FUN WITH FOOD
by Lois Liuwei Wang
A Project Presented to The Graduate Faculty California College of the Arts
In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Fine Arts
Ima
age
8 12 20 VISITING THE STARTUP HOUSE 26 THE COOKING PARTY 30 THE VEGETARIAN WEEKEND GAME 34 FOOD JEOPARDY 38
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24 PLATES 46 THE NUDGE AND THE WATER COASTER 48 THE RECIPE PUZZLES 50
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INTRO KNOWLEDGE, BIAS, GUILT TO EASE, TO CONVEY DATA, METHOD AND QUESTIONS
TO EASE, TO CONVEY TESTING AND LEARNING
FUN, THE NUDGE, THE TRICK MIXY PAN FINAL THOUGHTS/TIPS
INTRO
Food has always been an interesting topic in design. Although many food designs been made, few of them truly effective in influencing people’s lives. Why it is so hard to make changes in the way we eat? It’s because the issues or problems we have with food nowadays are not just due to simple personal preference but much bigger problems—culture, the structure of the food industry, and government policy, among other issues.
For those interested in studying food as a thesis topic, my advice is this: be prepared to be thrilled and be mindful about your creation. In my journey, I was overwhelmed many times by the knowledge and unchangeable facts of food. And there were moments when I was motivated and excited by the fact that more and more food journalists, nutritionists and chefs are working hard to promote healthy eating. There were also moments when I realized that how little awareness people have about what they are putting into their mouths. Being in San Francisco is definitely helpful for the study of food, since people here are highly conscious about their food choices. However, at the same time, we also need to be aware that most of the country doesn’t think the same way and that the creation of a food culture is unique in San Francisco.
My thesis focuses mainly on how to use design to transform cooking from a method of getting food into a process of understanding food. Cooking is a way to understand that human beings are part of nature. We have been fooling our taste buds with artificial food products for years, and we need to refresh our bodies both internally and externally through eating and cooking with fresh ingredients. Through a new cooking experience, people can gain knowledge about food and become motivated to change their eating behavior. Alternately, this experience can inspire people to think about the relationship between our bodies and nature.
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KNOWLEDGE BIAS GUILT
People talk about food constantly. Questions arise: What to eat for lunch? What to buy? Organic? Local? How to lose weight without starving? Does being vegan help the environment? Let’s talk about how people interact with food. Food has to be cooked and attractively presented. Someone needs to prepare the required ingredients, seasonings, and cooking utensils, (or in the case of industrial food, workers and machines). Before this, farmers grow plants and raise livestock, and someone has to turn them into raw ingredients. These are the four basic categories of food discourse — agriculture, cooking, purchasing, and eating. Agriculture and cooking are usually discussed by chefs: it is their job to care where the ingredients come from and how to combine and transfer them in the best way. Food journalists write about food. They study and criticize the economic, political, and social aspects of food.
In his Ted talk “How I Fell in Love with a Fish”, New York chef and writer Dan Barber discussed what constitutes real organic food. He mentioned his visit to an eco-friendly fish farm in Spain. A company there turned an abandoned canal into a wetland and built a self-renewing ecosystem. The system makes the land so rich that the fish eat what they’d be eating
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in the wild—plant biomass, phytoplankton and zooplankton. This is the ideal scenario when we think of organic food sources. However, in order to label the fish organic, most fish farms in the United States do not need to create such ecosystems for their fish. As long as the fish feed contains no chemicals like antibiotics, they can be called “organic.” Therefore, it is technically okay to feed the fish shredded chicken meat, and still call them “organic”. In terms of future agriculture, allowing animals and plants to live and grow in natural ways should be the focal point. We need to study the land and figure out what plants are suitable, and we should eat what the land provides, instead of the other way around.
Agriculture may be far from urban dwellers, but there are plenty of people talking and writing about food. Michael Pollan is one of the most reader-friendly food journalists. He presents his thinking in many different styles for different reader ships. In Pollan’s books The Omnivore’s Dilemma and Food Rules readers are sure to find one that fits his or her interests and tastes. In The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Pollan criticizes the current food policies and modern agribusiness, which he believes to be one of the causes of many modern American health issues. Mark Bittman, another inspiring New York food journalist, author, and columnist also blames current food policies and industrial food system, and he also points out that the “efficient” meat industry not only increases lifestyle diseases, but also speeds up global warming. Bittman developed interesting and fun recipes and recipe generators for people to practice easy and healthy eating.
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FOOD MATTERS A Guide to Conscious Eating by Mark Bittman: A Perfect book to learn the most practical and creative ways to be a mindful eater, not only for our own sake but also our planet.
Eating habits can be “bad”, or selfdestructive[, but] food itself—real food, not junk—though it may be of varying quality, usually isn’t “bad”, in the sense that it will make you sick. Picture from amazon.com
FOOD RULES An Eater’s Manual by Michael Pollan: This book contains the most simple, fun and practical rules to help people make food choices. These rules not only work but are super fun. I tried them myself, and I am still following them.
Don’t eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.
Picture from amazon.com
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The coffee+dessert kit
Participant making coffee Picture from Copenhagen Airport Pinterest page
HALLO HELLO was a concept restaurant in the Copenhagen Airport. This pop up event brought solitary tourists to sit down together and share a three-course meal prepared by a local top chef. Also, participants were given a pack of coffee kit and snacks to share with the people sitting with them on the plane. This is a perfect example of how design can make a change in socializing eating in a specific circumstance.
Participants eating at the departure lobby Picture from Copenhagen Airport Pinterest page
I enjoyed reading all these books and understanding their well-researched, well-stated analyses and criticisms. However, it is hard for me to think about global warming every time I eat beef, or try to figure out if buying an expensive organic avocado is truly worth my money. Yes, we have Michael Pollan’s Food Rules and Mark Bittman’s Food Matters, but one book may not be powerful enough to
permanently change people’s thinking about what they are eating. Facts, statistics and well-written prose are not enough to influence people when their taste buds are indulged. When facing a bag of delicious chips, a nutrition rule probably cannot overcome one’s instinctive craving for flavors, even with the awareness of all the artificial ingredients.
The convenience and accessibility of “designed” food, not only bring people taste stimulation, but also offer them an opportunity to socialize and connect with others. Sharing Prickles with friends, even strangers, makes you a friendly person. However handing someone half of your organic apple seems odd and senseless. We are educated to eat healthily, but we are persuaded to share junk food. All the buy-oneget-one-free offers, the party-size bags, and the all-you-caneat meals get implanted in our minds through car radios, billboards and the sidebar of Facebook feeds. Eating healthily is considered an individual preference. Why can’t it be social? Why can’t we have fun with it?
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TO EASE TO CONVEY Data, Method and Questions
Target Group Which group of people have the least knowledge and concern about the food they eat? College students! They have many reasons for not caring about what they are putting into their bodies: saving money for drinks in social life, having no access to a kitchen, being too lazy to learn how to cook, etc. Another important reason is that even when they eat poorly, their young bodies recover quickly, so they don’t feel the impact. No matter how they eat, the harm is not serious enough to leave an impression. According to the American College Health Association “The percentage of overweight and obese American college students increased from 27.4% in fall 2006 to 29.2% in fall 2011”(Pompi). Moreover, “studies in the 1980s indicated that 4% to 5% of college students had eating disorders, but a 2006 survey by the National Eating Disorders Association found that nearly 20% of more than 1,000 college students surveyed – both male and female – said they had or previously had eating disorders”(Smith). Information about healthy diets is readily available and convenient, but this demographic is very challenged in assimilating and using this knowledge properly. College students prefer everything to be quick and new, so they have no patience to finish a book in order to get a deep understanding about food. In the best case scenario, one reads a short post on a social network, or hears a “healthy” tip from a friend, then applies it to daily life with his
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or her own interpretations. Eventually, the person forgets about the tip and goes back to more “comfortable� eating habits.
Is there a way that design can integrate food knowledge into the social lives of young adults, and also create permanent change in their lives? Is it possible to create a tangible, interactive experience that makes food knowledge entertaining, social and evocative?
Design Method Design made based on local needs and traditions is called vernacular design. I believe this method will lead me to success in my food study, since eating is vernacular. To be able to do this, I need to have a new understanding and perspectives on the situation, different from what my target group understands. Designers are trained to design solutions that aim for longterm benefit. But, generally speaking, it is human nature for people to be attracted more by immediate rewards than longterm benefits. Good design needs to offer people both. The audience may think instant gratification is the intended approach of the design, but the more they are actively engaged with the design, the more surprises they will discover. Continuous peak moments are the real goal of the design. The level of satisfaction of the audience is measured by the pace and quality of the long-term experience. In other words, plan the experience with multiple small and large peak moments in a clever way. Along the way, the user will discover, experience, and enjoy these moments.
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What are young adults’ eating habits?
What do young adults think about cooking?
How much do young adults know about healthy eating?
What causes young adults’ lack of awareness of healthy and balanced eating?
Do young adults need more accessibility or more motivation to eat healthy food?
TO EASE TO CONVEY Testing and Learning
Based on these questions, I created several probes to help me figure out the answers. What I got from my testing is more like insights than reasons. The more I understood my target group, the more I realized that it is all about feelings and motivations.
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Visiting the Startup House I went to the Startup House in SOMA to investigate the living environment of young adults. I wanted to be familiar with their daily lives, in order to create an intuitive food experience that would fit in their lives.
Andre, an enthusiastic young engineer gave me a tour and introduced me to his friends. There are 45-50 people living in the house, sharing one kitchen, one living room and a working space all located at the first floor. The upper two floors are all filled with double-deck beds. Most of them are young engineers and entrepreneurs from all over the country. They are friendly, energetic and have a lot of passion about the future. They share three refrigerators at the kitchen. Most of the time, the residents cook pre-made food and eat alone.
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Making Sandwiches (middle)
The Kitchen (top)
Amando is making super-meat-patty sandwiches for late night snacks.
Working Area (bottom) Most people eat while they are working
What’s in the Fridges?
Findings: The Startup House residents eat unbalanced diets, mainly frozen food and dairy products.
According to Andre, a small group of people eat healthier, but the rest eat mostly meat for every meal. Many residents told me they are trying to build their bodies, so they eat large portions. They believe it is good for them.
Most people eat only when they are hungry.
People mostly buy groceries from Target, sometime Whole Foods (these are the closest groceries to their house).
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Preparation for the cooking party
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The Cooking Party In order to understand these young adults’ thoughts and cooking skills, I hosted a cooking party at the Startup House. Seven people attended, and the experience was fun and inspiring. Participants were paired into groups of two and assigned a recipe to cook for everyone: Shaved asparagus salad, Super BLT wrap, and Soft Frozen Banana with Chocolate coating. Most of them had little experience cooking from scratch, but everyone enjoyed the experience as a team and sitting down together to eat and chat as a community. Although one team had a trouble shaving the asparagus, they quickly got help from others, and managed to make a fairly popular dish.
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Feedback from the participants: It is interesting to observe others trying to cook. Cooking and eating alone is boring, and one always ends up with too much food. People want to get recipes with ingredients they’re already familiar with. Participants want to have digital recipe cards. Participants would like to have the activity in a greener environment like a park. Eating healthy is tricky. You need to consider tastes, efforts, health and price. A cooking party can motivate people to cook for themselves and others.
How? (top left) Team one was accessing the digital version of the recipe card they were given.
Shave The Asparagus (top right) It was most participants’ first time using a peeler.
Dinner together (bottom)
Master “Chef” (middle)
People enjoyed eating and
Roy was more experienced,
cooking together.
so he was showing off his cutting skills.
The Vegetarian Weekend Game I created a Vegetarian Weekend game, and played it with two young engineers, Andre and Ben. The task was to be vegetarians for a weekend, and they were given an envelope containing instructions on what to eat, four fairly tasty vegetarian recipes, and $25. The participants were asked to send me photos of the food they prepared and ate. Ben was assigned to be an Ovo-vegetarian (vegetarians who don’t eat eggs), and Andre was assigned to be a Lacto-vegetarian (vegetarians who don’t eat dairy products).
My expectation was that they would use the money to purchase fresh ingredients and cook their own food over the weekend. In this experience, I hoped they would learn that healthy vegetarian food could be tasty too.
However, the result was far from my hypothesis: they reported the first day was tough for both of them. In the morning, they didn’t notice that they were on a diet until finishing breakfast. They started to pay more attention to the food they planned to eat for lunch and dinner. Sunday
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Photos from the two participants
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morning was the peak moment for them. Both had yogurt and fruit for breakfast, and felt extremely healthy and satisfied. This mood faded gradually until Sunday dinner, and finally ended with a strong craving for meat.
After the experience, both participants said that they had good time and discovered new tasty food that’s also healthy. However, none of them used the recipes (they also refunded the money to me) or wanted to continue this experiment. Also, the food photos they sent to me were not technically healthy.
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Insights and Findings: The recipes were too complicated. Maybe four-ingredient recipes would be better. The game put a little bit too much pressure on the participants. Ben was more interested and active in the game than Andre, which suggests that omnivores may have greater curiosity about the vegetarian experience, because it is completely new to them. Both had a peak moment in their experience, which was at breakfast on Sunday morning. People need time to digest a change in their life at least for a day. Some competitive element might give the participants more motivation to follow through. Small rewards are needed along the way, instead of just a big one at the end.
3 Female Testers (top) They were hesitant to give answers to 3 Male Testers (middle)
the quizes
They were more interested in winning the game than the content of the answers
Grocery Choices (bottom) Different levels of questions about food products
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Food Jeopardy In this experiment I wanted to test young adult’s knowledge and understanding of healthy eating. I used the format of the Jeopardy TV show, and created my own Food Jeopardy game. The participants needed to give the questions based on the answers they picked. By supplying the correct questions, the participants would gain the money (in my game the money were points) associated with each answer. The person who got the most money was the winner.
This game aimed to give participants a fun and social learning experience about food knowledge in order to increase their awareness of what they are actually eating on a daily basis. The questions were all about the food we see every day, such as “which is not a benefit you can get from strawberries” or “which is not a healthy oil.” I tested this game in the class, as well as at U.C. Berkeley with an extended version.
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3 questions that people found the most interesting
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Insights and Findings: It was interesting to observe people’s reactions when they were tested on their food knowledge. It was not very successful in terms of increasing food knowledge. Most people had confidence, believing their eating habits to be fairly healthy. However they didn’t understand the reasons why their choices were healthy or unhealthy. People were not comfortable talking about eating habits in public, even with friends and family. Food choice is so personal that people do not want to be judged or criticized about what they eat. Therefore, lecturing is not effective in changing behavior.
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FUN THE NUDGE THE TRICK
From the previous tests, I realized that in order to motivate young adults to eat a healthy diet, promoting the benefits of healthy eating is not enough. There must be other kinds of motivations involved in the food experience to make them feel it is worth their time and effort. Since I focused on promoting cooking as the entry point, I felt I should invent new ways of cooking that interest young adults.
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24 Plates This game aimed to offer the participants the joy of being a chief and also to create opportunities for people to have deep conversations about food.
I tested this game in class. Participants were paired. One was asked to create a tasting sample and divide it into two servings to share with the other participant. The second participant had to taste and recognize each ingredient in the sample, while blindfolded.
Feedback from the class: People enjoyed the process of mixing ingredients. It made them feel like a real chef. People enjoyed watching others tasting the food. People were attracted by the display of different, colorful ingredients, even before they knew what the game is about.
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Participants were tasting their creative small dishes.
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NUDGE Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness by Richard H. Thaler & Cass R. Sunstein: An inspirational book about how to set good nudges to create behavior change.
You want to nudge people into socially desirable behavior, do not, by any means, let them know that their current actions are better than the social norm.
Water Coaster in use Photo from a participant
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The Nudge and The Water Coaster Nudge, a book by Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein, is about how little tweaks can improve people’s decisions on a variety of situations, including health conditions and personal financial management. One interesting example is that a school cafeteria wanted their students to eat more fruit. Instead of educating the students, they simply placed fruit where the students would look first. Also, they moved the unhealthy food into corners, where it was hard to see. The result was positive, and the students didn’t notice that they were consuming more fresh fruit than before. Inspired from this example, I made a coaster with a graphic icon of a glass of water along with the text “drink water” on it. I gave the same “Water Coaster” to several people, to see if this nudge could make a change. However, the feedback I got was vague: one participant did drink more water, but was not sure if it was the coaster or the weather is getting warm. Some said when the coaster was covered by a mug, the reminder function disappeared, so they didn’t think it was going to work for long (which I partly disagree with).
It is hard to test such a simple nudge with a small group of people, especially when the effect cannot be quantified or qualified. I will keep using nudge as my methodology, but with a much stronger approach.
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The Recipe Puzzles Based on the insights I got from the previous tests, I decided to remake my cooking experience by adding more specific instructions and gaming elements. I created a food box with fresh, seasonal ingredients (at that time asparagus was in season) and matching recipes. Instead of using traditional paper or digital recipes, I redesigned the experience of reading/learning to cook from recipes: I made a set of puzzles with photos of each steps on each of them. The users needed to figure out the puzzle in order to understand the steps to make two simple asparagus dishes.
Recipe puzzles
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Testing on the recipe puzzles
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Testing Results: People found the puzzle game intriguing, sometimes more intriguing than the actual cooking they had to do after the game.
Some of them asked me in what circumstance would they buy this box?
Some said it is a lot of things to do to get such simple treats. They’d rather look up the recipe online.
People imagined it to be an activity they would play with their friends in a hang out.
People liked simple graphics with no text. Some mentioned that they didn’t like the professional terms used in recipes, and graphics make recipes more friendly and vernacular.
People wanted more social aspects in the game (since it is a game after all). Some said it would be great if people could learn different cooking techniques together and create dishes together with their learnt techniques.
MIXY PAN
Gaming is certainly a creative way to make cooking playful, but the challenge was to add gaming without overriding the cooking aspect. Should the game be part of the ingredient box, or should it be separate? How complicated could the game be made without making the users feel exhausted or bored? In what scenario would the users encounter this box and be willing to try it?
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To answer these questions I refined my cooking box. I created a deck of recipe generating cards based on Mark Bittman’s Egg-Combination Generator. The cards were included in a box with all the ingredients matching the cards. The users needed to draw one card each from “The BASE”, “The EGG” and “The FINISH” to generate a unique egg combination. The users only needed to have eggs, olive oil, a pan and a stove to play the game.
I tested this box with a number of young people, and asked them two questions: Where would you imagine yourself hearing about or seeing this box? How many people would you like to have in this activity?
The testing result is really valuable, and people did imagine themselves using this box in a social dine-together with family and friends. Indeed, more iterations are needed to perfect this cooking box adjusting the serving size, the role of each participants in the game, etc. So far, the evidence proved that the gaming aspect is an effective solution to motivate young people to cook.
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Testing the box
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Testing the box
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Testing Results: People loved the box, especially the card game. One participant mentioned that she liked that the final dish was unknown until the game was played. She imagined herself playing it during a family dinner night. On average, most people wished to have 2-4 people involved in the game. Most people imagined themselves seeing a promotional campaign for this cooking box in a supermarket like Whole Foods. Then they would subscribe to this service online, customize their order, and have it delivered each week for dinner night or a brunch party. It was interesting to see people actually discussing the details of how they would arrange the cooking activity at home using this box and how they would play rounds of the game to avoid leftover ingredients or give the leftover ingredients to friends as a promotion for the cooking box.
User’s Journey with Mixy Pan
STAGE 1: Find out about it at grocery store or on-line social networks
STAGE2: Order the subscription on-line. Play it with family and friends. Learn new skills and ingredients.
STAGE3: Recommend it to others or co-play with others.
STAGE4: Collecting ingredient cards to level up the box for new skills and ingredients.
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Subscriptionbox Obsession Although on-line shopping has become more and more popular, our obsession of receiving a box without knowing what’s inside never decrease. Food subscription-box service has growing rapidly, especially in urban areas—Farm Fresh to You, Plated, Blue Apron, etc.—subscribing food/ cooking box has become the new delight of modern life.
Mixy Pan uses this box-obsession in encouraging young people to cook. This design solution emphasizes on the creative, fun and surprising aspects of cooking, and reduces the seriousness and complexity. The goal of this design solution is not to train a user to become a professional chef, but to teach him/her useful basic cooking skills that will make them feel good about cooking. The gaming and social aspects give users additional motivations to stay in the learning journey.
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FINAL THOUGHTS /TIPS
The one-year thesis journey was not smooth and simple: it had bumps along the way and was full of surprises. To me, the most challenging part was not the actual design but the user testing. As an interaction designer, the ability to organize successful user testing is critical. You do need boldness confidence to be able to talk to strangers as a professional, only in this way will people trust you and share their real thoughts. It was extremely helpful to have fellow designers on my side when doing the tests. Two more people always looks more official and trustworthy than one. Besides you will have someone help you take photos or handing stuff so that you can concentrate on testing. It is inevitable and also common to get rejected by potential participants, because people often think you are trying to sell products. Therefore, a good and brief introduction at the beginning helps to grab people’s attention. If you meet people who are offensive, try not to take it personally, and be as objective as you can in terms of the content of participants’ responses. Finally, remember that you are the master of your project, not your users. It is necessary to listen to what the users need and want, but it is not a must. Keep your personality in the project, and remember to have fun!
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WORKS CITED Barber, Dan. "How I Fell in Love with a Fish." Dan Barber: How I Fell in Love with a Fish| Talk Video| Ted.com. Ted.com, Feb. 2010. Web. 05 Oct. 2014. <http://www.ted. com/talks/dan_barber_how_i_fell_in_love_with_a_fish?language=en#t-1105181>.
Bittman, Mark. "What's Wrong with What We Eat." | Talk Video| Ted.com. Ted.com, Dec. 2007. Web. 05 Oct. 2014.<http://www.ted.com/talks/mark_bittman_on_ what_s_wrong_with_what_we_eat?language=en#t-45777>. Food Matters: A Guide to Conscious Eating with More than 75 Recipes. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2009. Print. amazon.com< http://www.amazon.com/Food-Matters-Conscious-Eating-Recipes/ dp/1416575650/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1429511565&sr=8 3&keywords=food+matters> "The Everyday, Anytime Egg-Combination Generator Eat."The New York Times. The New York Times, 14 Mar. 2012. Web. 03 Apr. 2015. <http://www.nytimes.com/ interactive/2012/03/18/magazine/anytime-egg-recipes.html?_r=0>.
Copenhagen Airport. “Copenhagen Cooking 2014.” Pinterest. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Apr. 2015. <https://www.pinterest.com/cphairport/copenhagen-cooking-2014/>.
Pollan, Michael. The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: Penguin, 2006. Print. Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual. New York: Penguin, 2009. Print. amazon.com< http://www.amazon.com/Food-Rules-Eaters-Michael-Pollan/ dp/014311638X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1429511695&sr=81&keywords=food+rules>
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Pompi, Jenni. "College Students' Weighty Choices Bring Obesity to Forefront." College Students' Weighty Choices Bring Obesity to Forefront. Bowie Patch, 23 May 2012. Web. 06 Oct. 2014. <http://patch.com/maryland/bowie/college-students-weightychoices-bring-obesity-to-forefront#.VDIdSyldUoI>.
Thaler, Richard H., and Cass R. Sunstein. Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness. New Haven, CT: Yale UP, 2008. Print. amazon.com< http://www.amazon.com/Nudge-Improving-Decisions-HealthHappiness/dp/014311526X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1429511799&sr=81&keywords=nudge>
Smith, Jennifer A. "The Hidden Health Crisis on Campus: Eating Disorders." The Hidden Health Crisis on Campus: Eating Disorders. ANAD, 2010. Web. 04 Oct. 2014. <http:// www.anad.org/news/the-hidden-health-crisis-on-campus-eating-disorders/>.
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