Cookbook Log vs Palate Journal
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Cookbook Log
This app allows you to maintain a personal food diary, discover what friends and family are cooking, and curate your own recipe collections. It helps you save meaningful food memories and decide on your next culinary creation, fostering a more personal and social home cooking experience.
- Personal food diary
- Discover loved ones' cooking
- Create cookbook lists
- Decide what to make
- Save food moments
- Share recipes
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Use Cookbook Log to: • Keep a personal food diary • See what loved ones are cooking • Create your own cookbook lists • Decide what to make next • Save meaningful food moments From everyday meals to favorite recipes, Cookbook Log helps you save what you cook, discover what others are making, and start cooking and sharing, together. We believe food is a love language – it carries memory, connection and care. Whether you’re logging meals or saving inspiration from restaurants, trips, or gatherings with friends, Cookbook Log makes home cooking feel more personal, social, and lasting.
Palate Journal
Create a private, personal guide to your favorite dining experiences. Log meals, dishes, and companions with custom tier marks. Generate an annual PDF summary of your culinary year.
- Editorial tier system
- Visit log with details
- Dish-of-the-year highlighting
- Annual PDF guide generation
- Cross-device sync
- Private by design
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Palate Journal is a private restaurant journal — a place to keep a record of the meals worth remembering, the dishes that surprised you, and the rooms you'd return to. No reviews to publish. No followers. Just your own quiet guide to the places you love. Each restaurant earns a tier mark — three stars for a journey, two for a detour, one for a very good meal in its category, plus Bib, Plate, Watching, and a private Blocklist. The system is yours; the marks are yours; nobody else sees them. Add a place in seconds: tap +, find the restaurant from a search or a dropped pin, give it a tier, and write as much or as little as you like. Photograph the dishes. Tag the companions. Note the occasion. Each visit becomes a card in your guide. Every December, Palate Journal renders your year as a beautifully typeset PDF — a print-ready volume of the restaurants you visited, the dishes of your year, and the patterns hidden in twelve months of eating. Print it. Share it. Shelve it. FEATURES • Editorial tier system: three star, two star, one star, Bib, Plate, Watching, Blocklist • Visit log with companions, occasions, photos, and per-visit tier marks • Dish-of-the-year highlighting • Map view across every city you've eaten in • Annual PDF guide auto-generated each December • Trips: group restaurants by city and dates • Cross-device sync via iCloud • Sign in with Apple, Google, or email • Private by design — your guide is never published, ranked, or shared without your asking Palate Journal is for people who keep track of where they've eaten the way they used to keep ticket stubs and theatre programs. A guide to the places you love — by you, for you. Terms of Use: https://www.palate-journal.app/terms Privacy Policy: https://www.palate-journal.app/privacy
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Cookbook Log at none against Palate Journal's 2. Cookbook Log also leads on ratings volume (3 vs 1) and iOS requirement (18.6 vs 26.0). Palate Journal's advantage is update cadence (every 4 days vs every 3 weeks). On price, rating, ads and monetization model there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Palate Journal sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $4.99 per year. Cookbook Log asks for nothing beyond the download.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for Cookbook Log against 5.0 for Palate Journal. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 3 and 1 respectively.
Cookbook Log ships an update every 3 weeks, Palate Journal every 4 days. The most recent releases landed on October 24, 2026 and October 14, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Cookbook Log | Palate Journal |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 5.0 (3 ratings) | 5.0 (1 ratings) |
| Number of ratings | 3 — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Every 3 weeks | Every 4 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone | iPhone, iPad — better |
| Requires iOS | 18.6 — better | 26.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 16 MB | 45 MB |
| Age rating | 12+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Cookbook Log LLC | The Ivy Studios LLC |
Customer experience
Cookbook Log
Palate Journal
In-app purchases
Cookbook Log
No in-app purchases
Palate Journal
- Palate Pro$4.991 Year
- The 2026 Edition$9.99








