Serena Williams-Backed ‘Foody’ Wants To Help Cooking Creators Monetize Recipes

Married entrepreneurial duo Dan and Brenna Stitzel have raised $1.5 million in a pre-seed round for Foody — a startup that aims to help food creators monetize their recipes.

The round was led by Serena Ventures, reports Techcrunch, a fund founded and managed by tennis legend Serena Williams. Other participants included Goodwater Capital and angels Jack Conte, former Postmates exec Vivek Patel, Greenoaks Capital’s Neil Mehta, and KeepTruckin’s Shoaib Makani.

Foody — which likens itself “iTunes for recipes” — enables users to purchase recipes, or upload their own in an ad-free space.

At launch, recipe providers include Brandon Jew, Evan and Sarah Rich, Harold Villarosa, Gaby Dalkin, Amanda Frederickson, Amanda Haas

, Laura and Sayat Ozyilmaz, A16 Restaurant, and Tu David Phu. The average recipe looks to cost $1 — though creators can also sell collections as mini-cookbooks of sorts — and they keep 80% of earnings.

“There was not one great software to help food creators of all kinds, from restaurants to authors, to monetize their content and get it out there,” banker-turned-culinary student Brenna Stitzel said of Foody’s conception. “Nor was there one central place for home chefs to save, share, and store their recipes.”

The pre-seed round is being harnessed to grow Foody’s team of 10 engineers and developers to build out new products and features, Techcrunch reports.