BaoBei Kitchen
What the app stores, where it is stored, and what happens when you share something.
Everything you create in BaoBei Kitchen — recipes, meal plans, grocery lists, photos and cook logs — is stored on your device.
If you are signed in to iCloud, the same data also syncs to your own iCloud account, so it appears on your other Apple devices. That copy belongs to you. It is held by Apple under Apple’s privacy policy, and BaoBei Labs cannot read it.
If you are not signed in to iCloud, the app works entirely on your device and nothing syncs.
When you tap Share Recipe, the app uploads that one recipe — and one of its photos, if it has one — to storage on Google Firebase, so the person you send it to can open it. This only happens when you choose to share.
- The file is identified by a random code. It is not listed, indexed or searchable.
- It is deleted automatically after 30 days.
- Anyone who has the link can open it while it lasts, so only send it to people you intend to.
We do not read these files, and nothing else in your library is uploaded.
A shared kitchen is a space you create and invite people into. What the kitchen holds — the recipes added to it, its meal plan, its grocery list, thumbs-up and thumbs-down reactions, and cook logs members add — is stored in iCloud, in a shared area that belongs to the iCloud account of the person who created the kitchen. Every member of that kitchen can see it. Apple holds this data under Apple’s privacy policy, and BaoBei Labs cannot read it.
Other members see the display name you choose for the kitchen, your initials, and what you do in it: recipes you add, meals you plan, items you add or check off, reactions you give, and cooks you log. They do not see your Apple Account, your email address, or anything in your own library that you have not added to the kitchen.
- Adding one of your recipes to a kitchen places a copy there. Your original stays yours.
- When you leave a kitchen, copies of the kitchen’s recipes and your own cook logs are saved to your library if you choose. Recipes you added stay in the kitchen for its other members unless they are removed.
- When the owner ends a kitchen, it becomes read-only for everyone and stays in the owner’s iCloud until it is removed. Any member can remove it from their own device at any time.
- An invite link is a small file on Google Firebase holding the kitchen’s name, the name you invited under, and the address of the kitchen’s shared iCloud data, so the person you invite can join. It is identified by a random code and is not listed or searchable. The link works for seven days and the file is deleted after eight; deactivating a link deletes it straight away.
- We have no user accounts and no logins.
- We do not collect your name, email address or contact details.
- We do not read your recipes, meal plans, grocery lists or photos.
- We do not use cookies, advertising identifiers, or serve ads.
- We do not sell your data, and we do not share it with data brokers.
- We do not track you across other apps or websites.
- We do not run a server of our own. Recipe links and kitchen invites use Google Firebase storage; everything else is on your device or in iCloud.
The app may ask for the following device permissions.
- Camera
- To take photos of your recipes. Photos stay on your device and in your own iCloud, and are included only if you choose to share that recipe.
- Photo Library
- To pick existing photos for your recipes. Selected photos are copied into the app’s own storage.
- Reminders
- To export your grocery list to the Apple Reminders app on your device.
- Notifications
- To send meal-planning reminders, and to tell you when something changes in a shared kitchen you belong to. Both are composed on your device. iCloud may send your device a silent signal that new kitchen data is available; that signal carries no content, and nothing passes through a BaoBei Labs server.
BaoBei Kitchen uses Google Firebase for crash reporting and basic usage analytics, so bugs can be found and fixed and so the most-used features are known. Firebase receives:
- Crash reports — stack traces, device model, OS version, and app state at the moment of a crash. No recipe content and no personal data.
- Usage events — anonymous events such as “a recipe was created”, “the grocery list was cleared” or “a kitchen was joined”. We never record which recipe, what ingredients, kitchen names, member names, or anything you typed.
- Device information — device model, operating system version, and app version, so fixes can be prioritised for the most common devices.
This data is not linked to your identity. Firebase data is processed by Google in accordance with Google’s Firebase privacy policy. No other third-party services, advertising SDKs or tracking tools are used.
Uploads travel over encrypted connections. Files on our storage are protected by rules limiting their size and type, and by Firebase App Check, which confirms that an upload came from a genuine copy of the app rather than a script. Data in iCloud is protected by Apple’s encryption and by your Apple Account.
You can delete any recipe, meal plan entry, grocery item or cook log in the app at any time. Deleting the app removes the copy on your device. Data you have synced to your own iCloud is removed by deleting it in the app, or by removing the app’s data from your iCloud settings. Leaving a shared kitchen removes your membership; ending one you own makes it read-only for its members. Shared recipe links expire on their own after 30 days.
BaoBei Kitchen is not directed at children, and we do not knowingly collect data from them.
If this policy changes, the updated version is posted on this page with a new effective date.