One of our first findings in the research phase of this project was that people do not like cooking alone. Whether they find cooking a mundane task lightened by socializing, or a delightful hobby that they simply like to share, the social aspect of cooking informed our research directions.

In an attempt to understand how people try to find social contacts online, we investigated several online dating sites. As an example, 56 women and 81 men within 10 miles of the center of Pittsburgh have ‘cooking’ listed as a hobby on their Match.com profiles. However, dating sites like Match.com concern themselves with pairing individuals for romantic purposes, while we focused our research on getting groups together with no romantic intentions.

"Cooking for one is no fun."

• when multiple people cook at a dinner party, they usually cook something simple due to varying skill levels
• common interest is a widely used filtering method