The first person who cooked every recipe in Plezha
He had almost no experience in the kitchen. He ended up changing the app.
Victor is an engineer, game designer, athlete. He has a lot going on and very little time to think about food and cook. But he knows that what he eats affects how he feels and performs — and he wanted to get that right.
“I wanted to learn how to eat healthy and balanced while spending minimal time on cooking. And Plezha is 100% the best fit for me! Even for a 0-skill cook like me, it’s usually 20–35 min with very clear video instructions for a whole tasty and balanced meal — either breakfast, lunch, or dinner.”
He cooked every recipe in the app — many times. Along the way, he shared thoughtful, honest feedback on recipe logic, meal balance, and the small details that could make the experience better.
What made Victor’s involvement especially valuable was the kind of attention he brought to it: he noticed what felt clear, what felt unnecessary, what could work better, and what real life was asking from the product.
Together, we refined recipes, adjusted cooking steps, and built features like the Shopping List.
Now, with Victor’s mathematical way of thinking, we even changed our approach to designing recipes. We started looking more carefully at how ingredients work together — not only in terms of taste and Harvard healthy eating plate balance, but also in terms of energy and macro structure. This is something we plan to reflect more clearly in future app updates.
But food is never only about numbers.
“I was not expecting some of the meals to be as tasty as they were. The app uses mostly pretty simple ingredients, no added sugar. But in a lot of cases it combines them in unexpected ways which result in a very good and unique taste.
Lentils with hummus & mushrooms is my favorite dish. Before trying it, I thought that I didn’t like almost every ingredient of it, but together it’s my favorite dinner dish ever now. Savory oatmeal is now my wife’s favorite breakfast, even though if you read the ingredients it sounds kinda crazy :D”
This is a big part of what Plezha is about. Not healthy food that feels like a duty. Balanced meals that are actually good — and worth making again.
Food is also about the people around the table.
“Dishes look great. With really low effort, just by following the instructions, you can achieve the look of the best Instagram plates. I wanted to make healthy food for myself but very quickly started using it to actually impress friends and people visiting my place, because most of the dishes really look like a work of art on a plate. It’s definitely not the recipes for a big dinner party, but as a meal for a friend who stayed at your place, it looks really exciting.”
His wife Alexandra noticed something else too:
“This app has made our relationship stronger. It’s such a nice feeling when your home feels like a restaurant. I mostly handle breakfasts, but everything else — Victor has taken it to another level. Also, over the past year, we’ve been going out to cafes much less — because now we can easily cook at home. It’s more convenient and more affordable. I genuinely want to recommend Plezha that has become very meaningful in my and my family’s everyday life.”
“This app has made our relationship stronger.”
Plezha grows through people like Victor and Alexandra — people who cook with it, notice things, and tell us what would make it better. Some recipes become clearer. Some steps become easier. New features appear because someone needed them.
That is how we want to build Plezha — close to real kitchens, real homes, real lives.
Thank you, Victor and Alexandra.