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What’s for Dinner?
The menu card displays the most current menu available. If you have internet or cellular connectivity, the most recent menu will be downloaded and displayed here. If you aren’t connected, the most current menu you have stored will be displayed. If you want to look at the menu, simply touch the menu’s title.
My Recipe Box
Selecting this button will take you to a screen that displays any recipes you have saved to your Recipe Box.
Browse
Selecting this button will take you to a screen which displays all menus for the month. The Browse screen allows you to ‘page’ through the months, forward or backward via the Up and Down arrows.
Search
This is a powerful seach screen that provides for up to five individual searches, and one ‘composite’ search. The number of menus that satisfy each individual search will be displayed in a button on the right. Selecting that button will display those individual search menus. Menus that satisfy all of your criteria can be displayed by selecting the Show Menus button.
Season
We encourage eating seasonally fresh foods. To help find menus that were added in a particular calendar season, simply select the season here. (See the ‘In Season’ section for an alternative approach.)
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Food Group
You can narrow the search to one of the following food groups
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Ingredients1-3
When you select one of these fields, a list of common ingredients is displayed, as well as a keyboard. But don’t be misled by the word ‘Ingredient’. You can actually type in any word here; it doesn’t have to be displayed on the list. We will search for the term in all of the menus’ list of ingredients, and the menus’ titles, also. Perhaps you remember seeing a menu that had the word ‘Braised’ in the title. You can look for that here. By the way, the search terms are not case-sensitive. Here’s another couple of tips:
● Use singular instead of plural forms of ingredients. You’ll note that many of the common ingredients we display use the singular form. That’s because menus that call for strong-flavored ingredients may only want one of them. A menu may specify ‘1 lime’ in the ingredient list. You would miss that menu if you searched for ‘limes‘.
● Sometimes adding a space to the end of your search term can make a difference. This is especially true if the term you’re looking for was in the menu’s title. The term ‘Ham’ will return menus that have the word ‘Hamburger’ in the title or the ingredients. The term ‘Ham ‘ (with a space at the end) would omit them.
Show Menus
Menus that satisfy all of your criteria can be displayed by selecting the Show Menus button.
My Lists
Use this screen when you’re in the grocery store. This screen displays all of the menus you want to shop for. (You can add a menu to this list from the ‘Menu’ screen.) Selecting a menu from this screen will bring up that menu’s Shopping List. Simply check off the ingredient when you’ve got it.
Note that this screen supports ‘autoscroll’. As you check off an item, autoscroll will scroll to the next unchecked item. When you check off the last item in the list, autoscroll will look for any item that is unchecked, and take you to that item. You can turn autoscroll on or off using the ‘My Shopping Lists’ switch on the ‘More’ screen.
In Season
For all of the “locavores” out there, this one’s for you. The two spinners relate to ‘Where’ and ‘When’. Select ‘Find Me’ and ‘Today’, and we’ll get your GPS location and display what’s in season right now in your state. Going to visit your parents in a month and want to cook for them? No problem. Just select their state and the month of your visit to find out what produce will be in season.
When the list of produce is displayed, you can select up to three ingredients that you want to use. When you’ve selected your ingredients, you can go to the ‘Search’ screen. Your selected ingredients have already been added, and the search results are ready to view!
Note that in order for the ‘Find Me’ feature to work, you have to allow the application access to ‘Location Services’. You control this by going to the iPhone’s General Settings, and selecting ‘Location Services’. Then scroll down to the ‘No Take Out’ entry and set the toggle switch to ‘On’.
More
Here’s where you control the application. There’s a toggle switch for every screen that supports autoscroll. You can turn the feature on or off for each screen. (You can also set these switches from outside the application by going to the iPhone’s ‘Settings’, and then scroll down to the ‘No Take Out’ entry.)
If you want to send us an email with a question, a suggestion, or to report a problem, you can do that from this screen, also.
Let’s be honest. Programs have bugs. We’ve tested the app extensively, but sometimes stuff happens. If your app has problems, you can ‘Reset Back to Install’ from this screen. This will erase everything that’s been downloaded and put the app in its initial state. Now make sure you have a good internet connection, and relaunch the app (or go to the Home screen). The app will download all menus and pictures again. Note that this reset will clear out your ‘Recipe Box’ and ‘My Lists’.
Menu
This is what it’s all about. It’s why you installed the app. You want to cook a meal, and these screens will make it easy. But before we look at the screens, notice the little button on the top-right corner. It has an arrow shooting out of a box. This is an ‘Action’ button. It allows you to add/remove the menu to your ‘Recipe Box’ and master shopping list. It also allows you to email the menu’s synopsis and a hyperlink.
Overview
More than just a pretty picture, this view shows you the time it will take to make the meal, the number of people it will serve, and even makes suggestions for wine and dessert .
Shopping
This is the shopping list for the menu. When you select an item from the list, it will be checked off. You can ‘uncheck’ it by selecting it again. This screen supports the ‘autoscroll’ feature. By the way, if you make this menu frequently, you probably don’t want to have to ‘uncheck’ all of the items before you start shopping. Simply shake the iPhone (similar to an Etch-A-Sketch®) to erase all the checks. Be careful! Don’t let the phone fly out of your hand.
Pantry/Tools
This view lists the common items you’ll need from your pantry, and the cooking harware you’ll use. The functionality is the same as the Shopping list screen. You can check and uncheck items, and shake the device to erase all checks. This view also supports the ‘autoscroll’ feature.
Game Plan
This view will walk you through making the meal, from the moment you walk in the door, through the preparation and cooking steps, to putting the meal on the table. As you complete each step, simply select the step to cross it off the list. (Of course you can ‘uncross-it-off’ by selecting it again.) And yes, this screen supports ‘autoscroll’ and ’shake-to-erase’.
The Game Plan also supports our Smart Timer technology. If a timer is detected in a specific step, a light gray timer icon is displayed on the right. Simply touch the icon and a preset timer will appear. And we didn’t forget all of our friends that live at higher altitudes. You can adjust the time up (or down) before you start it. Of course you have full control of pausing, resetting or deleting any specific timer. And we allow multiple timers in each step. And we display the time remaining within the step’s instruction so that you don’t have to access a different screen to find out how much time is remaining. We even allow you to have a ‘warning’ before the timer alarm goes off (e.g., “A timer completes in 30 seconds.”).
Cooking Mode
If you want to make it even easier to use in the kitchen, turn the device sideways 90 degrees, and you’ll see a landscape view that shows one step at a time. This is our Cooking Mode, and we seriously pull out all the stops to make it as easy as possible for you. Everything is in the largest possible font so you can see it from anywhere in the kitchen. Each step displayed will have Right and Left Arrow buttons for stepping forward or backward thru the Game Plan. And if a timer is detected in the step, there will be a Timer button in the middle of the screen. And we preserve your battery by going to a black screen with white font. (Yawn.)
Did we mention that we also have Voice Control starting in version 1.0.3? Yeah, we thought that might get your attention. Any button you see in Cooking Mode can be controlled by a voice command: “Right Arrow”, “Left Arrow”, “Start Cooking”, “Timer”, etc. Of course all of the Timer buttons can be controlled, also: “Add 5 Minutes”, “Minus 30 Seconds”, “Start”, “Pause”, etc. (Our tech staff wanted to change the name from ‘Cooking Mode’ to ‘Look Ma, No Hands!’ mode.) Seriously, we pulled out all the stops.
Voice Control FAQ
Q: Why would I use Voice Control instead of just touching the screen?
A: Two situations where you may not want to touch the screen:
● Your hands have gook all over them (you are cooking), and you don’t want to mess up the screen.
● Your hands are clean (because you washed them before handling food, right?), but you’re not sure how clean the screen is. (Now that you think about it, didn’t you see your youngest playing a game on your iPad just before you started dinner? And you know there’s no telling where those little hands have been!)
Q: When can I use Voice Control in the app?
A: Voice Control (VC) is available for a specific menu’s Game Plan when you rotate your iPhone/iPad to Landscape mode.
Q: Should I care about where the microphone is?
A: Yes. The microphone is on the lower-left when the device is in Portrait mode. When you rotate to Landscape, rotate either left or right so that the microphone isn’t blocked, and is generally facing where you’ll be speaking from.
Q: What’s with the stoplights in the upper corners?
A: These let you know what’s happening with Voice Control.
Red: Voice Control is unavailable. This happens when an audible timer alert is sounded (e.g., “A timer completes in 15 seconds”).
Yellow: Voice Control is calibrating the background noise. Calibration occurs when you rotate to Landscape mode, and after a timer alert has finished.
Green: Voice Control is ready and waiting for you to say a command. (Tip: If you say a command and the Green light stays on, you need to speak louder.)
No Lights: Voice Control is actively trying to understand what you’re saying.
Think of Voice Control as a student at school. (Red Light) When the school bell rings, VC heads to class. (Yellow Light) All the students noisily walk into the class and take their seats. (Green Light) Voice Control is in class, but daydreaming. (No Lights) The teacher gets Voice Control’s attention, and VC tries to understand the teacher’s instruction.
Q: Can I have the TV or radio playing in the background?
A: Sure. When Voice Control calibrates, it’s actually checking the background noise level. After calibrating, you just need to speak louder than the background noise. That said, background noise can increase the recognition time and/or diminish the recognition accuracy. But don’t let that rule your life. Have a conversation…listen to some good tunes while you cook. It’s a kitchen, not a library.
Q: What commands can I say?
A: Just say the title of any button you see. For example, “Start cooking”, or “Minus 30 Seconds”. (Refer to “Full List of Commands” below.)
Q: Do I need to say the whole title?
A: For most buttons, yes. But for adding or subtracting time to a timer you may omit the words “minutes” and “seconds”. (e.g., “Plus 1″ instead of “Plus 1 Minute”). Try the shorter version of the times first and, if Voice Control doesn’t respond, use the full title.
Q: What about buttons that have a picture instead of a title?
A: There are three buttons on the landscape view that don’t have a title: the Left & Right Arrow buttons, and the Timer button. They will respond to the following:
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Q: Do I need to speak slower, or enunciate words carefully?
A: No. We assume you’re busy and you have your hands full, so we’ve calibrated Voice Control to interpret 1/2 second of silence as the end of a command. It actually works better if you run the words together a bit. (Also, you can actually sing the commands, which makes for a pretty fun kitchen.)
Q: Will it understand my accent?
A: Maybe. We’ve tested with different regional US accents as well as UK accents and had varying levels of success. Try it. The worst that can happen is that it does nothing. Also, play with alternative pronunciations to find the best result. We had better results pronouncing “Exit” as “eck-sit” rather than “egg-zit”, for example.
Q: Can I create my own commands?
A: Unfortunately not.
Full List of Commands
From the Primary Screen, you can use any of the following:
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If you’ve selected “Timer” and the step has more than one, you’ll be prompted to specify which timer you want to control. Simply say one of the following:
“Number one” through “Number nine”
When a timer is displayed, you may use any of the following to adjust the time:
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When a timer is displayed, you may specify any of the following actions:
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When a timer has ended you’ll be notified with a message box and the timer beep will sound. When it has finished, Voice Control will recalibrate. When the green light appears, you can say:
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