1- Disable the this feature by going into the Gnome Settings > Privacy > Usage & history.
2- Edit the ~/.config/gtk-3.0/settings.ini
file by adding: gtk-recent-files-enabled=0
as shoen in the official documentation. If the file doesn't exist you can create it:
[Settings]
# ...
gtk-recent-files-enabled=0
3- Log out and log back in for the changes to apply.