Chapter 07
Sourcing assistant
Find location-aware ingredient offers, compare packages, save quotes, and handle estimates safely.
Sourcing searches for ingredient offers in the market represented by the selected Price Book.
Choose a mode
- Quick search for a few ingredients.
- Assistant for a conversational request or substitutions.
- Complete prices for missing catalog/recipe prices.
- Quote a list for an existing shopping list.
- Recent quotes to reopen saved results.
Make a useful request
Use purchasing language rather than a preparation sentence. Include grade, form, pack, or dietary constraint when it changes the product—for example, “dark couverture chocolate 70%, 2 kg” instead of an entire recipe instruction.
Read a result
Check:
- store/vendor;
- package price and quantity;
- normalized unit price;
- currency;
- link and observation date;
- confidence/source label;
- whether it is verified, cached, regional, AI-estimated, or conservative.
The cheapest package is not always the best normalized price, and an estimated result is not a supplier commitment.
Location and broad search
Standard search is centred on the Price Book location, and a broad retry widens the radius when the local result is empty or incomplete. Switching Price Books clears the visible working result so offers are not confused between locations.
You do not have to configure anything for this: the app centres the search on your Price Book city automatically. If you buy from a specific wholesale district and want tighter aim, open the Price Book purchasing context and set Price search location — pin your own coordinates with "Use my location" and choose a search radius. "Back to automatic" restores the default behaviour.
Where "Go to store" takes you
The button label tells you the destination before you click:
- Go to store — the merchant's own product or store page.
- View on Google Shopping — the ad's Google page, used when the vendor did not expose a direct link.
- Search on Google Shopping — a plain search, which is all an estimated price can offer.
Save a price
Select the result, confirm its package/unit/currency, and save it into the active Price Book. Depending on the workflow, it may appear as a review candidate before becoming the trusted primary price.
Substitutions and optimized cart
The assistant can suggest substitutions when an item is unavailable and can summarize a cart across result groups. Apply culinary judgment: allergens, yield, quality, and supplier terms can matter more than displayed unit price.
Quotas
Free sourcing usage is measured in provider calls, not simply the number of searches shown in history. A retry can consume another call. The interface warns when the allowance is exhausted. Paid plans include unlimited sourcing under the current plan rules.