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Build a pantry-ledger meal app with Claude Code (House Menu)

WorkedEvidence: Described by posterPosted Last checked

Eric Chavez used Claude Code to ship House Menu with a 133-migration pantry ledger now in daily home use.

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What the prompt labels mean

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Help me build a household meal app with a pantry ledger: meals on a calendar as guest checks, available vs reserved stock in Postgres, grocery lines that only buy missing items when a meal is locked, price tracking, and a narrow API so an AI assistant can propose changes without bypassing the ledger. Include tested migrations.

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ChatGPT Gemini Grok Claude

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Optional stronger version

Our rewrite with extra checks. The poster didn't test it.

Before you start, ask me 1–3 short questions about the details below and wait for my answers. Once I've answered, confirm the plan in one line and run the whole task start to finish.

Goal: Build a household meal planner with a tested pantry ledger and shared grocery list.

Questions to ask me first:
- Who is in the household and how do they sign in?
- Where should Postgres and the app host?
- Should an AI assistant be allowed to propose meal locks?

Inputs (fill in or confirm):
- Household: [MEMBERS]
- Stack: [REACT / SUPABASE / VERCEL]
- AI write API: [YES / NO]

Rules:
- Stock moves only through database functions.
- Never double-buy reserved ingredients.
- Keep a secret-free demo mode for screenshots.

Checkpoint: Show the ledger schema and lock flow before UI polish.

If you get stuck: If a migration test fails, stop and fix before adding features.

Verify before you finish: Locking then unlocking a meal leaves stock unchanged in tests.

Output: Working PWA with calendar, pantry, grocery list, and migration tests.

Done when: The household can plan meals without double-buying pantry stock.

AI tool

Claude Code

Outcome

Eric Chavez built The House Menu with Claude Code: a phone-first household meal planner where meals are diner-style guest checks, a Postgres pantry ledger tracks available vs reserved stock across 133 tested migrations, and locking a meal reserves ingredients so the shared grocery list only buys what is missing. An AI assistant proposes meal changes through a narrow serverless write API that still runs the same database functions as the UI. The app is in daily home use after about six weeks of building (742 commits).

Evidence: Described by posterThe person describes what happened in words, without screenshots or video.

Source

Posted
by Eric Chavez
Last checked
Method:
How we verify

https://ericmchavez.github.io/projects/house-menu

Context: Portfolio case study; exact publish day not listed—month estimated mid-2026 from project timing. Repo is private; demo uses fictional data.

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