Koba: a Cooking App For beginners
"Most people want to cook. They just don't know where to start."
What started as a pitch in my app development class grew into a six-month-long capstone project: a full app design, visual identity, packaging system, cookbook, recipe cards, and a theoretical partnership with the Oregon Food Bank.
Presented at OSU Horizons in June 2026 as part of the OSU Graphic Design Senior Showcase.
Project Overview
I love to cook, and Koba came directly from that love. I watched my friends struggle to feed themselves when they moved out on their own. The problem wasn't motivation. Most people can follow a recipe just fine. But hand them a fridge of random ingredients and ask what's for dinner, and the wheels come off.
Koba is a cooking app designed for young adults who want to cook more but feel overwhelmed by where to start. Through beginner-friendly lessons, pantry tracking, and ingredient-based recipes organized by skill level, it helps users cook with what they already have and actually understand what they're doing and why.
The long-term goal is for users to eventually outgrow the lessons of the app. Once the skills are built, they live in your head, not on your screen.
The Challenge:
The apps that exist assume you already know how to cook.
Existing cooking apps are built around recipes. They tell you what to make. They don't teach you how to think. A beginner who doesn't have one ingredient is stuck. A beginner who doesn't know what to do with what's in their fridge is also stuck. The gap isn't recipes — it's foundational knowledge, confidence, and flexible thinking.
Interview Participant
Survey Response
Teaching Chef Interview
Research:
What I found out talking to real people.
I conducted interviews with beginner cooks, experienced home cooks, and a teaching chef, ran a survey of 71 participants (84% ages 18–24), observed a friend cook a meal in real time, and did a competitive audit of four cooking apps. I also documented my own shopping and cooking habits to surface assumptions I might carry into the design.
Iterations:
User Pathway
Low Fidelity
Mid Fidelity
Koba went through a lot of sketching before it became a lot of screens. Most of the iteration happened at the concept level. I had to figure out which features were useful versus just interesting to design.
The biggest shifts came from research: what users said they needed versus what they actually did when handed an app to try.
Early Iteration:
Photography throughout, food that looked aspirational and polished. These would have been made and photographed by me!
AI-powered ingredient matching as a core feature.
Onboarding that assumed the user knew what they wanted.
These ideas evolved into more sustainable solutions →
Final Iteration:
Illustrations! Approachable, consistent, and free from the "this is too hard for me" moment that a perfect food photo can trigger.
Machine learning-based pantry logic is smarter and more realistic for actual development.
Experience-level onboarding that adapts the entire app path to where the user is.
Final Outcome: An app that's almost ready to build.
A centralized cooking app that brings lessons, pantry tracking, and ingredient-based recipes together in one place. There is no longer jumping between platforms and no assuming prior knowledge.
Pantry Tracker: Log what you have and get recipes that actually work with it.
Skill-Level Lessons: 2 recipes that teach you how to think about cooking, not just follow steps.
Experience Onboarding: The app adapts to where you are, whether you are a complete beginner or getting more confident.
Tagged Recipes: Easy, quick, cheap, uses X. Filter by what matters to the user right then and there.
Key Screens:
From the experience-level onboarding through pantry setup and into the lesson and recipe flows — designed to feel warm and low-stakes at every step.
Onboarding
Ho9me
Pantry
Image Scan
Cooking Mode
Triptych
To add:
branding set up
illustration
cook book
food bank collab
post cards
recipie cards
note pad
Mockups:
Included packaging tape, embroidery, marketing pamphlets, stationery, and clothing tags. Created a Style scape for branding guidelines.
Post Cards & Package Designs
Poster and Postcard Designs
App & Cook Book
Package Design
The Outcome:
The rebrand creates a clearer visual narrative around artist collaboration and community connection. By simplifying the system and reinforcing the spark concept, the identity feels cohesive, scalable, and aligned with the brand’s mission.
