Building Chicken Tinder: A Real-Time Group Decision App

Earlier this year, my coworkers and I participated in a code-a-thon event. While we didn’t walk away with the trophy, we walked away with something arguably more valuable: a working application that solves a real problem and gave us firsthand experience building real-time applications.

We called it Chicken Tinder.

The Problem

Anyone who has ever tried to make dinner plans with a group of friends knows the struggle:

• One person wants sushi
• Another insists on pizza
• Someone else doesn’t care, but definitely not tacos again

The back-and-forth can drag on longer than the meal itself. We wanted to solve this decision-making deadlock with an app that makes the process fast, collaborative, and even a little fun.

The Solution: Chicken Tinder

Chicken Tinder is a web application that lets friends quickly create or join a shared “room” where they can suggest, vote on, and agree on a restaurant in real time.

Key Features

• Create or join rooms for group decision-making
• Suggest restaurants and add them to the group pool
• Vote on options to see where the consensus lands
• Real-time updates so everyone sees changes instantly
• Directions provided once the group makes a final choice

We built it with .NET 8, Blazor WebAssembly, and Razor Pages. These tools allowed us to move quickly, focus on functionality, and still deliver a clean user experience.

A Look at the App

Users can start by creating a room or joining one with a shared link or code.

Once a room is created, the host can share the room code or direct link with friends:

Joining is as simple as clicking the link:

When everyone is in, the fun begins. Participants can browse through restaurants, add suggestions, and vote.

And when consensus is reached, the winning option is displayed along with directions:

What We Learned

While Chicken Tinder started as a fun idea, building it pushed us to explore several important concepts:

• Real-time communication: ensuring every participant’s view stayed in sync as votes rolled in
• Scalable architecture: balancing quick prototyping with a structure that could be extended for future use
• User experience: keeping the flow simple enough for friends to join and vote within seconds

These lessons are already influencing how we think about other projects at work.

Final Thoughts

We may not have won the code-a-thon, but we walked away with something even better: an app we can actually use with friends and family and a stronger understanding of building real-time web applications.