Inspiration
Our inspiration came from our team member Zara, an international student who had some milk in her fridge that was about to expire. That very same day, she was missing her favorite childhood dishes and wished she could eat her mom's home cooked meals. She suddenly realized she also had some chicken thighs laying around and decided to combine the two items to make her favorite creamy malai (milk) chicken. After hearing about this story the next day, we decided to create a recipe generator for everyone to seek comfort in food and not waste precious ingredients.
What it does
This website will take in a list of ingredients given from a user and will generate a list of custom recipes depending on the user's cooking experience and preferences. There is a bonus feature of a chat bot that will assist the user throughout the cooking process to ensure their food is tasty.
How we built it
We built the website using a ReactJS framework along with HTML\CSS\JavaScript for the static web content. For the chatbot, we implemented Microsoft Azure's Open AI, specifically ChatGPT 3.5. As for the recipe generation function, we implemented a Spoonacular API to give a list of recipes from a list of ingredients. Finally, all development operations were possible with the help of Microsoft Azure services for continuous integration and continuous deployment. As a additional element, we would add a public SSL Certificate, which can also be found through Microsoft Azure.
Challenges we ran into
Throughout the project, the team encountered version control conflicts while trying to collaborate on code. However, through constant constant team communication and resources found on the internet, we were able to resolve any issues.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
Overall, we were proud of our collaboration skills and group synergy to complete tasks to achieve a common goal. We self-delegated tasks and used every member's unique skillset to contribute to the overall idea.
What we learned
We had the opportunity to explore a wide variety of Microsoft Azure services offered under the Azure Student Development Pack. Also, we were able to develop our skillset in Frameworks such as ExpressJS and ReactJS. Finally, we were able to learn about professional deployment and networking practices.
What's next for PantryPal
For our production grade website, we plan to improve the UI/UX to meet WCHG 2.0 standards and create an account profile option for users to save favorite recipes and commonly used ingredients. Finally, we wish create a custom API for generating the recipes to fully customize the training model and add more functionalities to the website.
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