I've been more adventurous in the kitchen lately, and while a delicious home-cooked dinner is a plus, I'm frustrated.
Why is the UX of an average recipe so bad? An apple pie recipe waxes on about every interaction the writer has ever had with an apple in their life. The page floods with ads to the point of illegibility. The measurements are guestimates, and the directions leave room for misunderstanding.
For me, food is about the end result. I'm not reading a recipe because I love the recipe, or searching a cooking term I don't know for the fun of it; I'm doing it because I want to end up with something edible on my plate. I have a goal, and the process is just a means to an end.
So I don't enjoy the act of cooking, not yet, but I'd like to. After all, it takes up such a large percentage of the day. Improved UX is one route, but I also want to start seeing cooking as a worthy process in and of itself. Making it personal. Getting recipes and recommendations from friends. Calling my mom for advice instead of Googling. Having memories, not ChatGPT search histories, tied to a recipe.
Maybe part of that is going back to physical cookbooks. Or taking some cooking classes. A friend in Bulgaria gifted me some recipe cards for traditional Balkan cuisine, and her design background shines through: clear steps, a picture of the end result, and no extraneous information. The pretty card-stock is a nice bonus.
I'm still grateful for what Pinterest or a quick search can turn up. I like the convenience. But I'm moving less towards ease and more towards the moment's value. Part of that is improving the UX of the kitchen/cooking/recipes/whatever else, but part of it is also on the user. Me, making an effort to add some intentionality to the process. (But if we could get rid of the novellas in recipes, that would help too.)
The novellas certainly can be frustrating, but there's another side to this, as I wrote earlier this year: https://nathanupchurch.com/blog/let-us-waffle/