Make People Fall in Love with Food Again
Ethnic minorities in North America with medical dietary restrictions struggle to find culturally relative food solutions. Having to give up eating what you love for your health can greatly impact your quality of life. MyPalate app helps people with medical dietary restrictions discover recipes that meet their cultural taste preferences.
The mission of MyPalate is to become the ultimate food app, where everyone is able to enjoy regardless of your dietary restrictions. Find recipes that are tailored to meet the needs of diabetes, chronic kidney disease, heart disease, celiac, and many more soon to come.
Role
Product Designer
Responsibilities
User Research/testing, design strategy, research planning, design sprints
Timeline: 3 months
Discovery of cooking/consumption habits
We conducted a survey of 50 participants with a median age of 25. 29 were students, 14 full-time employed, 7 were unemployed.
84% were female and 16% were male participants. Roughly 60% were from North American. 50% are from the United States.
user Insights
76% said that they do use recipes (38 out of 50). 24% do not use recipes.
For participants that use recipes, their favorite platforms include:
Websites: (3) BBC Food, (2) AllRecipes, (2) HelloFresh, (2) SeriousEats, (1) BuzzFeed
Apps: Fernanda Fontoura's App, Albert Heijn app, deliciously ella
Others: Woolies, NYT Recipe of the Week, giallozafferano, Just One Cookbook,
Nom nom paleo, "tudo gostoso", ChefKochSocial Media: (5) Google, (3) Youtube, (2) Pinterest, (1) Tiktok, (1) Instagram
Favorite Site/App Features
Easy to Read/Navigate
Clear Step by Step Instructions
Ingredient List
Filter/Search
Current Methods of Recipe Collection
Notes
Physical copies
Bookmark
synthesizing our findings
Based on the discovery, we were able to refine our search results, and categories for types of cuisines. The most common allergies included shellfish, nuts, gluten and lactose intolerance were the baseline for the onboarding process as well as the Browse and search tool, marking enhancements to our search tags and a focus on the most popular ethnic cuisines which helps findability and engagement to the MyPalate App.
Additionally, the usability compared to other receipt apps and sites was the biggest concern for our targeted audience. Many recipe platforms are not intuitive and have advertisement content that are disruptive and annoying. There was a lack of focus on these platforms on the ingredients and the recipe itself.
SITE UI/UX Updates
In preparation of the beta launch, our goal was to refresh the site experience in alignment with the app design ecosystem.
We crafted a design systems for web with a prioritization for responsive breakpoints on various devices.
Implement new components, modules and features such as search, blog, recipe database, and sign up form.
INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE
DESIGN SYSTEM
I collaborated with the product team to update existing color palettes and components to create a universal design system.
