A pocket atelier for people who weigh salt in grams and argue about jammy yolks. Built for ambitious home cooks, culinary nerds, and anyone who has ever opened McGee next to a cutting board that was already greasy.
The labs
Equilibrium curing, wet brine, and dry sausage math from the actual meat weight — salt, nitrite, and the boring percentages that keep a coppa from becoming a cautionary tale.
We show the work. Folklore “35% weight loss means it’s safe” does not get a lab coat.
Sous-vide and pasteurization holds from published charts: thickness in millimetres, core temperature, then the hold. Hardware-agnostic. Your circulator’s marketing department is not invited.
Cook-chill exists. The fridge is not an ice bath, no matter how optimistic you are.
A physics timer, not a 7-minute superstition. Weight, starting temperature, and the kitchen height you set (sea level unless you live higher) — then a countdown to the second.
Fridge eggs lie about their childhood. Tell the lab they were cold. It already knew.
Hydrocolloids without the dinner-party mystique: gelatin bloom, agar hysteresis, pectin windows, alginate, methylcellulose. Grams of gel, not vibes of gel.
Optional Texture Lab Unlock is a one-time purchase. No subscription. Gels should set; invoices should not.
In the kitchen
Large targets. Dark kitchen mode that doesn’t glare off a stainless backsplash. Live Activities and StandBy so the phone can sit on the far side of the board while you pretend you will “just check it in a second.”
No Apple Watch required. We assume you took it off before the pork shoulder.
Calculations and batch notes stay on your device. No ChefLab account. No cloud chamber. Your nitrite math is not a growth funnel.
Results carry their sources — Baldwin, food-code tables, Williams, the usual suspects. Tap through if you are the kind of person who reads footnotes in cookbooks. (You are.)
Educational, not a health department. ChefLab is a calculator and log for home cooking. It is not a medical device, not HACCP certification, and not a substitute for a thermometer you actually calibrated. When in doubt, throw it out. Then write it in the notes so you don’t do it again.
Help
Bugs, App Review notes, or “my alginate became a sad noodle” — write to support.
Email support@cheflab.orgDutch and English in v1, or follow the system language. Metric first. Imperial if you insist. Decimal commas for the home crowd.
Projects stay on device. No ad SDKs. No creepy trackers. The chamber is yours.
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