MacGourmet

I got MacGourmet as part of a bundle (Dec 2008) and it's become one of my favorite apps. I'm boosting recipes from everywhere to add to my repertoire and creating a family recipe collection so we don't fight about what goes in Bubbie's Brisket. This morning I downloaded and started playing with Pantry, a free app to track what's in your kitchen, create shopping lists, sync to the cloud and there's an iPhone app you can buy for 2.00 to download lists to your phone. I'm not going to keep it, but I can see some potential there, it's just missing some deal breaking features and it feels like a work in progress. I've also found a website: supercook.com where you create an account, add in the stuff in your pantry and it will find recipes based on those ingredients. Excellently cool, but you can bog it down by adding too much stuff like too many kinds of cheese, too many spices and condiments. You have to remove items to winnow down the results. It works best with just a basic set of items. And you can get some bizarre results: based on my ingredients, I searched for a first course and dog bones appeared as #1 in the results followed by butterscotch filling. Now anyone with any common sense knows butterscotch filling is a main course and dog bones go with the after-dinner liquors. I mean, really! Anyone see where I'm going? I have a dream. The absolute all-time, full-on, crazy cool cooking app in the entire known universe! Step 1: Food: Add in the stuff you have (ooh, with a barcode scanner that uses your iSight camera and connects to an all-knowing database in the sky, I have a dream.) Expiration dates a must. (If I believe in it, the baking powder will work on the sheer force of my will! Wait, those raisins are HOW old?) I'll add dates myself, I'm not a total slacker. Step 2: Recipes: Add your own or grab off the web. (Done. It's called MacGourmet. Dreams can come true.) Step 3: Use Step 1 with Step 2 to find recipes you do have that use the ingredients you already have or (wait, it gets better) Step 4: Search for recipes you don't have with the ingredients you do. (Galactically cool.) Step 5: Shopping lists. Two kinds: What I need to restock from Step 1 because I'm running out and/or What I need to make recipes from Step 3 or Step 4. (That's it, I can die happy.) Who's with me? Anyway, thanks to: Apple for the laptop and MacGourmet Deluxe 1.2 or MacGourmet 2.4 with Nutrition 1.3.0 Cookbook 1.1.0 Meal Plan 1.1.0 or whatever goofy nomenclature the developers use for letting me dream. And no, I'm not sharing Bubbie's Brisket recipe.

Functional for its purpose, but Adware which verges on Malware. Check your firewall. Simply launching the program when connected to the internet will immediately connect the user to close on 100 (yes ONE HUNDRED) monetising advertising, tagging and tracking servers. A sample of the first 15: exelator.com scanscout.com dynamicyield.com mathtag.com infolinks.com mediavoice.com viglink.com saymedia.com hotjar.com content.ad crwdcntrl.net supert.ag kargo.com eyeviewads.com gwallet.com I suggest anyone considering using this software install LittleSnitch, HandsOff, or something similar (or have some who knows what they are doing do it for you), and block those puppies. I paid for a product. To database my recipes. I did not pay for Mariner Software to be renting me out as a live product to four score and more advertisers, taggers and trackers every time I go online. Simply disgusting Mariner Software.

Pretty much what you expect from Mariner - average but workable software. It does the job but pretty artlessly. Weird UI. Why does text show up in two windows when you enter it? Why is text teeny-tiny for editing with no choices for larger text entry? Why the repeated categories? It does the job, which is what expected. It doesn't do it with finesse, which I also expected.

Pretty much what you expect from Mariner - average but workable software. It does the job but pretty artlessly. Weird UI. Why does text show up in two windows when you enter it? Why is text teeny-tiny for editing with no choices for larger text entry? Why the repeated categories? It does the job, which is what expected. It doesn't do it with finesse, which I also expected.

terrible- would give it zero stars if I could. The company I would also give zero stars. I have been raving about the old version of this product for years until I was forced to "upgrade" due to the old version no longer being supported. Now my shopping lists no longer sync. Customer service is absolutely non existent and tech support no longer responds to calls or emails since they can't figure out the problem. As far as I'm concerned it is theft for them to take money for something that doesn't work. Of course you can't reach anyone at the company to even try to get your money back. I'm so disappointed as this program was like my right hand to me. I was constantly using it and have spent thousands of hours creating the database. I have been promoting this product for years and this is the treatment I get.

I admit to not being an advanced user of MacGourmet. But for my uses it has proven itself to be a handy little app. Options for adding receipes is quite complete, and the process very slick. Changing units and scaling (to create more/less servings) painless also. I've also used exported recipes to share with friends and that has worked as expected. Solid app for my (non-expert) uses.