This has a lot of potential!
I like the style, the complexity of the dishes, the direction (you mentioned a menu system), ... It is almost everything I'm looking for in a cooking game.
As for improvements, for me (on linux) the timer is way too tight for how complex the dishes (and controls) are. Either I would like an easy mode with a more forgiving timer or a practice mode with a timer that counts up (and holds your record).
Also, the context specific controls could be a bit better. Swapping is sometimes a bit awkward. For example, when you have a sheet on a counter and a bowl of dough in your hands, it would be nice to be able to simply press twice to first move the bowl to the sheet and then swap the bowl with the sheet and the bread.
Similar for ingredients from the box that you need to pick up with a bowl. I think it is more intuitive to pick up the ingredient and put it in a bowl or pan instead of the other way around. We could assume that it comes in a disposable bottle. Otherwise you could separate these items and put the ingredients without bowl in the box and the ingredients with bowl in a dispenser.
Finally, it would be nice to be able to change controls. For example, I would replace j/l by either q/e or the scroll wheel.
(I know the latest activity was a while back but I wanted to share my thoughts anyway.)