A recipe and meal planning app

[CookingAddict]

Hello everyone,

My name is Bill and I am a food lover and freelance developer. I've been cooking for over 15 years and recently I created a mobile app called CookIt that's designed for chefs who want to find recipes and plan meals. Some of the key features of the app include exploring and saving recipes, create shopping lists for recipes, get nutrition data, create meals on a personal calendar. You can also create your own recipes, post cooking videos, and even livestream cooking. The app does a lot to encourage communication between users because as a chef myself the biggest problem I run into while following a recipe is being unable to understand a certain part of the recipe or visualize what the directions are saying so I wanted my app to have more user engagement so people can easily ask questions and get answers.

I recently finished making the app (it took over a year because I also have a daytime job and this is my hobby) and I was wondering if some of our aspiring chefs here would be willing to try it out and see what you think about it. I would love to hear anything about how the app could be improved or functionalities you think it should have. Unfortunately it is only available for Android at the moment (I will create an ios version as soon as I can get my hands on an Apple device).

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CookIt - Apps on Google Play

Mod Edit (SNSSO). I've approved this post, but that doesn't mean I endorse the app. I have installed it, but like a lot of apps I've not seen the coding so it is install at your own risk relying on Google having security in place etc. The decision to install and help test the app, is your's and your's alone.

The app has been opened up to be installed worldwide, but was written for USA only originally, so you'll need to take this into account if you're outside of USA. Little things like the States for your location are USA states only despite setting the country to Australia in my case.

You'll need to register and validate your email address, that email turned up in my spam folder.

Also I've not seen anything on data collection and how that info is protected, but I also haven't yet asked that question, so it is entirely up to you if you are in Android and want to help out.

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

I've noticed immediately that I don't have all the fonts on my phone that you appear to be relying on. I'm on a Samsung Galaxy A73 5G running on Android 13 with all the latests patches

So not just symbols but also foreign character that I have full access to in my phone (I can type in ½ floz Créme de cassis without issue)

Setting up a profile image, it is badly distorted.

Sholeh Zard/Sari Shilah - Persian Saffron Rice Pudding

• SatNavSaysStraightOn
• 27 Mar 2023

As always my member name is too long. Most sites either restrict the number of characters to fit most screen sizes or expand what can be seen (we do a mixture of both).

Navigating the app is not the easiest. I can't get back to the home page easily. There is only a back button most of the time, and if I've followed one recipe to another to another it takes the last time I actually saw the home button or the bottom bar, I have to click back 5 or 6 or 10 times to get back to the last page I saw it on to be able to access a link back to the start screen. It's quicker sometimes to exit the app and go back in.

Directions are hit and miss. In some recipes they are appearing in the ingredients list at the bottom of the list (in not certain what the order is in that list but if I've 2 vinegars going into a pickled egg recipe, and both get added together I'd hope to see them together (one above the other) in the list of ingredients for example not at other ends of it.

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

I'm not seeing any obvious number of servings in the recipes which leaves nutritional information dubious at best. Ignoring the obvious issues that come about from different countries have different recommendations for requirements (I appreciate you only wrote the so for USA originally), men and women have different recommended calorie intakes, so percentages if recommended amounts would need 2 columns (ignoring differing amounts related to age) or at a very minimum clarification of which recommendations you are showing by percentage (men or women). 500kcals of a 2,000kcal diet (women) is a different percentage to 500kcal for 2,500 kcal for a male diet.

Also highlighting anything isn't that obvious in my phone. The difference is only marginal.

Finally lots of images are low quality, compressed obscurely and often sideways.

 

[CookingAddict]

Thank you so much! This is very helpful, I will try to revise all of these

 

[CookingAddict]

Hi everyone! Just an update on the app, I have fixed most of the issues identified by SatNavSaysStraightOn (thank you, again, I know it must have taken some time to identify all those issues). There should be no more foreign characters, pictures can be cropped, highlighting is more obvious. I will look into the inconsistency/mixing of directions and ingredients and distorted pictures, but those problems are probably harder to fix. And I would love it if anyone else here is interested in checking out the app, its great for keeping recipes or just finding something interesting to cook.

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