Examining the usability of Chef'd with two field tests.

1. Sestokaite 1
Vilune Sestokaite
Professor Lamer
Web Publishing
8 March 2018
Usability Test for Chefd.com
Test Preparation
To prepare for the test, I decided to complete the tasks myself. I wanted to do this so I
could better understand the successes and/or difficulties my participants may experience.
Moreover, trying to complete the tasks myself will aid me in understanding the website better.
Because I am most productive at the library with my studying, I chose to do my own testing
there. I sat at the double screen computers like usual, where the Chefd website was pulled up on
the left screen and the word document on the right side of the screen. The lighting on the first
floor of the library was bright with an average level of noise. It wasn’t too noisy to where I
couldn’t focus completely, but I could still hear people conversing from all directions. I had my
assignment papers to the left of me, my phone charging in front, and my water to the side.
Task 1
In my tasks, I used Google Chrome. The first task was to build a Spoon University meal.
I started on the Chefd homepage, as with all of the tasks. I first hovered over the ‘Meal Plans’
header. Since I was building a meal plan, it made most sense that it would be under this category.
Spoon University Meal Plan was the fourth one listed on there, so I clicked on it. I scrolled down
and saw a button that said ‘Start Meal Plan’ so I clicked on it. It prompted me to answer what I

2. Sestokaite 2
was allergic to. Since I wasn’t allergic to anything, I clicked ‘none.’ I scrolled down more and it
prompted me to select the proteins I like in a meal. I selected beef, poultry, fish, and pork. Then I
clocked ‘next.’ Then it asked me how many meals I’d like to
add to My Spoon U Box. I wasn’t sure what this meant (did it
mean meals per day, per week, the number of different meals
pertaining to variety?) so I went back to the home page of
Spoon University, but didn’t find out what this meant. I then
went back to the quiz and answered with 7 meals (the range
was from 0-7) and clicked ‘next.’ A loading button popped up
and I got the message as depicted in the message to the right. I clicked ‘got it’ (my only option),
it reselected 3 meals for me and then I scrolled down. I ran into an error here. The meals they
gave me had either only shrimp, or no meat. I was confused because this was not I selected. I
took the quiz again and figured it out. The question that asks of allergens is an opt in type of
question, where nothing is selected, so then the user must select which allergen they have. Below
is a before and after for me, who has no allergens.

3. Sestokaite 3
The protein question, however, was the opposite. The questions starts out with everything
highlighted in orange making this one opt out. The first time through I selected the meats that I
wanted (thinking that I was selecting what I wanted in the meals, but I was actually selecting
what I didn’t want.) So the second time, I instead clicked what I didn’t want, so the highlighted
ones were the ones that I wanted. Below, shows how oppositely this question works, as opposed
to the first one, creating some confusion.
Although this may not be an issue others ran into, it is significant that the rhetoric of both
questions does not match up. As a user, I expected the questions to be of the same form. After
clearing this up, I got my meal results. I had 3 categories. One for meals, one for grab n go’s and
one for snacks. I was only given lunch and dinner meals, while nothing was provided for
breakfast, which I thought was odd. I thought clicking the ‘swap meal’ option would give me
some breakfast ideas, but it did not. I liked all of the food the planner provided me, so I clicked
‘add to cart’ which totaled $140. I found out that the number one clicks when deciding how
many meals to put in the My Spoon box, only includes the meals. So, I clicked 7 and got 7
The second time, I had to
deselect what I didn’t want,
leaving the orange as the thing I
wanted. The first time around, I
though selecting the protein and
it going gray, was my
preference.
This format is opt-out,whereas the
first allergen question is opt –in.

4. Sestokaite 4
meals, plus 6 grab n go’s and fruit/snacks. Although I found out at the end what clocking the
number would mean for the meals, it would have been nice to know that I am also getting grab n
go’s and snacks along with the 7 meals. It would also be nice if I could customize the grab n go’s
and snacks (not just the number of meals).
Task 2
Adding the meal to the cart led me to the next task (adding a spicy meal for the week).
After adding to the cart, a sidebar popped up on the right side of the screen. Because the task
asked me to add a meal, it made sense to click the edit button. Next, two options came up: either
to customize or be done, so I clicked customize. This led me to the quiz again, so I had to re-do
the entire quiz in order to change preferences. I ran into another problem: I couldn’t select 8 for
my meal number (I wanted to go from 7 to 8 in order to add the spicy meal). I looked at the cart
icon and saw that there were 16 items in the cart from the previous plan I built. I decided to click
‘All Meals’ at the top, to search for a singular meal instead of trying to bump the 7 meals to 8 on
the planner. Once clicking ‘All Meals’, a new page loaded and I clicked ‘Get Started.’
Here, I got annoyed because I had to answer more questions to look at meals. I had to
answer the following questions: what’s your cooking style, what type of meals are you looking
for, how many are you cooking for, and the kind of cooking experience I want). After answering
these questions, it prompted me to create an account to look at meals. I did not want to do this,

5. Sestokaite 5
which was also frustrating. Lastly, I resorted to the search bar. I keyed in ‘spicy’ and the bar
gave me 5 options and a view all button. I clicked Spicy Tomato-Jalapeno Chicken Breast.
I was taken directly to the recipe, and clicked a button that read ‘2 for $25’ because there
was no single person option. This immediately was added to my cart after clicking.
Task 3
My next task was to make sure that none of the meals, snacks, or Grab n’ Go’s was more
than 450 calories per serving, and that if it was, I would need to remove it. After adding the spicy
meal, the cart sidebar popped up again on the right side, so I clicked on edit. Again, I had to go
back and redo the questions dealing with allergens, protein, and how many meals I wanted.

6. Sestokaite 6
After going through again, my meals popped up. I scrolled down to the food. I clicked on
the first Grab n Go, Chicken Tamale in Green Sauce. A window popped up with the recipe.
When scrolling down, there were different tab options such as ingredients, allergens, from your
kitchen, and nutrition facts. I clicked on nutrition facts,
and a nutrition label popped up. This recipe was under
the 450 calorie count, meaning I did not need to worry
about swapping, so I clicked the ‘x’ on the window and
went to the next Grab ‘n Go. When a Grab ‘n Go did
have a surplus calorie count, there was a button under
the meal that said ‘swap meal.’ If needed, I would click this button, but then it would only give
me one option for swapping. This option remained the same for every Grab ‘n Go I chose.
I clicked here
after adding the
spicy meal. After clicking edit, I
was taken back to the
Spoon University quiz,
which I had to retake.

7. Sestokaite 7
This only option was over the 450 calorie count, but added it anyway to see if I would
have another option to swap out with. Again, I chose to swap and it gave me another single
option (which was the very first one I had). Seeing as my instant options were limited, I decided
to go to ‘All Meals’ tab at the top. Once I clicked this, I was taken to a screen where there was a
filter on the left side. For the ‘Category,’ I chose the Grab n Go filter. The loading circle came on
screen, then a message popped up saying I needed to filter my results more. I filtered my results
more, but the same message kept appearing. I did not complete this task as the options I was
given to swap were limited to one or repeating Grab n Go’s I didn’t want and because the filter
for Grab n Go was not working properly. I did the same thing for the
meals and snacks (clicking and looking at the nutritional
information). The meals and snacks had more swapping options,
making the process easier than the Grab n’ Go’s.
Task 4
The swap meal
button After clicking the Swap
Meal button, this is the
only option I was given.

8. Sestokaite 8
For my last task, I’m determining when the meals can be delivered. I clicked on the cart
icon and at the bottom, clicked ‘Checkout.’ I put in my shipping zip code as it asked (64468) and
then was prompted to select a delivery date. It is Tuesday the 27th and my delivery options are as
captured in the screenshot (a week to a week and a half later).
Overall, I experienced at least one problem or annoyance in each of the first three tasks
and wonder if my users will experience the same and how our processes will differ.
Choosing Participants
Tester 1: Korbin Jones was my first tester. Korbin is a 23 year old male college student.
Korbin works in GreenTower Press with me, where we publish an international literary
magazine. About 3 times a week, Korbin brings in meal prepped lunches to eat usually
consisting of chicken, rice, beans, and pineapple. I talked to Korbin about his meal prepping and
he says he is trying to make healthier habits in his lifestyle, so he first is paying attention to
nutrition. Aside from being the Content Editor for The Laurel Review, Korbin also runs his own
tarot card reading business from his house, creates the typesetting for the magazine, and makes
collages for the Visiting Writers Series. Because Korbin is a college student and is on the road to
making healthier choices, I thought he would be a reasonable tester. I also thought his eye for
design and typesetting would give me some unique feedback about the website. I told Korbin
about Chef’d and he immediately said “Oh, that’s kind of like HelloFresh, right?”
Korbin told me he is online about 30 hours a week emailing, writing, using social media,
and running his tarot business. Although he does all of this, most of his time (about 80%) is spent
on social media. Korbin considers himself a high-experience user.
Environment for Tester 1

9. Sestokaite 9
 Location of Test: Korbin said he wanted to do the test at his
house, where he feels most comfortable to do his work.
 Physical environment: At Korbin’s house, we conducted the test
in his living room on an L-shaped couch. Korbin had his feet
propped up with the computer in his lap, and I was sitting to the
left of him. The lighting was dim (only the kitchen light and a floor
lamp in the living room were on) and there were many decorations
on the wall. The TV was on, but mute, and Korbin had this phone
to the right of him on the couch.
 Technical environment: Korbin was using Safari on his MacBook
Pro to do to usability test.
Choosing Participants
Tester 2: Bailey Weese was my second tester. Bailey is a 22 year old female graduate
student. She works at the B.D. Owens library as a graduate assistant where she processes book
orders and plans conferences. In the past, Bailey and I have had undergraduate classes together
and she is often down in GreenTower Press hanging out. I knew her, but not too well, so I
approached her about the usability test and asked her about her eating habits to make sure she
could be a good fit. She said she rarely eats junk food and monitors her eating habits, but doesn’t
meal prep because of time constraints. Bailey is a reasonable fit because she is a graduate student
and showed that she cares about what she puts into her body. It was even better that she didn’t
meal prep like Korbin because Chef’d would intrigue her. I told Bailey about Chef’d and she
said she hadn’t heard of it, but knew there were some food delivery services out there.

10. Sestokaite 10
Bailey is online about 25 to 30 hours a week, with 30% being social media. She claims
she is a low experience user because she doesn’t do a whole lot outside of using Google’s search
engine and emailing.
Environment for Tester 2
 Location of Test: Bailey wanted to conduct the test at the library,
since she spends a lot of time working and studying here.
 Physical environment: Bailey chose a big table on the first floor
of the library. The lighting is bright, the desk space was wide open,
and Bailey had her phone to the left of her. I sat on the right while
conducting the test. It was a Sunday, just after the library first
opened for the day, so it was quiet and there weren’t many people.
 Technical environment: Bailey used the computer issued by the
university and conducted the test on Google Chrome.
Test Results
Initial Site Thoughts: Korbin focused mostly on the visual design aspects. He thought
the large image on the home page of Chef’d was too big and distracting. He wanted the tabs that
run across the top to be bigger, but said overall, there was too much white space on the page. He
like the orange and how striking it was without being too bold. He noted that with this website,
he can probably learn more about the food options and where the food comes from.
Bailey focused more on how the information was laid out. She didn’t like how the
pictures were in a slideshow. The first picture had a button that said ‘Shop Now,’ but Bailey said

11. Sestokaite 11
she wanted to know more information before seeing that button. She didn’t like that she had to
scroll to find out how the site works, but that the information was easy to find.
Task 1: Build a Spoon University Meal and determine the weekly cost.
Summary for Both Testers:
Highlights:
1) Testers thought they were selecting what protein they wanted, when
instead, were actually selecting what they didn’t want.
2) Testers didn’t understand what they were being asked when prompted
to add meals to the My Spoon U Box
3) Testers tried to go back to change preferences in the small quiz, but
each time they went back, had to do the quiz from the beginning (it didn’t
save preferences).
Biggest Problem: The biggest problem was the opt-in and opt-out question style
that dealt with allergens and protein. On the first question dealing with allergens, one opts-in,
meaning they selected what they are allergic too. On the protein question, everything is already
selected, and one must deselect what they don’t want (opt-out). But because of the nature of the
question, the user did the same thing for question 2, as for question 1, which created confusion.
Both of my users experienced this.
Tester 1: Hovered on meal plans on the header, then clicked Spoon University
Meal Plans, said, “There is so much white space I’m afraid to click on the wrong thing”, scrolled
down and clicked ‘Start Meal Plan,’ he liked that the first question dealt with allergens and
selected ‘none’ because he didn’t have any, wanted beef and poultry in his meals, so he selected
beef and poultry. He was confused what the number meant when he was choosing the Spoon
Tester 1 Tester 2 Average
Average Satisfaction 2 1 1.5
Success Rate 0% 0% 0%

12. Sestokaite 12
University Meals, so he clicked 7 for how many days there are in a week. A message appeared
saying he needed to broaden his choices, so he went down to 5 meals, and noticed that even
though he selected beef and poultry, there was no beef or poultry in any of his meals. He clicked
back, and was upset that he had to re take the quiz. This time, on the protein question, he selected
everything he didn’t want, so that beef and poultry remained unselected. After receiving all of
his meals, the user scrolled down and saw that the total for selecting 5 meals was $140. He was
upset with the high price and gave up out of frustration, not wanting to conduct the quiz all over
again. He also was confused what exactly the Spoon University Meal Plan entailed, so didn’t
know how to fix the price.
Tester 2: Hovered over meal plans, then clicked Spoon University Meal Plans
because “that’s what made sense.” The user selected none for allergies, then clicked chicken
because she wanted chicken (in reality she was telling the interface she didn’t want chicken), and
was confused what she was being asked when she needed to select meals to add to the meal plan.
She selected 5 for the days of the week and didnt like they only asked about allergens and meat.
She said, “they didn’t even pay attention because I clicked chicken and they didn’t pay
attention… none of it involves chicken.” She clicked ‘Swap Meal’ under fish tacos and swapped
for spaghetti carbonara. The user clicked the back button trying to get out of the screen and she
was annoyed she had to start over again. She selected the same answers, not catching her
previous error, swapped the same things again, and saw that the total was $114. She said she
didn’t understand, scrolled up and went down to 4 meals, checked the price again ( $101) and
commented, “What am I doing wrong I don’t know.” She wanted to know more about the Spoon
University Meal Plans, so clicked on ‘How it Works’, then the ‘Meal Plans’ tab, but that didn’t
give any information about Spoon University. She ended up adding what she had to the cart

13. Sestokaite 13
hoping it will tell her why it’s so expensive. After adding it to the cart, a right side bar appeared
and she clicked ‘edit’, then clicked customize because she was confused and it took her back to
the quiz. She said, “I don’t know what to do now because I’ve already picked my 5 meals and
there are Grab n’ Go’s and snacks, but I just want the meals…Can I be done?” Tester 2 also gave
up. She didn’t know what she was looking for anymore.
Alignment to Heuristic: Consistency and Standards
This heuristic matches the biggest problem because there is no consistency between the
first question pertaining to allergens, and the second questions pertaining to protein. The first
question is an opt-in, while the second question is an opt-out. The user applied the standards of
the first question to the second question (which was set up differently), which caused the chosen
meals to be off.
Task 2: You have the budget to cover one extra meal per week, but you want it to be a spicy
meal. Determine your spicy meal options and choose one meal that you are willing to prepare.
Summary for Both Testers:
Highlights:
1) Tester selected the spice level at the bottom left of the filter system on
the ‘All Meals’ page, but didn’t have what to compare the spice level to.
2) The tester didn’t know what some of the ingredients were in the recipes
and didn’t want to go through the trouble of Googling what the ingredients
were.
3) Tester saw the how many likes each recipe had, but didn’t see any
dislikes to gage it with.
Tester 1 Tester 2 Average
Average Satisfaction 4 4 4
Success Rate 100% 100% 100%

14. Sestokaite 14
Biggest Problem: The biggest problem was that Tester 1 didn’t have anything to
gage the spice level with.
Tester 1: Tester 1 hovered over all meals, then clicked ‘View All Meals.’ He looked
through the ways to filter the food and found ‘Spice Level’ on the bottom left. The choices were:
none, mild, medium, and hot. He selected hot but said it would have been nice if there was
something to compare the levels to since spice level is different for everyone. He selected
Szechuan Stir Fry because it looked good and had 272 likes, but again, didn’t have what to gage
the likes to.
Alignment to Heuristic: Match between system and the real world
This heuristic matches the problem because the user couldn’t gage the level of spice. The
categorization was not speaking in terms that the user could relate to or understand. Because the
words don’t speak in a way that can be translated for the user, some confusion is created.
Task 3: Ensure none of your meals, “Grab ‘n’ Go’s” or snacks is more than 450 calories per
serving. If the calorie count is too high, swap the item for another.
Summary for Both Testers:
Highlights:
1) Tester clicked the back button from the Stir Fry recipe to get back to
meals in the plan, but it took the user to the start of the quiz.
2) Tester complained that each recipe had to be clicked on to see the
nutrition, whereas is should be more readily available considering it’s the
most important piece of information.
Tester 1 Tester 2 Average
Average Satisfaction 3 1 2
Success Rate 100% 0% 50%

15. Sestokaite 15
3) Tester didn’t like how when swapping meals, there weren’t many
options.
Biggest Problem: The biggest problem in this task was that both users had to re
do the Spoon University questions in order to get back to their meal plan. Both testers
experienced this problem.
Tester 1: From the Stir Fry recipe page, tester clicked the back button to get back to the
recipes. Instead of taking him back to the recipes in his plan, it took him back to the original
quiz. The tester complained about this, but proceeded to do the quiz and answered everything the
same way as before. The tester found this task to be easy, as he clicked on each recipe and easily
found the nutritional facts tab on the right hand side. The tester clicked this tab and the
nutritional information was displayed. If a meal, snack, or Grab n’ Go had more calories, then
the tester would click ‘Swap Meal’ and replace with another meal. Then, they scrolled up to see
the ‘x’ button to get out of the screen.
Tester 2: The second tester had a lot more trouble with this task, mainly for the biggest
problem, but for another one as well. This tester, too, clicked the back button and had to plan the
meals again. The tester started out by doing the same process as Tester 1. She clicked on the
recipe picture, then clicked on nutrition to see the calories. Once the Tester was done looking at
the calorie information, she clicked ‘x’ to get out of the screen to go back to the full list of meals.
After clicking on the Chili Mac n’ Cheese, the loading button appeared. She became impatient
after 10 seconds of the recipe loading, so she picked up her phone (reminds me of Nielsen’s three
response time limits). The recipe was still loading after she checked her Facebook, so she cliced
the back button and the top left, and it took her back to the quiz. Tester 2 exclaimed, “Literally
this screen again…why cant they save my settings?” She retook the quiz, went to the Mac n’

16. Sestokaite 16
Cheese recipe, but it continued to load. While it loaded, she couldn’t get out of the screen. The
tester gave up.
Alignment to Heuristic: User control and freedom.
This heuristic aligns to the problem of the back button in that after clicking the back button, the
Spoon University Meal Plan questions aren’t saved. In this case, the testers chose the back button
as a mistake, not knowing that it will erase the data. Chef’d does not offer any way of letting the
tester get out of this state without having to redo the quiz all over again.
Task 4: Determine when the meal will be delivered.
Summary for Both Testers:
Highlights:
1) At first, tester didn’t know how to add the spicy meal to the cart.
2) Tester was surprised that you couldn’t buy the meal for a single serving.
3) Tester didn’t like how far away the dates were (meaning tester had to
plan further in advance).
Biggest Problem: The biggest problem was that the tester couldn’t figure out
how to add the spicy recipe to the cart. Tester 1 was the only one with this problem.
After reading the task to the user, the user slapped his head and sad, “I have to go
back to the spicy meal! I’m going to be so mad if I lose my progress!” Here, the user was
thinking about his previous failures in having to take the quiz again, versus the task at hand,
showing how much the earlier tasks affected him. The user hovered over all meals, clicked view
all, scrolled down to the spice level, checked hot, and clicked on the Spicy Stir Fry he looked at
Tester 1 Tester 2 Average
Average Satisfaction 4 4 4
Success Rate 100% 100% 100%

17. Sestokaite 17
earlier, but didn’t add to cart in the earlier task. He said, “I guess I’ll just add it to my cart, but
how do I do that?” The user scrolled up and down the page for 15 seconds, stumped. He finally
clicked on the button that read, “2 for $35” button. A right hand side bar appeared after he
clicked this, then clicked checkout, entered his zip code in the prompted box, clicked residential
address, and the delivery dates popped up (about a week later being the first available time).
Alignment to Heuristic: Consistency and Standards.
The problem of having to look around for how to add it to the cart is a consistency and
standards issue because the button that Chef’d has, does not follow the standards of what typical
e-commerce websites. Most e-commerce websites have a button that says “add to cart’ or even
the shopping cart symbol (a universally known symbol that means adding something to the cart).
Because Chef’d strayed away from these standards, the tester was stumped and did not know
how to go about the task.
Final Site Thoughts: Tester 1 did not like the site what so ever. At a first glance, it looked
simple and minimal, so the tester thought it would be easy to use, but it wasn’t. It had some nice
aspects here and there like the nice pictures and the colors of the design, but overall the sight wa
an inconvenience and not something the tester would go back and use in his free time.
Tester 2 thought the site was awful and hard to navigate. She liked the simple design, but
it was too simple to where there wasn’t enough information to understand was Spoon University
was compromised of. Tester 2 said that with some improvements, the site could become easier to
work with.
Recommendations to improve user experience
Single problem being fixed: Task 4: Adding the spicy recipe (any recipe) to the cart.

18. Sestokaite 18
Problem Improvement:
Before
After
The big picture is
the only thing
above the fold,
making user
scroll. The button that serves
for adding something
to the cart.
New fold line
Universal cart
symbol
Reviews are
under the
fold
Buttons: allergens,
ingredients,
nutrition facts

19. Sestokaite 19
To fix this problem, I had to do a couple things. First, I took the previous ‘add to cart’ button
(that said 2 for $35) and instead, inserted a cart icon. Some form of the cart icon is used on every
e-commerce website to indicate that the shopper wants to add something to their car. Moreover, I
placed an addition sign above the cart, indicating that they want to add. This will take away the
delay the tester experienced finding the add to cart button. The second problem was that the
tester had to scroll to get down to the button. So, I moved the contents above the fold. I moved
most important information above the fold so it didn’t need to be scrolled to, and left the reviews
underneath the fold because that wasn’t as important and didn’t prompt the tester to take action
like the cart icon. All in all, I made the ‘add to cart’ button recognizable and visible: the two
problems the tester was having.