About · Updated 2026-05-27
About Custrd.
Alex Vakser
Founder & Developer, Custrd
I built Custrd because I kept opening the fridge, staring at ingredients, and having no idea what to make with them. I started building the app at 14 — and honestly, that problem still happens every day.
Custrd is my attempt to solve it properly. Snap what you have, get real recipes that match, and actually build the habit of cooking more. No AI-generated nonsense — just a real database of real meals, matched to whatever is actually in your kitchen.
I’m building this solo, learning as I go. It’s on the App Store now. If you were one of the people who signed up early and waited, thank you — it means more than you probably know.
Common questions
- What is Custrd?
- Custrd is a recipe-finder app and free web tool that matches the ingredients you already have against 200,000+ recipes. The iOS app uses on-device computer vision to identify ingredients from a photo of your fridge or pantry. The web tool at cooksnapapp.com/recipe-finder accepts typed ingredients and returns matches against the same 15,000+ recipe library.
- Who built Custrd?
- Alex Vakser, a solo founder, started building Custrd at age 14. It remains an independent product — no outside investors, no growth team. The team is one person plus a careful roster of recipe editors and beta testers.
- Is Custrd free?
- Yes. The web recipe finder is free with no signup. The iOS app is free, with an optional Pro tier (from $3.33/mo billed annually, or $9.99/mo) for camera-based ingredient scanning, barcode lookup, macro tracking, and 15+ dietary filters.
- How is Custrd different from SuperCook, DishGen, or ChatGPT?
- SuperCook scrapes the open web and lives on volume. DishGen, FoodsGPT, and ChatGPT generate recipes on demand and tend to hallucinate ingredients. Custrd matches against a small curated library of real recipes, so every match is a recipe that someone has actually cooked and tested. The comparison page at cooksnapapp.com/compare has feature-by-feature breakdowns.
- Where does Custrd's recipe library come from?
- Every recipe carries a complete ingredient list, method, and nutrition before it can appear. Ingredient lists are normalized to a canonical taxonomy of about 1,400 ingredients. Hero images are sourced through a strict pipeline. Steps are checked for completeness. Recipes from Custrd creators go through the same editorial gate.
Press & contact
For press inquiries: press@cooksnapapp.com. For general support: support@cooksnapapp.com.
The press kit has downloadable logos, screenshots, founder bio, and the full boilerplate.