CookiX

Well, I felt bad for this little, unreviewed, program. There are so many recipe managers on the Mac now that it's hard for a new program to work its way in. Upon downloading I began to wonder if the reason it hadn't been tried was the French language in the installer. I speak French, so I soldiered on through the install. Finally, I was ready to put the program through its paces, and it stopped me with a license page. I thought this program was free? Oh, it is - the license is free - but there are hoops through which one must jump in order to register it. Having applied for a license, I found that the program allowed me to continue, though the initial screen didn't indicate a "demo" mode. The program is completely in French. (I suppose there might be some other, non-English, localisations). It is very simple, especially compared to its commercial competition, like MacGourmet. You can easily enter a recipe, but it doesn't track the ingredients separately, nor is there any provision for scaling the recipe. There is a simple interface for indicating the cost of a meal, but it is very imprecise. There is also an indicator of the relative difficulty of a meal. In short, the program is very simple to the point of barrenness, the registration process is confusing and slow, and some of the main features I expect in a recipe/cooking program are missing. To whom would I recommend this program? Well, there is a sample cookbook included that contains 29 recipes from France. If you are interested in French cuisine and speak enough French to make the program function, access to 29 recipes might be worth the frustration of the interface. And, it's free.

Well, I felt bad for this little, unreviewed, program. There are so many recipe managers on the Mac now that it's hard for a new program to work its way in. Upon downloading I began to wonder if the reason it hadn't been tried was the French language in the installer. I speak French, so I soldiered on through the install. Finally, I was ready to put the program through its paces, and it stopped me with a license page. I thought this program was free? Oh, it is - the license is free - but there are hoops through which one must jump in order to register it. Having applied for a license, I found that the program allowed me to continue, though the initial screen didn't indicate a "demo" mode. The program is completely in French. (I suppose there might be some other, non-English, localisations). It is very simple, especially compared to its commercial competition, like MacGourmet. You can easily enter a recipe, but it doesn't track the ingredients separately, nor is there any provision for scaling the recipe. There is a simple interface for indicating the cost of a meal, but it is very imprecise. There is also an indicator of the relative difficulty of a meal. In short, the program is very simple to the point of barrenness, the registration process is confusing and slow, and some of the main features I expect in a recipe/cooking program are missing. To whom would I recommend this program? Well, there is a sample cookbook included that contains 29 recipes from France. If you are interested in French cuisine and speak enough French to make the program function, access to 29 recipes might be worth the frustration of the interface. And, it's free.