Looks awesome. Is this bootstrapped or raised?
Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking
311–320 of 377 posts
Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking
#312Earlier quoted context omitted.
Heh, I may be having a strong reaction to the overly-patronizing app. I'm surprised myself at how unpleasant I found it to use. Reading through this thread, others have also been rubbed the wrong way. The approach they're using is to tell you you're wrong over and over, but in a saccharine "that's okay squirt, you're doing your best!" kind of way. Like, here's another question: "What is the best way to store hard che…
OP here. A couple of thoughts... We created this app to focus on teaching beginners, so the content assumes no prior knowledge (for now). It's clearly eliciting strong reactions from experienced cooks, who have many opinions about how to do things. But put yourself in their shoes: if you wanted to learn how to make a Botan shrimp nigiri (perhaps that's new to you), how would you learn about sushi rice, how to buy liv…
I really like the concept of breaking things down to ingredients and techniques. I think your "naked knowledge graph" is worse than other approaches. I can't tell if it needs polish or a different structure.
The thing that stands out to me is context. A lot of your questions are presented as if they are context-free, but they are highly contextual both when they are written and when they are presented.
E.g. The meat spoilage question was written from the context of purchasing meat, not checking meat in your fridge. Your egg questions are written from an American perspective. That's fine if you know it and present it in the context it was written in.
When you rip those from the context they were written in, and present them bare, it's confusing and sometimes can mean something incorrect.
The other part is the recipe itself is contextual, but the knowledge graph isn't picking up some nuance. Hard cheese doesn't melt well, so why are you bringing up how to store it? It seems like you're grabbing the "cheese" node and whatever questions come with it. Maybe you can fix that by specifying "soft cheese."
Your knowledge graph needs to be truly context free, and/or it needs to contextualize its elements correctly for the recipe (and culture). Right now you're not really doing either.
Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking
#313Earlier quoted context omitted.
OT but same. jobs was right, it all belongs in the browser. apps pose too much of a privacy and security risk.
We actually built a previous version of the app as a PWA but the experience and performance was horrible. You can still try it here: https://beta.parsnip.ai/ Warning: this is not a great user experience; it's somewhat helpful for experienced cooks but useless for beginners and product adoption was terrible.
nod and please understand that i am not criticizing your app (which looks excellent), but rather lamenting the sad state of (im)personal mobile computing.
the engineering effort would have been better spent making web technology better rather than two vastly different custom sdks with poor respect for user privacy and security.
Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking
#314Earlier quoted context omitted.
Heh, I may be having a strong reaction to the overly-patronizing app. I'm surprised myself at how unpleasant I found it to use. Reading through this thread, others have also been rubbed the wrong way. The approach they're using is to tell you you're wrong over and over, but in a saccharine "that's okay squirt, you're doing your best!" kind of way. Like, here's another question: "What is the best way to store hard che…
OP here. A couple of thoughts... We created this app to focus on teaching beginners, so the content assumes no prior knowledge (for now). It's clearly eliciting strong reactions from experienced cooks, who have many opinions about how to do things. But put yourself in their shoes: if you wanted to learn how to make a Botan shrimp nigiri (perhaps that's new to you), how would you learn about sushi rice, how to buy liv…
> But put yourself in their shoes: if you wanted to learn how to make a Botan shrimp nigiri (perhaps that's new to you), how would you learn about sushi rice, how to buy live shrimp, how to fillet the shrimp, preparing wasabi, etc? We hope this model can apply
I typed "botan shrimp nigiri" into Google and got detailed videos showing me how to prepare, fillet, cook the shrimp. Most full recipe videos explain side bits about what to buy and things like that.
> The dirty secret is that by the time you get to the end of the quizzes, you'll already know how to cook the hamburger. The recipe is ridiculously elementary.
Here's where I think there's a disconnect.
Why would someone not start with a recipe which shows most of this and then look up the bits they are missing?
You seem to be then targeting someone who wants a broader base understanding of cooking at home, so why would a basic cooking course not be the structure?
Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking
#315Earlier quoted context omitted.
We actually think recipes are mostly unimportant, but teaching the underlying principles are what's important. Measurements are more important for pastries but less important for stovetop/oven cooking. The recipes we have right now are pretty easy for any English speaker to use. Our main content creator is from Australia, lives in Canada, and makes fun of the Imperial system all the time :)
American living in Germany. The thing you're not understanding is that "use roughly an ounce or so" will mean nothing to anyone in Europe. It's not about "recipes aren't important" but speaking the language of people who use your app. Locality is just as important.
Same goes for cups.
Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking
#316Earlier quoted context omitted.
OP here. A couple of thoughts... We created this app to focus on teaching beginners, so the content assumes no prior knowledge (for now). It's clearly eliciting strong reactions from experienced cooks, who have many opinions about how to do things. But put yourself in their shoes: if you wanted to learn how to make a Botan shrimp nigiri (perhaps that's new to you), how would you learn about sushi rice, how to buy liv…
I really like the concept of breaking things down to ingredients and techniques. I think your "naked knowledge graph" is worse than other approaches. I can't tell if it needs polish or a different structure. The thing that stands out to me is context. A lot of your questions are presented as if they are context-free, but they are highly contextual both when they are written and when they are presented. E.g. The meat…
I feel like the knowledge graph idea only works at a higher level. Rather than "how to buy an egg" unlocking "how to store an egg" and then "how to boil an egg" I want "hey there's a thing called mirepoix that's pretty fundamental, learn how to do it properly".
I learned about lactofermentation, it's really easy and opens a huge range of things.
Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking
#317Earlier quoted context omitted.
OP here. A couple of thoughts... We created this app to focus on teaching beginners, so the content assumes no prior knowledge (for now). It's clearly eliciting strong reactions from experienced cooks, who have many opinions about how to do things. But put yourself in their shoes: if you wanted to learn how to make a Botan shrimp nigiri (perhaps that's new to you), how would you learn about sushi rice, how to buy liv…
I really like the concept of breaking things down to ingredients and techniques. I think your "naked knowledge graph" is worse than other approaches. I can't tell if it needs polish or a different structure. The thing that stands out to me is context. A lot of your questions are presented as if they are context-free, but they are highly contextual both when they are written and when they are presented. E.g. The meat…
I agree with you wholeheartedly on the app.
There is so much wealth and context when it comes to food. Every region, culture etc has their own ways.
Like a sibling says to store pieces of cheese that you won’t use in a freezer.
I can imagine that framing all of the questions in the right context all the time is hard. But now it seems to be a bit too simple “know-it-all”.
Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking
#318Hey, there's a lot of highly-rated negative feedback here. For what it's worth, I _love_ the idea, it's exactly what I want, I'd pay a bunch for it. I really hope y'all keep at it and are able to take constructive pointers out of some of the harsher feedback, because if you _do_ nail this, it'll be incredible.
Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking
#319Earlier quoted context omitted.
I appreciate the perspective, it's a common objection. Similar arguments I've heard are that in order to learn to cook, you need to do one of: - read a lot of cookbooks and understand them - go watch a ton of YouTube videos and triangulate the best way to do it - go get a job in a kitchen (essentially, apprentice) I learn the way you do and I totally get where you're coming from. But this only works for serious autod…
> go watch a ton of YouTube videos and triangulate the best way to do it I don't understand this, you can watch one video of someone just cooking a thing you think sounds tasty.
No? I'm clearly the prime demographic for this app because your comment makes no sense to me. Most recipe videos skip the tedious (but important) bits, and many ALSO don't give notes about needed techniques. I often find that 1 recipe video results in me watching at least 5 other videos to clarify things that were left out, usually in pairs so I can compare/contrast the info provided. Because, again, I'm new to this whole thing and I can't tell which advice is good/relevant/etc
Just to clarify, I'm not defending their app, I'm defending the problem statement.
Re: Show HN: Parsnip – Duolingo for Cooking
#320Earlier quoted context omitted.
> But if someone wants to learn to cook an egg, it's because there's an egg in their fridge and they're hungry. So start with actually cooking that thing. Like, getting a suitable frying pan, setting the right temperature, throwing some butter in and then cracking and flipping the egg, learning to recognise when it's cooked to the desired doneness. No one cares about how to buy eggs... This is exactly it. I desperate…
I think it would be a miracle if any product could teach you how to cook and get you food in 5 minutes. I'm not sure it's possible. But, I think we can get you there after a few weeks of using Parsnip on a regular basis, with some basic dishes.
Sorry but this is just silly.
If you have an egg and butter on hand and the mental and physical capacity to tie your shoes you can absolutely learn how to make a basic scrambled egg in 5 minutes. Crack whisk pour flip eat.
If I’m a novice cook and your pitch is that it’ll take me weeks for your app to get me able to make a scrambled egg or avocado toast (mash spread salt done) I’m probably just going to give up.