diff --git a/plugins/knife/_knife b/plugins/knife/_knife
index 22ba1e300..4e7ee69ae 100644
--- a/plugins/knife/_knife
+++ b/plugins/knife/_knife
@@ -3,6 +3,9 @@
 # You can override the path to knife.rb and your cookbooks by setting
 # KNIFE_CONF_PATH=/path/to/my/.chef/knife.rb
 # KNIFE_COOKBOOK_PATH=/path/to/my/chef/cookbooks
+# If you want your local cookbooks path to be calculated relative to where you are then 
+# set the below option
+# KNIFE_RELATIVE_PATH=true 
 # Read around where these are used for more detail.
 
 # These flags should be available everywhere according to man knife
@@ -207,12 +210,15 @@ _chef_environments_remote() {
 
 # The chef_x_local functions use the knife config to find the paths of relevant objects x to be uploaded to the server
 _chef_cookbooks_local() {
-  
-  local knife_rb=${KNIFE_CONF_PATH:-${HOME}/.chef/knife.rb}
-  if [ -f ./.chef/knife.rb ]; then
-    knife_rb="./.chef/knife.rb"
+  if [ $KNIFE_RELATIVE_PATH ]; then 
+    local cookbook_path="$(_chef_root)/cookbooks"
+  else 
+    local knife_rb=${KNIFE_CONF_PATH:-${HOME}/.chef/knife.rb}
+    if [ -f ./.chef/knife.rb ]; then
+      knife_rb="./.chef/knife.rb"
+    fi
+    local cookbook_path=${KNIFE_COOKBOOK_PATH:-$(grep cookbook_path $knife_rb | awk 'BEGIN {FS = "[" }; {print $2}' | sed 's/\,//g' | sed "s/'//g" | sed 's/\(.*\)]/\1/' )}
   fi
-  local cookbook_path=${KNIFE_COOKBOOK_PATH:-$(grep cookbook_path $knife_rb | awk 'BEGIN {FS = "[" }; {print $2}' | sed 's/\,//g' | sed "s/'//g" | sed 's/\(.*\)]/\1/' )}
   (for i in $cookbook_path; do ls $i; done)
 }