The #MENUVERSE
The New York Public Library is making available for download a vast collection of restaurant menus.
Here are some visualizations of this data.
Menuverse 1:
Simple maps of the Menuverse: it shows menu-pages (blue dots) and their dishes (white dots). As the numbers grow the Menuverse becomes more nebulous and interconnected, no dish is alone.
Menuverse 2
The next images show if menu pages share a dish.
When running it over a small number of dishes the Menuverse has a well-defined structure but soon it all curls up again into a big
knot. This I tried to overcome by tweaking the parameters. Later images connect the menu pages only if they share at least 10 or even 25 recipes.
#Menuverse3
These images show what type of ingredients are matched with what other types as reported by the name of dish.
It is color-coded (meat, dairy, vegetables, alcoholic drinks).