I have, brace yourselves folks, been learning how to cook! However, I still need to follow recipes, unlike my husband who can create a meal out of three ingredients. With that being said, I have a boatload of printed recipes and recipe cards just strewn in my cabinets, with no sort of organization whatsoever. So imagine my excitement when I came across todays Etsy shop, Tartella. The shop’s owners, Amanda and Andrea, create fabulous items for your kitchen.

The one item that initially caught my attention was this recipe card holder.

Wood Flip Recipe Card Holder

I totally need this to keep me organized. This card holder comes with ten inserts, which can hold 20 recipe cards, but feel free to add more inserts, since the rings can be opened very easily. And the wood boards make for easy clean-up. Believe me, I’m super messy. This is a necessity.

Recipe Card Gift Set

These recipe cards are a must in my household. As previously mentioned, I will print recipes out from the internet in my effort to become the next top chef. These cards (which of course can fit in the above holder!) are great to jot those recipes down on and am sure will be way easier to organize. This set includes 25 cards and is packaged in a lovely bookcloth covered card holder.

Winter Tea Towel set

This tea towel set would be a great hostess gift! Tartella has taken the motto, “eat. live. love. repeat” and screen printed it onto a tea towel. These towels are made with 100% cotton flour sacks and are totally washable. Which is good because I make messes…This set comes in two color choices- green (shown) or vintage blue, with the motto towel in blue and the whisks have orange handles. It’s too hard to choose! I love them both!

And, from December 5-11, Tartella is offering free shipping on all U.S. and Canadian Etsy orders. For U.S. Orders, use Coupon Code TARTYFREESHIP upon checking out. If you are in Canada, make sure you convo Tartella and they will set up a reserved listing with the adjusted shipping rate.

Andrea was kind enough to answer some questions, enjoy!

1. How did you come up with your shop’s name?

I knew that I wanted to make up a name, so that I didn’t have to worry about getting web addresses, trademarks, etc. and I also knew that I wanted it to have something to do with baking. So, I made lists of words that I liked (both cooking related and non) and just started putting them together to see what worked. Tart was on the list because pies and tarts are my favorite desserts, and Ella was the name of my cat. I sent my favorites to my friends and had them vote…and, Tartella won!

2. What is your favorite item in your shop?

I think I’d have to say the Bread Print is my current favorite. Bread is my absolute favorite thing to bake and eat, and I love how those illustrations came out. But, Whisk Tea Towels are a perennial favorite.

3. I see you work with your sister. Who’s the better cook between the two of you? (I frankly, can’t cook to save my life!)

My sister is just starting to cook and lives in a different city, so I haven’t tasted a lot of what she has prepared. But, her pumpkin pie outshone my apple pie this Thanksgiving (at least, according to my husband, who is supposed to have clear allegiance to my cooking!), so I think I have some mighty competition in the future. We both draw on experiences of our grandmother’s farm cooking and our mother’s Norwegian heritage, so our food preferences and what we choose to cook and bake is often similar. I add in quite a bit of French-based and comfort food (read: rich & creamy), while my sister experiments more with Asian dishes.

4. What was the first item you created?

The first items I designed for Tartella were letterpress recipe cards and cookbook marks (available at www.tartella.com). I originally thought that I would produce mainly paper and stationary products, since that was my background. But, then I took silkscreen classes and started printing on textiles like tea towels. Customers at shows responded really well to them, and I started spending more time and energy on textile products. I still design and produce new recipe cards and cookbook marks every year, though, since there is always a core customer base that still uses and appreciates these products (like me!).

Thanks Andrea!