Hey Doc,
IMO the first option is a much better one, because it'll provide more incoming links for your main page, which can also get indexed, and that'll provide greater link popularity for your gallery pages...
I know this is small scale and not a massive link pop campaign, but every little bit counts if you're going for not too competetive terms.
DD has a point with having duplicate pages, but I think everyone should remember linklists will also send some traffic (they're not just pr machines), so a few doorways will help you out in the beginning!
And if you think duplicate pages are such an issue, make one page your "index" that you want to get indexed by the se's and put your recips at the top of the other "doorway" pages, because IMO it's the stuff at the top that counts and you'll have different code at the top of each that way
I'm not expert, but I think google has kind of gotten over the duplicate content deal... Yeah it'll only index one of the pages, but I don't think you'll be penalised. (this opinion is not really based on anything really... Just seems that way to me!)
HTH, looking forward to the disagreements
Matt
BTW, with regards to the content in the same folder, I think that's just because!