A restaurant discovery platform where verified food bloggers replace anonymous star ratings with trusted recommendations.
Chalkuj
01 / Overview
Recommendations with a name attached
Restaurant ratings are usually anonymous averages. Chalkuj starts from the opposite idea: a recommendation is more useful when a verified food blogger stands behind it publicly.
The platform began as my bachelor's thesis and grew into a live product. I created the brand, product, website, API, administration and mobile application independently.
02 / Challenge
The gap between map services and food blogs
Research into five existing services found the same gap: none combined verified reviewers, an interactive map, food categories and public author profiles.
The product also had to serve diners, food bloggers and administrators without mixing their different needs and permissions.
03 / Approach
Three roles, one map, chálkas instead of stars
Venues appear on an interactive map with cuisine categories, galleries and allergen data for individual dishes. Search tolerates misspelled names, while verified blogger reviews are clearly identified. Ratings use the platform's own chálkas instead of anonymous stars. The mobile application shares the same product data, and a security audit found and fixed three real vulnerabilities before launch.
04 / Results
Launched with real venues, tested like a product
Chalkuj launched with real venues, verified bloggers and structured security and user testing completed before release.
15+
Venues verified by bloggers
Every published venue was added or approved through the verified blogger workflow.
72
Security checks passed
Sixty security tests and twelve complete product scenarios pass after fixing three real vulnerabilities.
13/13
User testing tasks completed
Five testers completed every task from registration to a published review without a blocking error.
