My grandma kept her recipes in a notebook — but not all of them. Plenty lived only in her head. And she had more free time than she wanted.
So I built her an app made for her hands: big buttons, large text, seven simple steps for every recipe. It works even without internet.
Every recipe. Every story. Forever in the family.
With one small challenge: every recipe she adds, she also has to cook, so she can photograph it. Writing a recipe down became a reason to make it again.
Then the family joined. Likes, comments, recipes shared with one tap — the notebook turned into a small, warm community.
Everything a family cookbook needs.
- 01
Seven steps, nothing lost
A new recipe goes in through a wizard of seven simple steps. Every step saves itself as a draft, so nothing is ever lost.
- 02
Portions in one tap
Ingredients come from a shared list of about 400–500 foods and can be grouped: “For the dough”, “For the filling”. One tap rescales every amount — in proper Serbian plurals: 2 glavice, 5 glavica.
- 03
Her story, in her voice
Every recipe can carry the story behind it and an audio recording of grandma's voice.
- 04
Search and filters
Find any recipe or cook by name, or narrow the list by category and tags.
- 05
Likes and comments
The family likes recipes and comments on them, with replies. Notifications say when something new arrives.
- 06
Share it anywhere
Send a photo of the dish with a link, save the recipe as an image, or as a PDF.
- 07
Works without internet
Everything works offline. When the internet comes back, the app syncs on its own.
- 08
Guests welcome, accounts by invitation
Guests see everything without an account. Accounts are made only through an invitation.
The app is in Serbian; its screens are shown here in English. The portions screen stays in Serbian — it's about the Serbian plural forms.
Built for her hands.
Every screen had to pass one question: can grandma do this on her own?
- 18pxtext, never smaller
- 48pxthe smallest button
- 0actions that only work with a gesture
- 0technical words in messages
- Vithe polite form of address, always
Grandma's notebook, for the whole family.
Her recipes aren't in one notebook in one kitchen anymore. They're with the whole family — with photos, stories and her voice.
- a month to run
- €0
- simple steps per recipe
- 7
- ingredients in the shared list
- 400+
- to rescale portions
- 1 tap
For the curious.
- Next.js
- the app, installable on a phone like any other (PWA)
- Supabase
- database, accounts by invitation, notifications
- Dexie
- a copy of everything on the phone: works offline first, syncs later
- GitHub Actions
- a backup of every recipe, every week
- €0 / month
- what it costs to keep it running