Meal Prep App

A full‑stack meal planning app with ingredient‑based recipe search, personal planning, prep plans, and shopping lists.

Highlights

• Ingredient‑based recipe search powered by TheMealDB.
• Planner for organizing meals and servings.
• Prep plan generation using OpenAI (optional but required to generate plans).
• Shopping lists per recipe plus a manual list with editing tools.
• Custom recipes, favourites, and saved prep plans.
• Cookie‑based authentication with basic password rules.

Tech Stack

• Web: React 19, Vite, React Router, Apollo Client, Tailwind.
• API: Node/Express, GraphQL Yoga, MongoDB.
• External services: TheMealDB API, OpenAI for prep plan generation.

Project Structure

• api/ GraphQL server, resolvers, repos, adapters.
• web/ React client.
• docker-compose.yml MongoDB container for local dev.
• Architecture.md, ERD.md, Validation.md for deeper docs.

Local Setup

1. Start MongoDB

cd meal-prep-app
docker compose up -d

2. API environment variables (meal-prep-app/api/.env)

MONGO_URI=mongodb://localhost:27017/meal-prep
JWT_SECRET=change-me
CORS_ORIGIN=http://localhost:5173
JWT_ISSUER=meal-prep-api
JWT_AUDIENCE=meal-prep-web
OPENAI_API_KEY=optional-but-required-for-prep-plans
PORT=4000

Notes:

• CORS_ORIGIN is required for cookie auth and must match the exact web origin. You can pass multiple origins as a comma-separated list.
• JWT_ISSUER and JWT_AUDIENCE are optional and default to the values above.

3. Web environment variables (meal-prep-app/web/.env)

VITE_API_URL=http://localhost:4000/graphql

Note: there is no dev proxy configured, so VITE_API_URL is required for local development unless you serve the web app from the same origin as the API.

4. Install dependencies

cd meal-prep-app/api
npm install

cd ../web
npm install

5. Run the API and web app

cd meal-prep-app/api
npm run dev

cd ../web
npm run dev

API will be available at http://localhost:4000/graphql.

Scripts

API

• npm run dev – run GraphQL server with nodemon.
• npm run build – compile TypeScript.
• npm run start – run compiled server.

Web

• npm run dev – start Vite dev server.
• npm run build – production build.
• npm run preview – preview build.
• npm run test – run vitest.
• npm run lint – lint web code.

Data & Auth Notes

• Authentication uses signed cookies and JWT.
• Password rules: minimum 8 characters, at least 1 number and 1 special character.
• Prep plan generation requires OPENAI_API_KEY.

Useful Docs

• Architecture.md – system overview.
• ERD.md – database schema.
• Validation.md – business rules and validations.