Kitchen & Bar

On this phone

How to get around

The bar under the name is the map. Swipe it sideways if a destination sits off-screen. On Tonight, the button pinned to the bottom cooks the lead dish.

  1. Tonight — What you can cook first, plus drinks that fit the same shelf.

  2. This week — Five dinners from the shelf, urgent things cooked first.

  3. Shelf — Edit what you actually own.

  4. Written methods — Every dish and drink with a method somebody wrote out.

  5. The pantry — Start from one ingredient: what it does, and everything built on it.

  6. Out of it — What to use instead, judged by the job the missing thing was doing.

  7. Photo review — Review a demo shelf photo and confirm every item before adding it.

  8. Flavor Lab — Pairings with a track record: classic matches and the mixology behind them.

  9. Wild cards — Combinations with no tradition behind them, only shared aroma notes.

  10. Send to Occasion OS — Prepare confirmed shelf availability for Occasion OS.

  11. The field — The gap this layer owns.

Keep it on the home screen

  1. iPhone — tap Share, then Add to Home Screen.
  2. Android — open the browser menu, then Install app or Add to Home screen.

After that it opens as Kitchen & Bar, not a browser tab. Inventory stays on this device.

Substitutions · 62 dishes here use it

Out of thyme

The most patient herb here — it survives long cooking, which almost nothing green does. Whole sprigs go in at the start and come out at the end, leaves and all left behind.

Everything below is judged against that job. A swap that covers it is a swap; one that only looks similar is not.

52% of the 62 dishes here that mention thyme already list it as optional. Before you look for a replacement, check whether you are in one of them.

What to reach for

Instead · 1

oregano

two thirds as much

What it gets you
A hardy Mediterranean herb that goes in early and survives a long cook, which is thyme's actual job.
What it costs you
Delicacy. Oregano is louder and more medicinal, and it pushes a French dish toward Greece.

Instead · 2

dried thyme, if the recipe wanted fresh

a third as much

What it gets you
Nearly all of it. Thyme is one of the few herbs that dries genuinely well.
What it costs you
The sprig, if the sprig was going to be fished out later, and any green on the plate.

Instead · 3

marjoram or savory

one for one

What it gets you
The closest match on the shelf — same family, same woody-floral register, same tolerance for heat.
What it costs you
Marjoram is sweeter and fades faster, so it goes in later than thyme would.

Where you can just leave it out · 32

These dishes list thyme as optional. They were written to work without it, so no ratio is needed and nothing has to be bought.

Showing 30 of 32. The rest are on the ingredient page.

Where the swap will be tasted · 8

These need it and are short enough that nothing hides: 4 required ingredients or fewer, which makes thyme a quarter of what is in the pan. Make the swap a decision rather than a repair.

Check what else is in the pan

The company thyme keeps in this library, counted off required ingredients. A swap that argues with the top two is the wrong swap, whatever a chart says.

What to make with thymeRank what I can actually cookAll substitutions