By Jessica Silldorff
We started 2015 off with an update to EatFresh.org that included a couple of brand new features: comments on recipes and recipes with step-by-step photo directions.
Comments on Recipes
We always intended on EatFresh.org being a place where people could share ideas and thoughts about healthy eating and living in addition to being a resource for nutrition education. When the website launched in 2013, we included forums on the Community page where we hoped users would start conversations and share “bright spots” with others around the globe. For one reason or another, the forums never took off, so we decided to remove them from the website. We soon learned through user testing, however, that our users did want to have a place to record their input; we had just put that feature in the wrong place. Over the p
ast year, we have had many requests for comments on recipes, and we have now fulfilled that request! By allowing comments on recipes, anyone can share their tips and tricks for a recipe that they tried or let us know if it wasn’t their favorite. This feedback will better inform our future additions of recipes to EatFresh.org, and hopefully encourage more healthy home cooking.
Step-by-Step Photo Directions
Some cooking techniques are better shown through a photograph than described through words, so we created another format for recipes that need a little extra “explanation”. On select recipes, each step in the directions will include a photograph that demonstrates the step being described. Kale Salad with Nuts and Seasonal Fruits from the Leah’s Pantry Tenderloin Cooking School Cookbook is an example of this format. Not only will this help guide users through a recipe, but it will also help alleviate language barriers. Over the next couple of months, we will be adding direction photos to several recipes and a filter in Advanced Search to easily find recipes in this format.