How can food bridge the gap between a new country and the feeling of home? For international students in smaller cities like Dessau, Germany, the struggle to find familiar ingredients often leads to homesickness and cultural disconnect. „Find Home on Plates“ is a design intervention that tackles this challenge. The core of the project is the „Flavour Compass,“ a system that empowers students to recreate the tastes of home using readily available local ingredients. Through ethnographic interviews and cooking experiments, I identified the essential „Key Flavours“ of various cuisines. These are distilled into curated „Spice Kits.“ The system allows students to pair these familiar spice kits with any local „General Carrier“ ingredients. This shifts the mindset from „what I can't find“ to „what I can create with what I have,“ fostering culinary creativity, reducing stress, and building a delicious bridge between cultures.
Context
Food is more than sustenance; it is a language of home, culture, and connection. But what happens when you can't find the words? For the 45% of international students at Hochschule Anhalt's Dessau campus—a figure more than double the national average in Germany—this question is a daily reality. In a small city with limited access to exotic ingredients, the struggle to adapt to a new food environment can lead to homesickness, dietary stress, and a sense of cultural isolation.
This project, born from my own journey as an international student, is a design-led exploration into this „wicked problem.“ It moves beyond simply providing recipes, instead offering a systemic intervention designed to empower students. The „Flavour Compass“ system helps them creatively and confidently navigate the local food landscape, transforming unfamiliar German ingredients into delicious, comforting meals that taste like home. It is a journey from „what I can't find“ to „what I can create with what I have,“ fostering culinary resilience, cultural exchange, and a true sense of belonging.
The Spark - Discovering the Problem
Every significant design project begins with a personal story. Mine started in a Dessau kitchen, feeling the profound absence of familiar flavors. As a newcomer with limited cooking experience, my diet consisted mainly of pizza, döner, and instant noodles—a far cry from the food I grew up with. This initial „food shock“ was not just about taste; it was a daily reminder of the distance from home. The turning point came during the Bauhaus Festival, where my roommate and I ran a food stall. Using almost exclusively local German ingredients, we created Asian-inspired dishes that were met with overwhelming enthusiasm from the local community. They praised the flavors as authentic and lamented the rarity of such cuisine in Dessau.
This experience was a revelation: authenticity is not about a perfect replication of a recipe, but about thoughtfully adapting core flavors. This insight became the catalyst for my research. By examining the unique context of Dessau—a small city with a large international student population but a limited food scene—I identified a clear gap. The challenges here are distinct from those in cosmopolitan hubs like Berlin. This led to my central research question:
The Foundation - A Review of Existing Knowledge
To build an effective solution, I first needed to understand the theoretical landscape. My literature review delved into the academic discourse surrounding food, culture, and adaptation. The cornerstone of my approach became John W. Berry's Acculturation Model, which identifies four strategies for cultural adaptation. The most positive and psychologically healthy of these is „integration“—the active process of embracing a new host culture while proudly maintaining one's heritage. This concept of fusion and balance became the guiding vision for my entire project. I aimed not to teach students to cook „German food“ or to find ways to exclusively cook „home food,“ but to help them create a new culinary identity that blended both.
The literature also strongly validated the emotional power of food, exploring concepts like „food shock“ and the deep-seated need for „comfort food.“ These are not just meals; they are emotional anchors that connect us to security and memory during the stressful transition of moving abroad. I then analyzed existing solutions, from university-led cooking classes to commercial meal kits and community projects like Dessau's Küfa. While valuable, I noticed a critical gap: most solutions were designed for large cities with diverse resources or focused on providing rigid information rather than empowering creative problem-solving. They didn't address the unique challenge of using a limited local pantry to create a taste of home. This realization set the stage for a new kind of intervention.
The Framework - A Method for a Wicked Problem
Addressing the multifaceted challenge of food adaptation required a robust and flexible methodology. I chose Transition Design as my guiding framework because it is specifically tailored for tackling complex, systemic „wicked problems.“ It encourages a long-term vision focused on sustainable, positive change rather than single, short-term fixes. This approach demands deep empathy, collaboration, and a holistic perspective, which were essential for this project.
To ensure my research was inclusive, I used a Research Participant Map to intentionally select students from diverse national backgrounds, with varying cooking skills and experiences in Germany. My primary research tool was Ethnographic Interviews, which allowed me to gather rich, qualitative data and understand the personal stories, cultural nuances, and emotional connections behind students' food habits. These interviews were followed by a thorough Qualitative Data Analysis, where I coded the transcripts to identify recurring themes and core insights. The solution itself was developed through Iterative Prototype Design and Testing. I began with a low-fidelity cardboard prototype, allowing for rapid testing and co-creation with users without the commitment of a polished design. This iterative loop of building, testing, and refining—all part of the classic Double Diamond process—ensured the final solution was shaped by real user needs, not my own assumptions.
The Process - From Insight to Intervention
The implementation phase was where theory met practice. A pivotal moment in my ethnographic interviews came from a single, powerful question: „If you had to choose three basic ingredients that represent the flavors of your hometown, what would they be?“ The answers were incredibly insightful. This revealed a fundamental truth: complex cuisines can be distilled into a few „Key Flavours.“
This insight sparked the core concept of my intervention: Key Flavours + General Carriers. The idea is to provide students with the essential flavor profiles of their home cuisine („Key Flavours“) and empower them to apply these to any readily available local ingredients („General Carriers“) like German potatoes, seasonal vegetables, or pasta. To test this, I conducted a simple „fried rice test,“ creating different versions of fried rice using spice combinations from the interviews. The test was a resounding success, proving that authentic flavor profiles could be achieved with a simple base.
This led to the creation of the „Flavour Compass“—a low-fidelity cardboard prototype featuring an ingredient area, a flavor map, and pre-portioned Spice Kits. The first round of user testing confirmed the concept's value; participants found it simple, fun, and were thrilled with the taste. The second round was a „stress test“: I challenged participants to cook with German asparagus, an ingredient completely unfamiliar to most of them. By using spice kits from their home countries, they all successfully „tamed“ the foreign vegetable, intuitively applying their own cultural cooking methods. This proved the system's power to not just provide comfort, but to build confidence and foster true culinary integration.
The Solution - The "Flavour Compass" System
The culmination of this research and iterative testing is the „Flavour Compass“—a design intervention that serves as a tangible bridge between cultures. Based on user feedback, the final concept was refined to include not just the flavor map and spice kits, but also a „Cooking Methods“ chart. This new element provides simple guidance on techniques like stir-frying, roasting, and simmering, giving users—especially those with less cooking experience—an extra layer of confidence in how to best handle their chosen ingredients with their spice kit.
The Discussion & Reflection
This system directly facilitates the „integration“ strategy described in Berry's model. The Spice Kits, containing the authentic core flavors, support the „Maintenance of Cultural Heritage.“ Simultaneously, the encouragement to use local, seasonal German ingredients supports „Cultural Adaptation.“ The result is a delicious and creative dialogue between two worlds on a single plate. The „Flavour Compass“ fundamentally shifts the user's focus from a mindset of lack („What ingredients can't I find?“) to one of abundance and creativity („What can I make with the ingredients I have?“). It transforms the kitchen from a place of stress into a laboratory for exploration, reducing food-related anxiety and empowering students to find a taste of home, wherever they are.
This project was a journey of discovery, both for the participants and for myself as a designer. While the results are promising, it is important to acknowledge the study's limitations, including a small participant pool and the subjective nature of taste. The „Flavour Compass“ system would benefit from further testing with a wider, more diverse group of users to refine the spice ratios and expand its reach.
My personal reflection on this process is one of profound learning. The project taught me to see a personal inconvenience as a systemic „wicked problem“ and reinforced the immense value of direct, human-centered interaction. There is no substitute for cooking and talking with users face-to-face.
Looking forward, the „Flavour Compass“ has exciting potential for growth. I envision expanding the map to include flavors from South America, Africa, and other regions, perhaps through a platform where students can contribute and share their own „Key Flavour“ designs. A fascinating next step would be to explore the host community's perspective: would local Germans be interested in using the system to explore global cuisines? This could foster a true, two-way cultural exchange, transforming the project from a tool for adaptation into a platform for shared discovery. The journey of „Find Home on Plates“ has just begun.
To read the full thesis and explore the research process in detail, you can download the complete PDF attached.
