Save PDF as txt file

to convert to text. you need a pdf converter program. you could use draw from libre office, or open the file in inkscape. but these programs are suited for single page conversion.

if you only have a few cookbooks you want to convert, you can install pdf converter professional. it's a windoze based program but it runs under wine and will convert documents to word format. you can get a trial version that lets you use it for 30 days. that should be plenty of time to convert all your cookbooks.

you can download it from the website download.com

it takes awhile for the program to load and the screen will look like it's going to crash, but give it awhile. after that, it works quite fast.

Thank you so very much for your help.
Each time I attempt to open the download I get This message:

Archive: /home/denise/Downloads/solidconverterpdf.exe
[/home/denise/Downloads/solidconverterpdf.exe]
  End-of-central-directory signature not found. Either this file is not
  a zipfile, or it constitutes one disk of a multi-part archive. In the
  latter case the central directory and zipfile comment will be found on
  the last disk(s) of this archive.
zipinfo: cannot find zipfile directory in one of /home/denise/Downloads/solidconverterpdf.exe or
          /home/denise/Downloads/solidconverterpdf.exe.zip, and cannot find /home/denise/Downloads/solidconverterpdf.exe.ZIP, period.

The prompt window that pops up says "what do you want to do? Open with Archive or save?" But each try yields the same Error message. I have no training in this :( but will keep at it!

Is there any reason you can't just copy and paste from the PDF?

http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/hardy/man1/pdftotext.1.html

http://shibuvarkala.blogspot.com/2008/11/howto-convert-pdf-to-txt-in-ubuntu.html

@denise
You need to install wine from the software center

@actionparsnip
I tried poppers utile but could never get it to work DAMN AUTOCORRECT
Anyways, with pdf converter products, the document with graphics is preserved exactly. Quite the useful program but it is quite expensive. If you can't live without it after using it, it often sells at half price.

you can try this free online pdf to text converter(http://www.online-code.net/pdf-to-word.html) to save pdf as txt file online.