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Creativity 🍳 Home Cook

Cook From What You've Got

Point AI at your fridge or pantry and get a real recipe. Works with a photo, a list, or just whatever you can remember is in there.

Best for Reducing food waste, quick meal planning, using up random ingredients before they go bad
When to use When you have ingredients but no idea what to make with them
cookingrecipesfoodimage-analysismultimodal

This is one of the most immediately practical things you can do with AI. You’ve got stuff. You don’t know what to make. AI does. Works three ways: describe what you have, paste a list, or upload a photo of your fridge.

The Recipe (text version)

I have the following ingredients and I want to make something for [meal / number of people]:

[List your ingredients — be honest about quantities if it matters]

Dietary constraints: [none / vegetarian / gluten-free / etc.]
Skill level: [beginner / intermediate / I can handle anything]
Time available: [15 mins / 30 mins / an hour]

Give me one creative recipe I can actually make right now with step-by-step instructions. 
Highlight any substitutions I can make if I'm missing something minor.

The Recipe (photo version)

If you’re using a multimodal model (ChatGPT-4o, Claude, Gemini):

[Attach a photo of your fridge, pantry, or ingredient spread]

Based on the ingredients you can see in this image, suggest a creative recipe 
with step-by-step instructions. Be adventurous — I want something I wouldn't 
have thought of myself. Call out anything I might be missing that would 
significantly improve the dish.

Two-step chain for better results

For more interesting results, run it as a quick chain:

Step 1 — Generate options:

Here are my ingredients: [list]. Give me 3 completely different recipe ideas 
(not just variations of the same thing) I could make with these. One word + 
one sentence each. I'll pick one.

Step 2 — Build the winner:

Let's go with [option you chose]. Give me a full recipe with:
- Exact quantities
- Step-by-step method in order
- One tip that makes the difference between okay and great
- What I could add next time if I had it

🔁 Leftover Remixes

🌶️ Spicy: “I have [weird combination of ingredients]. What’s the most interesting thing I could make? Don’t play it safe.”

🧊 Mild: “I have [ingredients]. I don’t want to cook much. What’s the laziest good meal I can make in under 15 minutes?”

💰 Budget: “Based on these ingredients, what’s missing that would unlock 3 or 4 totally different meals? Keep it to basics I can grab cheaply.”

Prompt concept via Ryan Morrison / Tom’s Guide. Adapted and expanded for The Prompt Kitchen.

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