Nested posts by tag and date

On our website, we want to feature recipes. We want them grouped by tag on a custom index page. For example:

Index Page

• Mexican Favorites – Program 10012

1. Taco
2. Fajita
3. Burrito

• Lunch for Two – Program 10013

1. Cesar Salad
2. Lasagna
3. Vegetable Soup

• Asian Buffet – Program 10014

1. Tofu Stir Fry
2. Fried Rice
3. Lo Mein

In the above example, each parent list item (like “Mexican Favorites – Program 10012”) would be a link to another page, which would contain several recipes featured from the respective cooking TV program episode.

We want the index page to list the recipe collections in order of air date. What makes this a little complicated is that a program may re-air at a later time, so we cannot simply list the recipes in sequential order by program number. We would probably adjust the date by modifying the post date for each recipe, if a program re-airs.

We want each recipe to be a separate post. The individual recipes need to be grouped by program, which can be done with a tag.

The parent listings on the index page (recipe collections) need to display by air date. Clicking one of those listings, like “Mexican Favorites – Program 10012” in the example above, would open a page showing all the recipes from that program.

What we need help with is creating the code to generate the listing of recipes. We don’t know how to nest them correctly. And maybe someone knows a better way to structure this than what we’ve done.

We are new to WordPress, so any detailed help would be most appreciated!