Chef Nam Catering Website

Builder · 2025 · 3 weeks · 1 person · 3 min read

Custom website built with modern stack—100% coded with Claude, zero prior HTML/CSS knowledge

Overview

Built a complete custom website for a local catering business using Astro and Sanity CMS, entirely through AI-collaborative development

Problem

Client needed a professional website to showcase their catering services. Template solutions didn't capture the brand personality, and I had no frontend development experience—didn't know HTML or CSS.

Constraints

  • No HTML/CSS knowledge at project start
  • Client needed full content control (CMS required)
  • Performance-critical for local SEO
  • Budget-conscious—couldn't justify traditional agency costs

Approach

Treated this as a test of AI-collaborative development for unfamiliar domains. Used Claude Code as my development partner—not to generate code blindly, but to work through architecture decisions, debug layout issues, and understand what I was building. Learned to work with my machine differently: command line, local files, deployment pipelines.

Key Decisions

Build custom with Astro rather than use WordPress or Squarespace

Reasoning:

Modern stack = better performance = better SEO. Full control over design and functionality. Learning investment pays forward to future projects.

Alternatives considered:
  • WordPress with premium theme
  • Squarespace or Wix
  • Hire a web developer

Use Sanity CMS for content management

Reasoning:

Headless CMS gives client full control over content without touching code. Generous free tier. Excellent developer experience for building custom schemas.

Alternatives considered:
  • Markdown files (no CMS)
  • WordPress as headless CMS
  • Contentful

Deploy on Cloudflare Pages

Reasoning:

Free tier handles traffic easily. Global CDN for fast load times. Simple deployment from Git. Already using Cloudflare for DNS.

Alternatives considered:
  • Netlify
  • Vercel
  • Traditional hosting

Tech Stack

  • Astro
  • Sanity CMS
  • Tailwind CSS
  • Cloudflare Pages
  • Claude Code

Result & Impact

  • Near-perfect technical SEO
    Lighthouse Score
  • 3 weeks from zero knowledge
    Time to Build
  • $0/month (free tier)
    Ongoing Cost

Client has full control over content. Site loads fast, ranks well locally. Proved that AI collaboration can bridge significant skill gaps—not by replacing learning, but by accelerating it.

Learnings

  • The 'how do I deploy this?' friction is where most side projects die. Claude helped me push through.
  • Three sites later, I'm not a frontend developer—but I'm no longer someone who outsources anything technical
  • Working with AI on unfamiliar domains requires learning to ask better questions, not just accepting answers

The Skill Acquisition Pattern

This project revealed a pattern I’ve seen repeat across domains:

Capability loading (AI gives you access to skills) is the easy part.

Sparring (working through problems, building judgment) is where actual learning happens.

I could have asked Claude to generate an entire website. Instead, I used it to understand what I was building—why this CSS property does that, why this component structure makes sense, how deployment actually works.

The result: I can now build and maintain websites. Not because AI did it for me, but because AI collaboration accelerated the learning I needed to do anyway.

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