Chef Gusto
A recipe app designed to accommodate gluten free eaters along with non-gluten free eaters.
A recipe app designed to accommodate gluten free eaters along with non-gluten free eaters.
I have a close acquaintance that has a young teenage daughter with Celiac Disease, for the sake of this article, I’ll name her Esther. Whenever we plan a get together, we always try to make a meal plan that Esther can enjoy as well by substituting gluten ingredients with non-gluten ingredients. However, as much as we try, the results are just never predictable, sometimes the substitution is great and other times just doesn’t really work, leaving both Esther and the rest of us eating a less than ideal dish that took so much thought and effort to prepare.
As a UX designer I thought there must be a good solution to this problem, where individuals diagnosed with Celiac, their family, and friends; can get and share good recipes that can be converted easily to a gluten free dish that tastes delicious.
On a personal level, I’ve observed Celiac diagnosis rising rapidly in the last few decades, so it couldn’t be that Esther was in this alone, but I had to find real evidence for this. So I decided to do a quick search on the internet, which showed me that she was indeed not alone; the rate of new diagnosis of Celiac Disease has increased 7.5 percent every year for the past few decades. There are many individuals who needed an option for converting everyday great recipes into gluten free dishes that taste good to both people with and without Celiac Disease.
After finding out that many people can benefit from a solution like this, I moved forward with some market research and competitive analysis, assuming that there must already be a web or mobile application providing a solution for these users. My idea was to find out what solutions have already been created and then analyze and test them to find out what users liked about these and what users felt was missing and can therefore be improved within these solutions. I was also looking for a sweet spot, where the market was lacking so that I can build my solution to fill that gap.
I spent time searching and researching both web and mobile applications and surprisingly found that although there were some solutions, there were not nearly as many as I had anticipated, and even those that did exist, barely served as a solution to the problem I wanted to address. Many of them simply provided some gluten-free recipes, not substitutions to convert great recipes in a tasteful way. While doing this research, I documented the information I gathered from this competitive analysis.
This strengthened the fact that this solution was needed and that although it can function in a similar way to the existing websites and apps, which functioned exactly like any other recipe blog or app; there were additional features that were needed to make this application solve my users issue. This research helped me identify what additional features were needed by seeing what was lacking in the existing solutions.
Now, as the most important part of my research I wanted to engage with my potential users so that I can empathize with them, understand their lives, feeling, thoughts and ultimately their problem. That would help me come up with a solution that would give them the great user experience they were looking for.
I got to work interviewing potential users. I focused on parents of children with Celiac Disease or those responsible for preparing meals within a family unit that has someone with Celiac Disease.
Here were some of my questions:
Now that I had done competitive research and engaged with my users, it was time to analyze and document the information I had gathered so that I can better understand them, empathize with them and properly frame their problem.
I documented the information I had gathered by creating a journey map, personas, story board and a competitive analysis.
Some of the insight and point of view I gained from the research:
I found that my target audience cooked dinner daily for their families. Some prepared two dishes while others prepared only one and tried substituting gluten products with gluten-free products. Most, though, said that they do some of both, since substituting does save them the time of preparing two dishes, but they then have to spend a lot of extra time figuring out what to substitute the gluten ingredient with and then, the dish sometimes comes out great, but other times, either the gluten eaters or non-gluten eaters, and sometimes both, don’t like the way the dish comes out.
The problem:
Based on my research I created two user personas, one is a working Mom, Naomi, who has to prepare dinner for her family every day, and the other is a cook/chef, Tim, who has to cook dinner for a family unit on a nightly basis. Having these users in mind as I ideated helped me focus on their needs in their given situations.
For example, when deciding whether I should create an app or a website, I thought about my users and their busy schedules; they needed a solution that was easily at their fingertips at any time and any place, particularly in the kitchen. This made me realize that for my users, a mobile app was the best way to go, users always have their mobile devices available and can simply access the application by clicking on the downloaded application icon. Having a website would require going to the browser and remembering and typing in a web address etc. So I went with a mobile application.
Being able to make great recipes with gluten substitutes that have been tested and result in a dish that tastes great to both people with and without Celiac Disease.
The outcome:
Now that I understood my competition, who my users really are so that I can empathize with them and their problem; I was ready to move forward by generating ideas and exploring possible solutions. During this process I created the wireframes, prototypes, assets, components, design system and information architecture, by conducting card sorting.
After analyzing and ideating on this a few times myself, I presented my prototypes to the users in order to test them out and see if they were able to understand the flow, perform tasks and give feedback. During this process there were a number of elements that I had to deliberate and I used the research I had done as well as user testing to come up with the best resolution.
Based on feedback, I iterated on my solution and changed my prototype, until my solution clearly resolved my users' problem.
One challenge I had in this process is that since this was a creative endeavor for me and I did not have access to too many users within the time I had to create this (outside of work), I found it frustrating to work with such a small amount of research and information. I would have preferred to be able to interview, research and perform user testing with dozens of users in a methodical way throughout the process.
Since this was an issue that I found, I decided to venture out and take this on in order to push my creative abilities, so I had to work within the limits of what I had access to.
Another challenge I had while building this app, was that as I ideated, I kept coming up with new add-on features I can add to the application, like adding social networking for those who have Celiac Disease, their parents, messaging features etc. so that users can connect and create a community for those with Celiac Disease and their family and friends. However, I went back to my users, their problem, the solution and desired outcomes; and ultimately I decided that there are already dozens of apps for social networking and messaging, that’s not the issue my application was trying to solve. Rather, with my personas in mind, my users were busy individuals who were looking for one simple solution to a very specific problem, one that they can use on the fly without any distractions or bloating.
This design still needs a lot more user research, and structured user testing, for now, I came up with the best solution based on the very limited resources I had while exploring this creative process.