Recipe headnotes are an optional part of a recipe and their appearance determined by the recipe-writing style of the author or the publisher. But, for many of the reasons I’ll discuss today, cookbook lovers and cooks in general love recipe headnotes. They add personality and liven up the writing in a cookbook. It’s up to an author if they want to use headnotes in their cookbook, as well as what information an author wants to include in a headnote.