I have no idea if it's possible to do this with this version of HEI but I thought it wouldn't hurt to ask. JEI for newer versions of Minecraft has the recipe-category-sort-order.ini config which allows you to reorder the recipe categories and it would be great to have similar functionality on 1.12.2.

if you use GroovyScript, this feature will be in the next update.
CleanroomMC/GroovyScript#257

Oh awesome, I don't use it yet but I can certainly add it.