I failed on the chocolate ice cream recipe, as mixing Cocoa and Sugar only gives a Cocoa/Sugar mix… is it really useful? Probably since the mix exists, but the description is really telling me it’s not really chocolate and it’s too late to cook…
I eventually found I had to cook the Cocoa first, without any Sugar.
Game design
The game has a bit of Automachef with machines but since it’s not automated, I’d say it’s more a try-and-guess combination game in the end. Unlike point-and-clicks where only 2 or 3 combinations will work just to solve the puzzle at hand, many things work and you can keep them aside for later if not exactly what you want, so it encourages experimenting!
UI
I suggest you enable debug mouse control, it makes things easier when playing on PC (standalone or browser). You can easily find doc on this, or refer to this example of mine: function toggle_mouse at https://github.com/hsandt/GGJ2018-Transmission/blob/master/reordered.p8#L416 (check REORDERED on my profile to see what it looks like in the browser)
Audio
The BGM lacks coherence. If you’re beginning with composing and don’t want to go full throttle with music theory, I’d recommend you start with a background beat, then add a few melodic elements with a strong leitmotiv. Then make another phase B, then another phase C, and with the PICO-8 editor insert phases like A-B-A-B-C->repeat. This way you can get consistency and a bit of variety at small cost (in the long term you still get repetition, but it helps).