Recipes, and other steps to follow

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Amounts that scale

count: before an amount marks it as one that scales, and multiplier:[] sets buttons, 1×, 2× and 3×, that multiply every count in its section: the heading it’s under, to the next heading at that level or above. So a file of recipes has a multiplier for each.

## Akara
Serves: count:4
multiplier:[]

* count:2 cups dried black-eyed peas
* count:1–2 fresh chili peppers
* (optional) count:1/2 teaspoon ground cayenne

1) Fry in batches of count:5–6, 3–4 minutes a side.

• Name other multiples in the brackets: multiplier:[1/2, 2, 4]. 1× is always among them, to go back.
• An amount is a whole number, a fraction (1/2, 1 1/2, ½), a decimal or a range of them (1–2, 2 to 3), and it’s multiplied as written: 1/2 three times is 1 1/2. A changed amount is tinted, and shows what was written on hover.
• A number without count: stays as it is: 5 minutes, 2 inches of oil.
• The multiple picked is yours, not the file’s: it’s remembered for that recipe in that document, as you edit and the next time you open it.

Boxes with stages

Boxes in a row, - [ ][ ][ ], are one box with stages: each click fills the next, written back as [x][x][ ], and once they’re all filled the item goes gray. A click on a full box empties it, and a shift-click goes back a stage. stages: under multibox: in the front matter names the stages of every staged box in the document, and the stage reached shows beside the box. This page’s front matter names them, for the sample:

---
multibox:
  stages: have, prepped, used
---

* [x][x][ ] count:1 small yellow onion, diced
* [x][ ][ ] count:2 cloves garlic, minced

reset:[] is a Start over button: it clears every box in its section, plain, staged or a choice, and its fields, as one edit you can undo. reset:[Clear] names it. It’s as much for a todo list or a game as for a recipe.

Steps to follow

A 1) list whose items have boxes is steps to follow: each number badge is the step’s box, and a click on it marks the step done, a check in its place. On a slide being presented, the badges only show which are done.

1) [x] Heat a splash of oil in a large pot.
2) [ ] Add the diced onion and cook until soft, about 5 minutes.
> [!TIP]
> Go slow; it's sweeter.

3) [ ] Stir in the garlic.

• Once a step is done, the first not done is lit up, and marking that one done lights the next. Click a step to light it instead; with the page clicked into, j and k light the next and the one before, and x marks the lit one done, or not done again; each says which step it left lit. They’re left to a box, button or link Tabbed to, but for a step’s own. What’s lit is only on the page, not in the file.
• The steps under one heading go together, across a callout or a quote between them.
• While steps are under way – begun and not all done – the screen is kept on, as hands are busy. (A browser keeps it on only for a page on localhost or https: not one opened by the machine’s address on the network.)

Ingredients

!word in a list item ties an ingredient to the steps that use it. The word is the item’s key, as a definition’s ! names its term, and elsewhere in the recipe it’s found without one, plural or singular, so a step that names it can’t slip by:

### Ingredients
* [ ] count:1 small yellow !onion, diced
* [ ] a handful of fresh !cilantro, chopped

### Steps
1) [ ] Add the diced onion and cook until soft.

• The word is underlined where it’s used, and hovering or focusing it shows its item, amounts multiplied; Enter on it shows it or puts it away, and Esc puts it away.
• The lit step’s ingredients are lit, in the step and in the list.
• When the last step that names an ingredient is marked done, its box is marked too, in the same edit: a box with stages filled, a plain one ticked.
• An ingredient that nothing else in the recipe names is flagged in no step.
• The recipe is the section with the multiplier, if there is one; or else the section the list’s heading is under (## Akara, for a list under ### Ingredients), unless it’s one of the document’s top headings.
• A ! before a word a definition defines is the definition’s, and \! keeps one as typed.

A log

A heading Log in a recipe keeps when it was made and how it went, in retro cards (see Notes on a talk): a heading for each time, and Try for what to change next time, ticked once it’s been tried.

### Log
#### date:2026-10-18[] · 2×
Good (Ana): loved the plantains
+1 (Sam)
Try (Josh): half the cumin

With a log in its section, reset:[] has a Log today button beside Start over, which adds a heading for today after the log’s last entry, with the multiple the recipe is at.