The Chef · Restaurant website & ordering system

Case study The Chef Churrascaria Recife

A grill house in Manaus, from the first look to the order.

Client: The Chef Churrascaria Recife
Type: Restaurant website & ordering system
Role: Front-end adaptation, back-end & integration
Year: 2026

01Overview

The website of The Chef Churrascaria Recife, a grill house that opened in Manaus in 2025, joined to an online menu and a new API built for its dining room: one brand across three projects, with the menu served from a real database.

02The problem

A restaurant needed a public face, a menu customers could browse, and the start of a system for tables and orders. The pieces available were separate: a site template, an open-source menu app branded for another restaurant, and an academic ordering project that no longer ran.

02The approach

Build on what already worked, and write the part that was missing. The site was adapted from an open-source restaurant template, the menu app was taken from a public repository and rebranded, and the domain of the academic project was rewritten from scratch as a new back end both of them can share. The original authors are credited in the project's README.

03The build

What was actually built

01
The institutional site in Next.js 15 and React 19, adapted from an open-source restaurant template (MIT): Portuguese copy, the house's own dishes and story, its green palette, and a WhatsApp widget that opens a chat with the restaurant.
02
A new back end in Node.js, Express, TypeScript and Prisma on SQLite, written for this system: users with admin, waiter and kitchen roles, tables (comandas) and orders whose status moves from preparation to ready to delivered, behind JWT authentication, role checks and Zod validation.
03
A catalogue API that matches the endpoints the menu app already expected, seeded with the restaurant's real menu (picanha, alcatra, tambaqui ribs and more) and reusing the site's own dish photos.
04
The integration: the menu app rewired to the new API through an environment variable, its text rebranded from “Bravus Burger” to The Chef, and the two front ends cross-linked, with “Fazer Pedido” on the site and a way back from the menu.

Technology

Next.js
React
TypeScript
Tailwind CSS
Vite
styled-components
Node.js
Express
Prisma
SQLite
Zod
JWT
Vercel

04The experience

The “Pratos em Maior Destaque” section on a dark background, with three dish cards: chicken leg and thigh, rare alcatra and rare picanha. — The dishes of the day, each with its full description.

The featured dishes section on a phone, below the The Chef header with the “Fazer Pedido” button and the WhatsApp number. — Featured dishes, mobile, with the order button in the header.

The menu app's “Menu completo The Chef” page with Carnes, Aves and Peixes categories above a grid of dishes and prices. — The online menu, loaded entirely from the new API.

The Picanha na Brasa product page in the menu app on a phone: a plate with picanha, black beans, rice, farofa and vinaigrette. — A dish in the menu app, mobile. The logo image is still the original one.

The “Alguns de Nossos Pratos” section of the site on a phone, opening with the Picanha na Brasa card. — The house's dishes on the site, mobile.

05Where it stands

The site is live on Vercel. The menu app and the API run locally for now; the order and table routes exist in the API but have no screens yet, and the menu app's logo image still carries the original brand.

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