CookLess
Find Meals Fit For You
Overview
CookLess is a tool that encourages users from all backgrounds to cook their own meals. By addressing constraints concerned for each individual, CookLess makes cooking easier and more accessible.
Timeline
May - July 2023 (12 Weeks)
Tools
Figma, Miro
Role
Product Designer
See, and save what your friends are doing!
Save recipes under a customized list tailored to your lifestyle that you can refer back to. See and save what lists friends have created for direction on your next meal!
See, and save what your friends are doing!
Save recipes under a customized list tailored to your lifestyle that you can refer back to. See and save what lists friends have created for direction on your next meal!
Context
People can’t find delicious meals to complement their diet or lifestyle.
"Why waste my time cooking, when I can find something perfectly nutritious and delicious outside"
Others see cooking as a nuisance because it exhausts extra mental effort, or it is too time consuming. As a result, people often prepare meals that are tasteless, often as a compromise for nutritional benefit.
"It's too overwhelming to find a recipe to cook"
People are often overwhelmed by the inventory of recipes made available online. Numerous blogs give specific instructions to make an assortment of dishes, but fail to bring value to all aspiring home cooks.
The Bottom Line
There is a market gap between what consumers need and what is currently being delivered.
Research
I conducted user interviews with 8 participants (4 of whom were individuals working daily 9-5 jobs, while 3 of which were currently students or not currently employed, and the last participant was working irregular shifts as a night-shift nurse.
Easy and Diet Friendly
There is a large inventory of cooking resources, but none cite fully accessible meals for all diets.
“The mental stress of it all…that discourages me the most…it’s one less thing to think about"
Cost-Effective
Participants shared concerns of seeking convenience, while compromising their expenses.
"It's easier to buy buy sweetgreen because groceries can be so expensive”.
All About Efficiency
Cooking meals that were well-suited to meet the constraints of time, while still being tasty.
“Too much time is 2 hours or more to make food”
Competitive Audit
I conducted a competitive audit of some other companies that implemented features to help people find recipes. Not only did this audit inspire some of my design decisions, it also aided me in finding key uses that were currently not deployed in today’s market.
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Audit of Mobile Recipe Platforms
Common recipe generators based off of user diet preferences. However, lack of affordance to define filters limited its use. Additionally, primary navigation centered on marketable recipes generated by popular demand, instead of accessible-first, and diverse category navigation.
Other companies have implemented products to help users find recipes. However, none of them specifically address a vast range of diets & lifestyles needed to keep the product, universally accessible.
Other companies have implemented products to help users find recipes. However, none of them specifically address a vast range of diets & lifestyles needed to keep the product, universally accessible.
Ideation
Initially, I ideated a responsive website with a community-user feed to help actively engage users. However, competitors with this feature, focused on content strategy and community engagement, taking away emphasis on finding tailored recipes for users.
Therefore, I decided to move forward with a simpler mobile application that uses a fixed management system that prioritized the goal of finding form-fitting recipes.
Therefore, I decided to move forward with a simpler mobile application that uses a fixed management system that prioritized the goal of finding form-fitting recipes.
Solution
Accessible Filter
Design Feedback
Use of chips wasn’t entirely intuitive. Common question recurred, “What if users were looking for filters to meet specific criteria?”
Design Decisions
Filter popup that enables user customizability to their preferences. Wide accessibility according to diet preferences, dietary restrictions, lifestyle constraints, etc.
Solution
Expanded Recipe Cards
Design Feedback
Use of chips wasn’t entirely intuitive. Common question recurred, “What if users were looking for filters to meet specific criteria?”
Design Decisions
Filter popup that enables user customizability to their preferences. Wide accessibility according to diet preferences, dietary restrictions, lifestyle constraints, etc.
Solution
Clickable Cache & Nutrition Card
Design Feedback
Use of chips wasn’t entirely intuitive. Common question recurred, “What if users were looking for filters to meet specific criteria?”
Design Decisions
Filter popup that enables user customizability to their preferences. Wide accessibility according to diet preferences, dietary restrictions, lifestyle constraints, etc.
Future Considerations
Never thinking an idea is too foolish
Many of my design ideas didn’t turn out to be the best iteration for this project,.
I don’t believe I would have been able to arrive at the best solution without exploring a broad range of design iterations
Involving an even more diverse pool of participants
Throughout the early stages of the design process, it became easy to lean into biases, expecting that most people shared similar lifestyle needs.
Prioritizing and ideating an even more accessible design would come more easily if I had recruited an even more diverse pool of participants.
Affinity Mapping is so useful!
Coming up with design solutions that could be fitted to a diverse pool of participants proved to be extremely challenging.
Avoiding biases in leaning into solutions too closely fitted to one participant was made extremely easier by affinity mapping.
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