The modern cookbook
This series is my self‑hosted alternative to food subscription services: build a recipe library, plan a weekly cooking calendar, normalize the shopping list.
Intro#
I’m building my own alternative to food subscription services like HelloFresh: a personal recipe library, a weekly cooking calendar, and a small local AI that turns ingredients into a clean, normalized shopping list — with the option to automate ordering at my local grocery store (Rewe) later.
This project has a clear path:
- Collect and curate recipes into a searchable library
- Plan a weekly recipe calendar the family will actually eat
- Use a small local AI to normalize messy ingredient lists into a single, deduplicated shopping list
- Eventually wire up optional automation to pre-fill a cart with a grocery delivery/pickup service
What we’re building#
Tandoor Recipes consists of three main components:
- PostgreSQL database for storing all our recipes and data
- Tandoor web application that provides the interface and API
- Nginx for serving static files and handling web requests
The whole stack runs in Docker containers, making deployment and maintenance straightforward.
Build the library
Phase 1
Recipes
Curate and tag recipes from family, the web, and my notes. Keep images, categories, and dietary tags so I can search and scale recipes later.Plan the week
Phase 2
Calendar
Create a weekly cooking calendar with servings and leftovers in mind. Make batch cooking and repeat favorites easy.Normalize the shopping list
Phase 3
Shopping List
Run a small local AI to normalize items (e.g., “2x can tomatoes 400g” → “Tomatoes, canned — 2 × 400 g”), deduplicate, and group by aisle/category — fully private and offline.Optional automation
Phase 4
Rewe integration
Experiment with pre-filling a grocery cart (e.g., Rewe) from the normalized shopping list to streamline the last mile.
All entries in this series#
2025
The modern cookbook — Phase 1: Build the cookbook
·534 words·3 mins