We need to talk about the future of home cooks.

Items mentioned in this video:

0:00 - Intro
2:02 - Why is it hard to feed yourself everyday?
4:31 - The problem with recipe websites, cook books, + YouTube video
10:00 - The problems creators face
10:56 - The missing piece I want to build.
15:15 - What’s holding us back
22:50 - What made you pivot from recipe to deep dive content?
28:23 - What’s your hottest cooking take?
33:15 - What were your biggest influences on how you learned to cook?
37:37 - What’s the most time consuming part of making deep dive videos?
43:29 - What’s been your favorite recipe / video of the year?
45:28 - How did you get into cooking and Youtube?

[EthanChlebowski]

This video has been a long time coming. Also feel free to ignore this one if you are just here for the normal videos 😅 Here's a quick recap of the first half before the Q&A:

The problem that we want to solve is:

It's hard to feed yourself everyday based on your unique constraints. (Time, energy, money, job, family, etc.)

The current solutions all tend to fall short in some way:
- Websites: Too many ads, long stories no one wants
- Cook books: Great if you have time, but not helpful for shopping / planning, throwing a quick meal together, can't take it with you
- Video content: Not enough educational content. A lot of content is made to chase views / ad revenue.
- Meal kits: High cost per meal, limited menu
- Paid content / courses: Already tons of free information / content everywhere.

These solutions are okay, but none of them are flexible enough for all types of home cooks. What we want to build is the Cook Well companion app. This is a paid utility app. Not a content app. The core features we want to start with are:

1. Feed of recipes + frameworks based on your constraints (time, health, macros, cuisines, etc.)
2. Grocery list -> Start from scratch, add recipes directly, or add a grocery template.
3. Calendar -> Add notes, leftovers, dinner plans, recipes, etc. This calendar is backward and forward looking. You can plan a full week or items day by day.
4. Let's Cook -> Prompt based on ingredients you already have to help you figure out something you want to cook.

We want to partner with creators. The app will need to be paid, so we can continue to develop features and make it better over time, but it is one piece of the overall Cook Well ecosystem. The rest will be freely available without (having to rely on the broken advertising model):

- Keep Cookwell.com ad free. Same recipes available in the app are available here.
- Cook Well makes our own content (YouTube videos, newsletter, etc.)
- Support creators to help them make better content


We'll be back to normal deep dive videos in a couple weeks, see you then✌Hope everyone has a great new year!

[taal]

The second biggest problem every homecook has is scrolling through someone's life story on every cooking blog.

[wdstevenson]

I'm here for ideas and techniques. I'm not going to subscribe to a service or pay for an app.
Might be an unpopular take but since you're being open and transparent, I will too.

Thanks for the great YouTube content you've created so far.

[ericmeckley]

I love the way you take a methodical, design-minded approach to all of your content. I’d definitely support a kickstarter to build this into the best it can be.

[rehamalabdalla]

Hear me out - I personally don't think people need recipes. We need EDUCATION. Ingredient education. Your vision is beautiful, but imagine if everyone can be a creator, their OWN creators and create things in the kitchen on their own without the use of recipes or copying what someone else does. I love your youtube channel because it has given me education on how to use basic ingredients in my kitchen and turn it into something of my own. Your garlic video has elevated my cooking honestly. I needed someone to teach me how to use garlic! it's in every recipe and I know how to use it because of you. I don't think people need a shopping list either, they need to be educated on how to choose ingredients (your video about tomatoes, onions, butter, etc - those videos HELP me make choices when I shop at the grocery store. You have passed down your knowledge and I can use it every time I shop because you have given me the gift of education.

Imagine this: you open up a folder called "spinach" and educate people on the different kinds of spinach, what they are used for, and different ways to cook it. Can it be baked? steamed? can it be eaten raw? give us examples on how to use it, mixed with cheese to make a filling, used a topping, eaten as an entire salad. What things pair well with spinach? give us some tips, like how when you make ravioli with it, it will be watery so it needs to be paired with something that will draw out the excess moisture. How do we store it to keep it fresh, then maybe throw out some example recipes for those who still aren't inspired or can't think of what to do with it.

Maybe educate us some more about how we can incorporate vegetables into our meals, or how we can swap out carbs for other things like cauliflower alfredo sauce, or using other pasta like chickpea pasta, or achieving juicy results with lean meats. etc.

I am a home cook and I watch youtube videos not for recipes but to learn the WHY behind these chefs choices. Any creator can say "first you add the carrots then the onions" but I love the ones that explain "you need to add the carrots first because they cook faster than the onions, then you'll want to add the onions" <-- see the difference? I gained some education and I can use that knowledge anytime I cook. I can recall "oh, I have to always cook the things that will take longer first" Sounds like simple knowledge but I didn't know that prior to home cooking. I think this is what people need. Recipes are pointless, we need in depth ingredient education. This will solve the problem of people not knowing how to cook, it will ease intimidation in the kitchen, and it will allow people to grocery shop better.

[sharonlockwood]

I appreciate your no ads on Cook Well. I love your teaching style and format so so much!
I have no thoughts on the app, but I already cook everyday and have worked out my own solutions.

[alexburgdorf]

This dude really took "I dont care what you do just be the best you can at that thing" and RAN with it

[CardiniPanini]

This is the best advertisement for a service I've ever seen. It isn't trying to push a product in my face-it's telling me about the methodology and design of a wonderful creation in the making that would benefit me in several ways. Well done! I'm sold.

[AlanMillerFencepost]

The Alton Brown series that taught me the most about home cooking? Cutthroat Kitchen by a huge margin. As a home cook, I may not have the ingredients I **want**, I may have to work with the ingredients I **have**

[danielgrabowski]

app idea: Create a section that is essentially a manageable "pantry" of what you currently have in stock in your home kitchen. The app makes note of this. Then when planning out your week by choosing which recipes you're going to make for each day, generate a grocery list that will show what you need to buy to create all the recipes for the week less what you have in your "pantry" already. This would be an intuitive way of both meal planning and grocery shopping. Obviously the user could just leave the pantry section blank and when they add each recipe they want to cook a shopping list can be generated that includes literally everything, but if you want to streamline things and add some value, it might be a feature worth exploring to justify a fee. Just a thought!

[nakajoea]

I'd consider turning the grocery list around the other way, like take a list of what looks good at the grocery (or what's kicking around the refrigerator) and then present ideas about what to do with that. More than targeting a specific dish going in, it's far more common for me at least to end up thinking "I have this, and at the grocery that looks especially good today, what fun dish can I make from that."

[jobo]

Your profile in the app should include what kitchen appliances you have available. I find this to be a hugely important factor, especially for students or anyone in a smaller apartment. You can stumble upon an amazing recipe but if it needs a specialized appliance or would be a pain without this appliance it is useless.

[sponkyczar]

I may not be as active a viewer of yours as I was years ago but I just want to say I absolutely love how you've approached everything about this channel and every other venture of yours. You are a tremendously smart person and have made a remarkable impact on my cooking and even life habits organizationally. I also really appreciate your methodology and reasonings provided for your opinions, everything you do is very carefully calculated and it's evident in what we see in the videos. I really relate to this mindset and I will always try to support you whenever possible. Your productivity and transparency is so inspiring, thanks for everything Ethan.

[newmancl]

You and Brian Lagerstrom make the most practical, useful, and tasty recipie videos on youtube.

I hate meal planning/prepping. I want to just make food that sounds tasty every day and its you and Brian that I look up on almost a daily basis.

[zheros]

Everything you said about recipe sites and cookbooks totally hit home! Love the vision you have for cookwell. I’ll be keeping my eyes open in case you decide a kick starter will be a good fit.

[kimcarr]

I need a recipe skeleton.... you've kind of already done this, but hear me out. I need a recipe where I can pick the meat, use the vegetables on hand, and whatever carb my family likes, and make different things. Right now, I use things like salads, burritos, soups to use up what I have. I would love more ideas like this. Maybe different sauces to pull different things together? New spice/herb combos to freshen a tried and true recipe. Again, I think you've done things like this. Just saying what I find helpful.

[boot]

Your consulting background makes so much sense given how you’ve framed the problems to be solved. Excited to see what happens. A few thoughts from a UX/UI Designer:

- the companion app needs to be usable on desktop as well (See TickTick as a case study) bc so much of the work flow with planning occurs on a computer

- choose a tech stack that enables this (react native, for example) where you can utilize your development resources to do iOS/Android/Web simultaneously. The app may not be as snappy as native dev for the ux, but it makes sense given the use case here.

- would LOVE to have macro nutrients listed out for the day. I still will use my macro counting app (Shout out Jeff Nippard for macro factor), but some way for me to have my cooking oriented around knowing my macro intake would be supremely helpful.

[iamsmashy]

I want you to know, that you, Ethan, are solely responsible for my growing interest in cooking as a college student and beyond. My mom used to be a professional chef and makes great meals all the time for us, but I never took to it even with that. Your videos are getting me there. I would love an app like this, and I don’t pay for a lot of things, but if it delivers on the points you mentioned, I absolutely would shell out. The entire process of cooking is so intimidating to me, but you hit the nail on the head with the before and after being the hard part, especially the before. I would love a spot where I can organize all of my cooking related thoughts, and have thought about it, and the app represents that so well. I also want you to know that you are doing this right (so far). The fact that you have very clearly put so much thought into the goals of the app and the intention along with how it would interface with an actual human is refreshing. I can really tell this is something you’re passionate about, and that makes me happy. Lastly, please do a kickstarter to help with funding, this is no small feat. It’s free money for you and I would certainly donate. If you do that (and regardless) please make a bite size, sendable video that condenses everything down (I’m sure you would). Having something that’s short and easy to watch and share will be helpful in letting people see your vision. Happy to see you pushing for improvement!!!

[omarvancheznik]

The app sounds cool I guess but even if it was free I wouldn’t use it because I’ve seen this movie before. It starts free then I take time making lists/favorites/recipes/notes or whatever else and then it becomes paid, or more expensive if it started paid, or the features that I used become paid or more expensive.

Love your content. Hope the project works out well for you, but like not SO well that your yt channels suffer.

Got to 30:56 and wanted to add that I would LOVE a series “But worse (and way simpler)”. Like where to cut corners that save time/money/energy with minimal impact on overall dish. My hot take is that, while I generally peel my own garlic, if I’m making a bunch of stuff one week that takes ginger and garlic then just give me that whole jar of minced ginger and garlic combined. It takes a little more to achieve the same flavor but it is SO much easier and keeps way better than I would’ve initially thought when stored in the fridge.

[colleensmith]

The best cooking resource I've come across is a group chat between my friends where we share the improvised meals we make for our families and the cooking 'hacks' we've discovered along the way. I don't need more fancy recipes that create a ton of dishes - just everyday meal ideas that I can riff on to get everyone fed and minimize cleanup and food waste.