You often hear people say, “There’s an app for that.” Among the zillion web applications for iPhones and similar devices, we now have one by a local food blogger.
Rebecca Subbiah has been writing her Chow and Chatter blog for about two years. Last month, she introduced an app for her blog recipes that can be used on the iPhone, iPad or iTouch.
“A lot of people develop cookbooks. But I love technology. I thought it would be fun to share my recipes this way,” Subbiah said.
Subbiah, a native of Britain, is a registered dietitian who quit working about two years ago when her daughter, Jasmine, was born.
“That’s how the whole blogging thing came about. Looking after Jasmine gave me more time to think creatively,” she said. “When you go to work full time and you’re busy, busy, busy, you don’t get the down time when you can think outside the box. This has been a gift for me.”
Her blog, at www.chowandchatter.com, started out with a lot of nutrition tips, but quickly morphed into a recipe site because, like most dietitians, Subbiah loves to cook. Most of the recipes are healthy.
Her blog gets about 11,000 page views a month. She is active on Facebook, where she has about 400 friends, and on Twitter, where she has about 3,400 followers.
In expanding into the world of apps, Subbiah hooked up with Daniel Sloan of Marion, Montgomery, Inc., a marketing and public relations company in Austin, Texas. They do a lot of interactive web development.
Most applications are developed for large companies. “This was Daniel’s first time doing a small app for an individual, and his first time doing a recipe app,” Subbiah said.
Her app has about 80 recipes taken from her blog.
Users can search by dish, ingredient or cuisine.
“There are 19 different cuisines,” said Subbiah, who has learned to love a lot of ethnic foods through her travels.
Recipes include Thai-inspired noodles, fisherman’s pie and sausage and enoki–mushroom risotto.
Favorite types of cuisine include Indian, in part because Subbiah’s husband is from India. She also loves Italian and Vietnamese food. “But they’re all good. It just depends on your mood,” she said.
Users also can e-mail recipes from the app to family or friends.
The app, available at the iTunes store online, costs 99 cents to download.
Subbiah can also update it to add recipes. Since the app went on sale Nov. 4, she has sold 146 downloads to people in 12 different countries.
Even though it’s a small app, it cost Subbiah about $3,000.
“I went into it being realistic. I saved up for it, and I knew it would probably take a couple of years to get my money back.”
The app got a positive review on appadvice.com, which called it “an easy to use, no-nonsense food app.” And customer reviews at the iTunes store online average above four stars out of five.
Subbiah is just happy to have found a creative outlet as a young mother, doing something she loves. “I’m a very sharing person. I love to share my knowledge,” she said.
“I just wanted to help the average person with healthy, simple recipes.”
mhastings@wsjournal.com
727-7394
Email
Facebook
Google
Twitter
Favorites
More
Advertisement