Kitchen Of
UX
UI
User Research
2021/2022
UX
UI
User Research
2021/2022
An app to provide home chefs with the tools to easily record their recipes and share with those in a small community.
The Idea
Framing the Problem
Initial Research
In order to understand how people were currently finding, recording and sharing recipes, I had to talk to some home cooks. After sending out a screener survey, I interviewed 7 amateur chefs about how they discovered new recipes, how they treated recipes from someone they knew personally, and how they kept track or documented recipes they cooked. I asked questions like: What do you look for in a recipe? Where do you go to find inspirational/aspirational recipes? When you cook something you enjoy, or are proud of, how do you preserve that recipe?
I Had an Idea...
Early on in my project, I wanted to test the idea of a collaborative recipe space, so I asked a few close friends to contribute to a minimum viable prototype (AKA a google doc)
Key Insights
After my initial research, I distilled my findings down into key insights. My complete research deck can be found here
Process
From my research, I was also able to break down the entire recipe process in 4 key steps:
User Journey
Identifying the Users
Task Breakdown
After identifying the users thinking about the pain points in a current user’s journey, it was time to start thinking about the features it made sense to include, and how these features woudl nest within each other. How could these ideas come together into a cohesive product?
Defining Architecture
Once the intended tasks were defined, it was time to start thinking about the “site map” of the product (in this case, an app). How would things link together to make a cohesive user journey? This model helped me identify which screens I would need to focus on.
Early Prototyping
Now it was time to create a user flow, thinking about real screens and interactions I wanted to be available.
Defining Style
At the same time, it was time to start thinking about how I wanted the end product to look. I wanted it to feel fresh, contemporary, approachable and fun, but still retain a few hallmarks of a classic recipe card. I decided on the the name “Kitchen of” as a tribute to recipes cards that have little notes saying “from the kitchen of...”
Putting it all Together
Finally it was time to put it all together in a functional protoype!
