BigOven

BigOven's app has over 1,000,000 recipes from home chefs, food bloggers, and cooking sites all over the web, plus the Recipe Clipper tool allows you to simply contribute your own. With the press of a button, you can add items from each dish to a grocery list, share the list, and mark off what you buy.

However, there are a few features that distinguish BigOven: To begin, instead of painstakingly typing in clipped recipes and handwritten family favorites, you may just take a picture of them. In 2-5 days, the software will convert the snapshot into a recipe format. You receive one free Recipe Scan, after which you must pay. There are a few bundles to select from, but the cheapest is $9.99 for 12 scans. The app's commercial editions provide 25 scans.

The Use Up Leftovers search button is another nice function. Enter up to three items, and the search tool will return recipes that contain those components.

The only disadvantage is that you must subscribe to Pro to access the meal planner feature. However, upgrading gives you additional methods to arrange your recipes into folders, more advanced search capabilities, and the ability to upload an infinite number of recipes.

• Cost: Free + starts at $2.99/month
• Best for: Finding new recipes