Better Know A Barcelona Startup Cookbooth

With over 90 million photos using the #food hashtag and more than 40 million people using cooking apps in Latin America, Europe and the US, it’s safe to say that people like food. If you like to cook, then you have a gluttonous supply of apps at your fingertips such as Epicurious, Big Oven and All Recipes. The problem is that the recipes are often hard to follow with no visuals on how exactly the dish should look at each stage of the preparation process. This is why my version of home made cookies tend to come out looking like weirdly shaped indestructible UFO’s instead of the real chewy deal.

Coined as the “the Instagram of recipes”, Cookbooth allows chefs and foodies to create and share recipes in a deliciously visual way. From dishes such a schirashizushi in Japan, chilaquiles with guacamole and air-dried beef in Mexico, or a seafood cataplana in Portugal, you can find it all on Cookbooth with step-by-step photos on how to prepare these delicacies.

According to foodie founders Malwine Steinbock & Víctor Fortunado, “our mission is to inspire people to cook more and to eat better through step by step visual photo recipes where each step contains all the details that make up a dish. The aim is that those who do not know how to cook, learn, and that those who do know share their recipes, clearly explained and in a very personal way. We are essentially creating a social cooking experience as an exchange of visual food knowledge that unites kitchens worldwide”.

The story of how the startup was founded goes back to 2011 in Germany when Victor and Malwine were preparing a special 70-year-old recipe for Coconut Macaroons that was handed down from Mimi Meyer, a lady from Einbeck. The recipe was written in calligraphy on aging yellow paper and the text was starting to fade. Victor explains, “It was very exciting to prepare a recipe that someone had conserved with such care for so long”. They photographed each step of the process on their mobile and decided to keep the end result. “It was such as simple proves but we were enamoured with it”, says Malwine. All they had to do was save the images and share the recipe so other people could follow it. That is the tale of how Cookbooth was born.

Unlike other options on the market, the difference with Cookbooth is the way that the recipes are prepared (from both the person preparing it to the person following the instructions). “To make photo recipes is easy and it’s so much fun doing it” explains Malwine. I’ve been using the app for the last few weeks and although I haven’t yet created any recipes myself, I have prepared some tasty dishes from all over the world. Victor says “When you publish a photo recipe you feel the satisfaction of having created a work of art that reflects a piece of who you are and your love for food, something you are proud to share with the world”.

The mobile application is presented as a new means of communication for chefs, food lovers, budding cooks, cookery students, professionals and brands, through which they can share their love for food and interact in a more personalized way. This app is about cooking and stimulating your senses visually as it harnesses the power of images to tell the story and discourages wordy descriptions.

Malwine and Victor have worked in advertising for over ten years, leading the strategy and creative direction of Spanish and international brands and other partner Iván Icra, a chef with 20 years’ experience in haute cuisine, has brought the professional vision of the user experience to the project.

Since it was launched in August 2013, chefs and foodies from 130 countries have created over 12,000 photo recipes on Cookbooth, with a network that includes over 10,000 chefs worldwide. The App has had over 220K downloads in just 6 months and has been number 1 in downloads in the Food and Drink category in 82 countries.

The appetizing Barcelona startup has announced that it aims to become a benchmark-cooking platform and that it intends to bring in all the talent needed to help the company grow. The founders explain that this is only the start of big things for Cookbooth, which will be launching “new features that will help you every day in the kitchen” in future versions.

If you love cooking, taking pictures and sharing your recipes with the world then this is the app for you.