Guides
AI recipe tests, recipe fixes, and iPhone app comparisons
We build Sous Chef, an iPhone app that edits the recipe itself instead of just filing it away. That gives us an opinion, so these guides say plainly where another app is the better buy. Capability and pricing claims link to the maker's own site, and each page carries the date we last checked it.
-
Comparison
The best recipe organizer apps for iPhone in 2026
Paprika is the best recipe manager for most iPhone users: $4.99 once, offline, aisle-sorted grocery lists. Recipe Keeper, Crouton, Pestle, Mela and Sous Chef compared.
-
Comparison
The best Paprika alternatives for iPhone
Paprika 4's premium features will need a subscription. Alternatives: AnyList ($14.99/yr household), Recipe Keeper ($19.99 once), Mela ($6.99 once) and more.
-
Comparison
Sous Chef vs. Recipe Keeper — which kind of recipe app do you need?
Recipe Keeper ($19.99 one-time Pro on iPhone) plans meals, sorts lists by aisle and syncs to Android and Windows. Sous Chef, free to try, rewrites one recipe on request.
-
How-to
How to import a recipe from a website on iPhone
Share from Safari, paste the link, or paste the text, step by step. Plus why some recipe pages won't import (paywalls, roundups, no recipe data) and the fix for each.
-
How-to
How to scale a recipe up or down without ruining it
Multiplying the ingredient list is the easy part of scaling a recipe. Pan size, cooking time, salt, and leaveners don't move in a straight line with it.
-
How-to
Cups to grams and °F to °C — how to convert a whole recipe
Per King Arthur's weight chart, 1 cup is 120g flour, 200g sugar, 227g butter, 113g powdered sugar, 340g honey. And 350°F is 175–180°C, or 160°C in a fan oven.
-
Explainer
How to substitute an ingredient without breaking the recipe
A substitution chart tells you what to use instead. It never tells you the quantity, or the step two lines down that stops making sense.
-
How-to
How to make a recipe vegetarian without rewriting it yourself
Most dishes convert well, some become a different (still good) dish, and a few just get replaced. How to identify what the meat was doing and replace it.
-
Comparison
The best AI recipe apps and cooking assistants for iPhone
AI recipe apps for iPhone do five different jobs. DishGen, CookSage, Crouton, Pestle, Mise and Sous Chef compared: generators, pantry apps, organizers and recipe editors.
-
Explainer
Are ChatGPT recipes any good? How to check, fix, and cook them
Sometimes. ChatGPT recipes work for adapting a technique you know; baking ratios, canning and safe temps need checking (USDA: poultry 165°F). 6 checks before you cook.
-
Explainer
ChatGPT vs. Claude vs. Gemini for recipes: five real tests
Same 5 prompts to GPT-5.4, Claude Sonnet 5 and Gemini 3.7 Flash: all hit 165°F chicken and 2.5x scaling; GPT contradicted itself on chickpeas, Claude omitted a bake temp.
-
How-to
Can ChatGPT scale a recipe correctly? We tested GPT-5.4
Mostly. Scaling 4 to 10 servings (2.5x), GPT-5.4 got the rice, water and spices right and chose a bigger pot, but gave 1kg and 600g drained chickpeas on one line.
-
Explainer
Can ChatGPT write baking recipes? Three AI muffin formulas compared
Plausibly, but check them: GPT-5.4, Claude Sonnet 5 and Gemini 3.7 Flash wrote 12 muffins with 75–115g butter vs King Arthur's tested 57g. Six checks before you bake.
-
Explainer
Can ChatGPT substitute ingredients? How to check the amount and the steps it changes
ChatGPT's swaps are a fine first idea. Check its amount against a sourced ratio, and use our table of which recipe step each common swap has to rewrite.
-
Explainer
Can ChatGPT make a recipe from a photo of your fridge?
Yes, but OpenAI warns image descriptions can be wrong and counts approximate. Ask for an inventory first, confirm it in text, add pantry staples, then ask for one recipe.
-
Explainer
Can AI detect a bad recipe? What ChatGPT can catch—and miss
The 8 recipe errors AI is good at catching, the ones it can't judge, what 3 models found in a deliberately broken recipe, and an audit prompt you can paste in.
-
How-to
The best ChatGPT prompts for adapting a recipe you already trust
10 copy-paste ChatGPT prompts to scale, substitute, convert cups to grams or go dairy-free. Paste the full recipe, ask for one change, and require a complete method back.
-
How-to
How to save ChatGPT recipes on iPhone, and what to fix before you save one
Notes, screenshots, shared links or a recipe app: where to keep a ChatGPT recipe on iPhone, and the chat-only lines like 'same as above' to fix before saving.
-
How-to
Does cooking time change when you double a recipe?
Doubling cookies, cake, bread, lasagna, soup, sauce, roast veg or meat? When to start checking each one, what changes the time, and the cue that tells you it's done.
-
How-to
How to halve a recipe with one egg — and other awkward amounts
Two ways to split one egg (with a scale or with measuring spoons), plus a halving chart for 3 eggs, 1/3 cup, 3/4 tsp, cans and pans, and a worked half batch.
-
Comparison
The best iPhone apps for saving TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram recipes
Pestle, Mela, ReciMe, Deglaze, Recipe Keeper, and Sous Chef compared on what they actually pull out of a cooking video — and what you still have to check.
-
Comparison
The best recipe scaling apps for iPhone, and what each one actually scales
Eight iPhone apps that scale recipes, checked against their App Store listings in Oct 2026. Which multiply numbers, which handle units, and which change the steps.
-
Comparison
The best free recipe apps for iPhone, and what "free" actually includes
Pestle keeps 15 recipes free, AnyList imports 5, Paprika costs $4.99 up front. What eleven iPhone recipe apps include on their free tier, checked Oct 2026.
-
Comparison
The best recipe apps for dietary restrictions, and which ones can adapt your own recipe
To find recipes by diet: Samsung Food (14 diets, free) or Tasty. To adapt your own: Crouton or Sous Chef. Fig scans labels. Vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free compared.
-
Comparison
The best recipe apps with a hands-free cooking mode (iPhone, 2026)
Crouton (hands-free mode, thumb gestures) and Mise (voice guidance) clearly describe touch-free step control. Paprika, Mela, Recipe Keeper and Sous Chef compared.
-
Comparison
Which recipe apps actually work with ChatGPT and Claude?
Only 5 recipe services publish a ChatGPT or Claude connector: Sous Chef, Deglaze, Cooking with Robots, Love & Lemons (Claude) and Instacart. Paprika and Pestle state none.
-
Comparison
The best recipe apps for cooking for one or two
Most recipes serve 4 to 6. Which iPhone apps scale down cleanly, handle half an egg or half a can, and help with leftovers, checked Oct 2026.
-
Comparison
Sous Chef vs. Paprika — organize a week of recipes, or change the one you're cooking?
Paprika wins on meal planning, grocery lists, desktop apps, and a one-time price. Sous Chef wins on editing a recipe's ingredients and steps together. Here's the split.
-
Comparison
Paprika vs. Recipe Keeper — which recipe organizer should you buy in 2026?
Paprika vs. Recipe Keeper, checked Oct 2026: prices per platform ($4.99 vs $19.99 on iPhone), photo scanning, nutrition, meal plans, and who each fits.
-
Comparison
The best Recipe Keeper alternatives for iPhone (2026)
Leaving Recipe Keeper? Paprika is $4.99 on iPhone, AnyList covers a household for $14.99/yr, and Crouton, Pestle, Mela, and Sous Chef each fix something else.
-
How-to
Does baking time change when you halve a recipe?
A half batch rarely bakes in half the time. Check cookies at the original time, cakes and bars early, and small loaves by temperature, with a pan-by-pan table.
-
How-to
How to double a cake recipe, and which pans fit the doubled batter
Doubling a cake? A grid of 21 pan setups for 2x batter with depth vs. the original (9x13, three layers, 12-inch), plus which cakes to mix as two batches.
-
How-to
How to convert a recipe for a different pan size (inch and cm multiplier grids)
Pan area and volume chart with ready-made multiplier grids for US pans (8-inch to 9x13) and metric tins (18 to 25 cm, 20x30 cm), plus batter-depth math.
-
How-to
Do you double spices when doubling a recipe?
Mostly yes, by the math, but hold back the to-taste items. What to scale exactly (baking soda, bread salt) and what to hold at about 75% (chili, cayenne, finishing salt).
-
How-to
Can you double a bread recipe? Yeast, salt, kneading, and two loaves
Yes. Double every ingredient by weight, yeast and salt too (2 1/4 tsp yeast becomes 4 1/2 tsp). Keep the oven temp, bake two loaves, judge rises by size.
-
How-to
How to triple a recipe: a fractions chart, unit roll-ups, and the limits math won't fix
1/3 cup x 3 = 1 cup, 2 tbsp x 3 = 1/4 cup + 2 tbsp: a full tripling chart, plus when to cook in three batches instead of one giant pot.
-
How-to
Cups to grams chart for baking — 50+ common ingredients, checked against King Arthur
1 cup flour = 120g, sugar = 198g, butter = 227g, brown sugar = 213g. A printable cups-to-grams chart for 50+ baking ingredients, checked against King Arthur.
-
Explainer
Can ChatGPT convert a recipe to metric? We tested GPT-6 Astra against King Arthur's chart
GPT-6 Astra converted a US blondie recipe to grams, °C, and cm with 9 of 10 weights matching King Arthur's chart. Here's what it got wrong and how to check.
-
Explainer
Can ChatGPT make a recipe dairy-free? We tested GPT-6 Astra on mac and cheese
GPT-6 Astra swapped all 8 dairy uses in a mac and cheese and flagged whey and casein, but missed the new allergens its swaps bring. Here's the full audit.
-
How-to
How to turn a TikTok recipe into a written recipe you can actually cook
Where a TikTok hides the amounts (caption, screen, voiceover, bio link), a fill-in recipe template, and how to safely fill a missing temperature, pan size or quantity.
-
How-to
How do I save a recipe from TikTok?
TikTok's Favorites saves the video, not the recipe. Here's how to bookmark it, how to get it written down, and how to import a TikTok link straight into Sous Chef.
-
How-to
How do I save a recipe from a YouTube video?
Watch Later and playlists save the video. Here's how to get the recipe itself out of a YouTube video or Short, by hand or by importing the link into Sous Chef.
-
Explainer
What happens to a saved TikTok recipe if the video gets deleted?
A TikTok favorite is a bookmark to someone else's post, so a deleted or private video disappears from your saves. Here's how to keep the recipe for good.
-
How-to
How do I organize all the recipes I've saved on TikTok?
Hundreds of saved TikToks and no way to find the one you want? Use collections for triage, then move the recipes you cook into a searchable recipe library.
-
How-to
The TikTok recipe has no measurements. How do I figure out the amounts?
Most "missing" TikTok amounts are on screen or spoken, not absent. Here's where to look, how to estimate the rest safely, and how Sous Chef labels its estimates.
-
How-to
How do I get the recipe from a YouTube video without watching the whole thing?
Where the amounts hide in a cooking video (description, transcript, on-screen text), how to pull them out in a couple of minutes, and a hands-off route for short videos.
-
Explainer
What's the best way to save recipes from TikTok and YouTube?
In-app bookmarks, screenshots, Notes, Pinterest, or a recipe app? Five ways to save video recipes compared on what survives, what's searchable, and what you can cook from.
-
How-to
How to change a TikTok recipe, and the shortcut ingredients to check first
Halving a TikTok recipe or making it dairy-free, vegetarian or gluten-free? The facts videos skip, and a label checklist for the jars and sauces they use as shortcuts.
-
How-to
Why won't my TikTok or YouTube recipe import?
Private videos, videos over ten minutes, Instagram links, and videos with no actual recipe are the usual reasons. Here's what each message in Sous Chef means and what to do.
-
Explainer
Is it okay to save and share recipes from TikTok and YouTube?
Saving a recipe to cook at home is normal; reposting a creator's video or text is different. What US copyright covers in a recipe, and how to credit creators.