If I were building a food takeout mobile app, and a user currently didn't have any user-defined favourites, would it be a pleasant UX for a user to see 'recommended restaurants'?
Pros: educates the user that there are good establishments/brands partnered with the app
Cons: the restaurants may not be close in distance to the user, so it may occupy unnecessary screen space/cause confusion given that it is takeout/pickup
Recommendations for takeout should be based on something you know about the user (location, cuisine, allergy accommodation etc.) in order to be meaningful. Use the onboarding of the app for example to make a profile for your user. Even if you only know the location, you'll still be able to show many relevant suggestions. If the ordering process goes through your app, you can also use that data for personalisation purposes.
Usually brands and establishments are local to the area, meaning it wouldn't mean much to a user to see that restaurant X in a different city is available within the app anyway.
