Pinterest launches advanced food and recipe search options

Pinterest has rolled out an improved recipe search function. (Image: 2013 Pinterest).

In response to the growing popularity of food as a category on Pinterest, the photo-sharing website has launched an improved recipe search feature that allows users to filter for vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free and paleo meal ideas.

Users can also search for meal ideas by specific ingredients, particularly handy for using up wilting ingredients in the fridge and cleaning out the pantry of products nearing their expiry date.

Entering search terms like avocados, black beans and bell peppers, for instance, will return dishes like quinoa salad, pork tenderloin with red pepper chili rub and black bean quesadillas, notes the site’s official Pinterest blog.

Those with specific dietary requirements or preferences can further filter their search by clicking on buttons like vegetarian or paleo. Vegetarian dishes are curated from the Food Network, vegan recipes from Epicurious, and gluten-free meals from Kalyn’s Kitchen and Leite’s Culinaria.

Simply Recipes provides the site with paleo-friendly meal ideas, while clicking on the ‘Indulgent’ button will yield sweet desserts from Nestlé.

According to a ShareThis infographic, food and recipe pins on Pinterest grew from 11 percent in 2012 to 18 percent last fall.

Similar sites include Foodily.com, an online archive of 2 million recipes that also allows users to share recipes with friends online, and Allrecipes.com, a crowd-sourced recipe