How to use KitchenTalk
No sign-up form, no password to remember. If someone invited you, this is everything you need to get going, and a few things worth knowing once you're in.
1. Joining
Someone in your circle sends you an invite: a link or a short code like KT-XXXX, usually over WhatsApp, text, or email. There's no account to create and nothing to install first.
- Open the invite link (or go to the join page and type in the code you were sent).
- Add your name so the circle knows who's who.
- You're in: you land straight in the shared kitchen, already stocked with whatever's been added so far.
Come back later on the same device and it remembers you, no need to re-enter the code.
2. A few quick questions
The first time you're in, KitchenTalk asks a handful of short questions: the kind of kitchen this is, roughly how many people you're cooking for, any dietary preference, how you like to cook, what you want help with, and anything it should watch out for (like an allergy or a health condition). Answer honestly; it shapes the meal suggestions and how the assistant talks to you. None of it is required; you can skip and adjust later.
3. Starting your pantry
After that, you're offered a starter pack of common items so the kitchen isn't empty on day one, a shared set of staples (salt, eggs, bread, and the like) plus a cuisine pack of your choosing:
- Indian
- East Asian
- South-East Asian
- Mediterranean
- American
- Mixed / a bit of everything
Pick as many as fit your kitchen, deselect anything that doesn't apply, or skip the pack entirely and start from a blank kitchen, whatever's closer to how you actually cook.
4. The everyday shape of it
Chat is the main way in: type to it like you'd text a person who happens to know exactly what's in your fridge. Inventory is the plain list view of everything currently in the kitchen. A camera button lets you add a batch of items at once by photographing a shelf, a pantry, or a receipt instead of typing each one.
Scanning takes a few seconds: point it at a shelf with a handful of items in frame, or a receipt. What it finds goes straight into your kitchen, and you get an Added 12 items summary showing where everything landed. Anything the scan gets wrong is easy to fix by hand afterward.
5. Things worth trying in Chat
There's no fixed command list, just talk to it. A few starting points:
Meal suggestions are pulled from what's actually sitting in your kitchen, not a generic recipe database, so the more your inventory reflects reality, the better the answers get.
6. Staying on top of expiry
Items worth using soon are highlighted in the Inventory list, and a perishable that KitchenTalk can only estimate is called worth checking rather than given a made-up date, so a glance is usually enough to see what needs eating first. The notification bell in the app keeps a running list of what's about to go off, so you can check it before something goes off instead of finding out in the fridge.
7. More than one kitchen
Most Circles get by with one. If yours has a bar cart, a pantry down the hall, a freezer in the garage or a kitchen outside, each can be tracked separately: one kitchen of each kind, plus as many custom ones as you like, named whatever you name them.
KitchenTalk is free for now, with every feature already on, so there's nothing to switch on first (everything that's included). Tap your profile picture, choose Manage Circle, open the Circle section, and under Kitchens use + Add Kitchen. Pick a type, give it a name, and it appears in your kitchen switcher.
Once there are two or more, that same Circle section shows Circle inventory → Sort items across kitchens. That opens a board with every kitchen as its own column, side by side. Tick anything that's in the wrong place (as many as you like, across as many columns as you like), and one button moves the lot. If it wasn't what you meant, Undo puts every item back in the kitchen it came from. It's easiest on a laptop.
Two things worth knowing: adding a kitchen and moving things between them are the Circle owner's job, not every member's. And a kitchen that isn't shared with anyone yet can only have one.
8. Where you shop, and what happens to it
Under Manage Circle → Circle → Your shopping there's a plain summary of where your Circle buys things, and what tends to come from each place. Search any single item and you get both halves of its story: how often it's been bought and where, against what got used and what got thrown away. Anyone in the Circle can open it.
This one is young. KitchenTalk only began writing purchases down recently, so a shop or an item with nothing against it means we weren't recording yet, not that you've never bought it. It fills in as you scan.
9. What only the Circle owner can do
Every Circle has an owner, whoever set it up. Almost everything KitchenTalk is for belongs to everyone in it: scanning, chatting, asking what to cook, marking things used or wasted, adding to the shopping list, opening the shopping summary. What's the owner's alone is the settings, not the day-to-day. Under Manage Circle → Circle:
- Add a kitchen, or delete one for good. Archiving a kitchen (hiding it from the switcher, which you can undo) stays open to everyone.
- Move things between kitchens. That's the Sort items across kitchens board, and the kitchen picker on a single item, a meal out, or an appliance. Anyone can open the board and see how things are arranged; moving them is the owner's.
- Decide what the Circle won't keep. Under Preferences, Excluded from this kitchen. This is the one owner setting that changes what everybody else can do: nothing on that list can be added, by anyone, from any screen.
- Choose whether your saved family recipes are suggested before the AI's.
- End the Circle. Under Danger Zone, and it's a request that a person reviews, not something that happens the moment you tap it.
One more lives outside that screen. Renaming the Circle is on the Circle name row behind your profile picture, members see the row with a padlock and can't change it.
If you're not the owner, most of this simply isn't on your screen. KitchenTalk hides these rather than showing you a button that refuses, so a Circle you've joined looks slightly shorter than the one you started, and nothing in it is broken.
10. Planning the week, and adding your own recipes
Meal Plan is on Home. Pick a theme and how many meals a day, choose from up to three draft weeks, and tap Use this plan. Everyone in the Circle can read it and tick Ate this; the owner or a delegate changes it.
To bring in a recipe you already have, open Recipes, tap Add a recipe, and choose Paste a link (a recipe page or a YouTube video) or Voice note (a clip saved from WhatsApp or a recording, up to 15 minutes). KitchenTalk shows you the recipe to check, and nothing is saved until you say so.
These two are on the web app now and reach the iPhone and Android apps with their next update.
A few common questions
Why can't I move something into the garage fridge?
Moving things between kitchens is the Circle owner's job, the same person who set the kitchens up. Everyone in the Circle can see where everything is; one of you moves it. If you're the owner and you can't see the option, the Circle needs a second kitchen first: add one under Manage Circle, in the Kitchens section, with + Add Kitchen. Like everything else it is free for now (everything that's included).
Can other people outside my circle see my kitchen?
No. Only people who've joined your circle see its inventory.
Can I use it on more than one device?
Yes, join with the same invite on any device and you'll land in the same shared kitchen.
What if a scan adds the wrong thing?
Just edit or remove the item from the Inventory list, or tell Chat directly (e.g. "remove the [item name]").
Does it work without an internet connection?
No, it needs a connection to scan, chat, and sync with the rest of your circle.
Can I use voice instead of typing?
Yes, hold the mic button next to Chat's message box (and in the Inventory search bar) to talk instead of type. It works the same way on web and on the iOS/Android app.