Site Description
According to their about us section their service is as follows (selected paragraphs):
"The site caters for the novice cook, with instructions on basic cooking methods and advice on essential items of equipment. It shows you how to eat a varied diet and to make the best use of foods in season.
Our features and articles are written by experts - who have experience, or a particular interest in this area."
Similarities and Differences in Concepts
Essentially the concept that I am proposing follows the same ambition of catering for the 'novice cook' in the sense that there will be no pre-requisites - there is no minimum or maximum level of knowledge needed. Where my idea differs however is in the educational side of things. There will not be lessons on how to cook or how to act in certain ways, there will just be the methods described in the recipes to inform the user how each meal is made and not cooking lessons as a whole.
The seasonal aspect of studentcook.co.uk is a real strength as knowing what is in season is an ideal piece of knowledge for students as this produce is cheaper than when it is not in season. This is certainly an aspect which could be applied to my project. Although they advertise this feature in their 'about us', searching through the site did not lead me to any significant indication that they were actually offering the service. Recipes failed to explain which of the ingredients were in season and the closest to a seasonal produce education was via their 'summer salads' and 'winter salads' sections.
Another difference between the two concepts is that studentcook.co.uk state that their recipes are "written by experts" - this is the opposite of what I am trying to achieve, it will be student generated using ingredients students are familiar with, not professional chefs preaching that we use expensive or unavailable ingredients.
Overall the website gives the impression of being a school lesson in food rather than a quick, easy to use student recipe website. There is a lot of content here and the majority of it is descriptive and lacking any true purpose. For example, on the 'cooking beef' page there is this introductory paragraph which generally serves no purpose:
"Beef is pretty simple to cook really and indeed, a good cut should only need the minimum intervention in terms of flavourings and seasonings as the meat should speak for itself. If you're more used to eating beef than actually cooking it then maybe it's time you tried out some simple techniques for yourself. From choosing your cut to feeling your taste buds tingle as the meat sizzles on the grill, it's a very satisfying experience. Below you'll find some classic ways to cook beef - all very straightforward."
This is definitely an issue that I will look to rectify as my project progresses - keep words used down to a minimum and simply illustrate the point without using superfluous language.
Structural Layout
There is a lot of pages on this site and this is supplemented with a huge navigational structure. Every link on the left hand navigation (apart from "Readers Comments") has a secondary menu. The navigation has been named effectively and the secondary navigation does often lead on from the keyword used initially. For example the first layer of navigation has a tab called "How To Cook..." which leads onto the second layer with pages such as "How To Cook Eggs" or "How To Cook Fish". Although this is useful for the average user I do have suspicions of how this would affect users who are using the site with a screen reader. Would the link "How To Cook..." bear any significance out of the context of a secondary visual aid (the second tier of navigation)?
In saying this however, there is a "Sitemap" with every link organised into its first and second layer. This would be very useful for screen reader users - even if there is a huge list of links to be read out.
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