Incredibly grateful to be in top 25! · Decoding Data Science

Incredibly grateful to be in top 25!

A few weeks ago I joined the Decoding Data Science’s 8-Day Building AI Application Challenge. I placed in the top 25 from 295 participants worldwide, what I walked away with is worth more than a podium finish.

8 days, one idea, a fully deployed AI application built from scratch.

I built Cookable, an AI powered recipe assistant that takes whatever ingredients you have and generates 5 detailed cookbook quality recipes in seconds. Built with Streamlit, Groq API, and LLaMA 3.3 70B.

Here is what I actually learned:

• Prompt engineering is harder than it looks. Small wording changes had a bigger impact on output quality than anything else.

• Error handling is not optional. 20 test cases on Day 4 found three failure modes I had not anticipated. Each one taught me something.

• The gap between working and polished is almost entirely CSS and session state. Core logic was done by Day 3. The rest was making it something I was proud to share a link to.

• Deploying something real changes your standards. The moment the app went live, edge cases stopped being optional.

I did not get a leaderboard position but I took home something better: a deployed app, a sharper skillset, and a clearer understanding of what it actually takes to build something real from scratch. That feels like enough.

Grateful to Decoding Data Science and Mohammad Arshad for building a challenge that forces you to ship, not just study.

Live app: https://cookable-bydurgaanand.streamlit.app/

GitHub: github.com/Durga-Anand-2006/cookable

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4 comments

Incredibly grateful to be in top 25!