LockPot Help

LockPot is a native companion app for Mealie, the self-hosted recipe manager. It brings your recipes, meal plans, and shopping lists to your Mac, iPhone, and iPad, keeps a copy on your device so you can cook offline, and syncs your changes back to the Mealie server you run.

Getting started

LockPot connects to a Mealie server you already run. It does not host recipes on its own and does not work without a server.

Sign in: Enter your server's web address and paste an API token. You generate the token in Mealie under your profile. LockPot signs in with a token, not a username and password.
First sync: Once connected, LockPot pulls your recipes, meal plans, and shopping lists into a local copy on the device. After that it keeps itself in step in the background.
More than one server: LockPot remembers the servers you have signed into and can switch between them. Your token and server address are stored on the device, in the Keychain.

Note: Mealie username/password and OIDC/SSO logins are not supported. Generate an API token from Mealie's profile page and paste it into LockPot.

Recipes

The Recipes tab is where you browse, search, and edit. Pick the layout that suits you and narrow the list with filters.

Display modes: Five layouts: Gallery, Cards, Tiles, List, and Compact. Switch from the View menu to move between a photo-first grid and a dense text list.
Search, filter & sort: Search by name, and filter by category, tag, or source site. Sort by name, rating, date added, and more. Cookbooks you define in Mealie show up as filters too.
Editing: A tabbed editor covers the photo, details, ingredients, instructions, organize, nutrition, and notes. Changes save on the device right away and push to your server in the background.
Everyday actions: Scale ingredients, mark favorites, set a star rating, duplicate a recipe, and record "I Made This" to build a timeline of when you cooked it.

Cook Mode

Cook Mode is a focused, full-screen view for when you are at the stove. Ingredients sit on one side and steps on the other, with step photos and linked ingredients shown inline.

Follow along: Tap an ingredient to cross it off, and tap a step to mark where you are. The current step scrolls into view as you move through the recipe.
Screen stays awake: The screen will not dim or sleep while Cook Mode is open, so you can keep your hands in the bowl.
Timer: If the recipe has a cook time, Cook Mode shows a countdown and sends a notification when it is up.

Meal planning

The Meal Plan tab is a weekly calendar. Add recipes to days, choose a meal type, and see the week at a glance.

Add a meal: Drop a recipe onto a day, or use a random pick. The dice picks from your current list; the wand asks your Mealie server for a pick that respects your meal plan rules.
Send to a shopping list: Add a single meal, a whole day, or the week's recipes to a shopping list in a couple of taps.
Calendar sync: Optionally mirror planned meals into your Calendar, with per-meal-type default times. This is off until you turn it on.

Shopping lists

Shopping lists are card-based, with a progress bar and the recipes each list is built from.

Check items off: Tap to check and uncheck items. This works even when your server is unreachable; the changes queue and sync once you reconnect.
Recipes & quantities: See which recipes a list draws from, and step a recipe's quantity up or down. Items can be grouped by label, and you can reorder the labels.
Reminders sync: Optionally mirror a shopping list into Apple Reminders, which brings it to your Watch, CarPlay, and HomePod. This is off until you turn it on.

On-device AI

LockPot uses Apple Intelligence, running on your device, to speed up a few tasks.

What it does: Parses ingredient text into structured food, unit, and quantity; suggests tags and categories for a recipe; reads a nutrition label from text you paste; and proposes a crop for a recipe photo.
Where it stops: These features need a device that supports Apple Intelligence, with it turned on in system settings. They also create entries such as foods, units, tags, and categories on your Mealie server, so they need a connection and are turned off while you are offline. You can always parse and edit by hand instead.

Note: The Mealie parser is offered as an alternative to the on-device parser, so ingredient parsing still works on devices without Apple Intelligence.

Offline & sync

Your library is cached on the device, so LockPot keeps working when the server is not reachable.

Reading offline: Browse recipes, meal plans, and shopping lists from the local copy. When the server cannot be reached, LockPot switches to read-only and shows an Offline label.
Editing offline: Edits you make save on the device and push when the connection returns. Checking shopping items off is the one change allowed while offline; it queues and syncs later.
How sync works: LockPot compares timestamps and pulls only what changed. If the same recipe changed both on the server and on your device, it asks which version to keep rather than overwriting your work.

Importing recipes

From a link: Paste a URL and LockPot asks your Mealie server to scrape it. If the scrape does not work, it can fetch the page itself and try again.
Share sheet: From Safari on iPhone, iPad, or Mac, share a recipe page to LockPot to import it. On Mac, enable the extension once in System Settings.
From Mela: Open a Mela export (a .melarecipes file) to bring those recipes in.
Backup & move: Export your recipes to a file for a backup, and import that file to restore them or move them to another server.

On your devices

Widgets: Today's meal plan, a daily random recipe, and your active shopping list, on the home screen, lock screen, and Mac desktop.
Siri & Shortcuts: Open today's plan, start Cook Mode, or add a recipe to a shopping list by voice or in the Shortcuts app.
Spotlight: Your recipes are indexed for system search, so you can find one from Spotlight and open it in LockPot.

Privacy

LockPot talks to the Mealie server you configure, and to recipe websites you choose to import from. It does not collect analytics, and it does not send your library to the developer. Your server address and API token are stored on the device in the Keychain and are not synced to iCloud. Some app settings, such as sort order and display preferences, sync through your own iCloud account when you leave that on. On-device AI runs locally.

Full details are in the Privacy Policy.

FAQ

Do I need a Mealie server?: Yes. LockPot is a companion for a Mealie server you run. It does not store recipes on its own.
How do I sign in?: With a Mealie API token, which you generate under your profile in Mealie. Username/password and OIDC/SSO logins are not supported.
Can I use more than one server?: Yes. LockPot remembers servers you have signed into and can switch between them.
Does it work offline?: For browsing, yes. Edits save on the device and sync when the server is reachable again. Checking off shopping items also works offline.
Do I need Apple Intelligence?: Only for the on-device AI features (ingredient parsing, tag and category suggestions, nutrition reading, and photo crop). The rest of the app works without it.
Which platforms?: macOS 26, iOS 26, and iPadOS 26, from one native app.