usual while also being where other drinks start.

Once there is a template, Add recipe asks whether to start from a blank recipe or from one of them. Picking one opens a new recipe with the template's category, tags, sizes, ingredients and steps filled in, the ingredients still linked to your inventory items. It has no name until you give it one, and no photo. Nothing is saved until you save it, and the new recipe is its own from then on: changing the template later does not change it.

## Finding templates

A template's card says Template beside its category, and once there is one a Templates filter under the search shows only those. Copying a handbook keeps its templates as templates.

## Duplicate saves nothing until you do

Duplicate now opens the copy in the editor without saving it. It is named as the copy with everything filled in, as before, but Cancel leaves nothing behind.

## What people asked for

- Asked for a way to make a recipe a template that new recipes start from.

Source: https://handbook.company/updates/recipe-templates/

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