{ "data": { "category": { "area": "everyday", "capabilities": [ "cooking.recipes", "cooking.nutrition", "cooking.meal-plans", "cooking.pantry", "cooking.grocery", "cooking.food-recognition" ], "description": "APIs that find recipes by ingredient and diet, give the nutrition of a dish or a photographed meal, plan a week of meals around a pantry and a budget, and turn the plan into a shopping list or a grocery order. Compared on recipe and nutrition coverage, diet filters, whether a plan can be written back, the licence on recipe text and what the free tier allows.", "json": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/categories/cooking.json", "name": "Cooking, recipes \u0026 meal planning", "slug": "cooking", "test": "In this run, public evidence against the published checklist. When the task suites run, the same pantry list and diet sent to each listing for a week of dinners, the shopping list read back and one meal's nutrition checked against a reference table. We check the recipes fit the pantry, the diet rule holds and what the terms let an agent keep.", "title": "Recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs for AI agents", "toolCount": 8, "tools": [ "logmeal", "spoonacular", "instacart", "eat-this-much", "edamam", "fatsecret", "mealme", "nutritionix" ], "url": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/categories/cooking" }, "faq": [ { "answer": "LogMeal has the highest benchmark score of the 8 ranked recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs, 49.1 (D). spoonacular is second with 49 (D).", "question": "What are the highest-rated recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs for AI agents?" }, { "answer": "0 of the 8 ranked here grade BB or better, the bar for agent-ready on the Anchor benchmark.", "question": "How many recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs are agent-ready?" }, { "answer": "None of the ranked listings here accepts x402 for its main call yet.", "question": "Which recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs accept x402 payments?" }, { "answer": "By the Anchor benchmark score out of 100, a weighted mean of the scored categories minus deductions for negative events, from public evidence re-checked as vendors change. Listings cannot pay for a place. The latest assessment behind this page is from 3 November 2026.", "question": "How is this list ranked?" } ], "howToChoose": [ { "label": "Full recipe or a link", "detail": "Check whether the API returns the method and quantities or only a title, a picture and a link to the publisher, since an agent cooking with a person needs the steps." }, { "label": "Diet and allergen filters", "detail": "Check which diets and allergens the search can exclude and how the data was labelled, because a wrong label on an allergen is a harm, not an inconvenience." }, { "label": "Write the plan back", "detail": "Check whether meal plans, pantry and shopping lists can be written through the API, so the agent's plan reaches the person's own app and shop." }, { "label": "Recipe text licence", "detail": "Read what the terms say about storing, showing and reusing recipe text and images, as most recipe APIs licence the data for display only." } ], "picks": [ { "also": { "name": "spoonacular", "slug": "spoonacular", "why": "D, 49/100" }, "name": "LogMeal", "need": "Highest score overall", "slug": "logmeal", "why": "D, 49.1/100 on the benchmark" }, { "name": "spoonacular", "need": "Reliability", "slug": "spoonacular", "why": "58/100 on reliability, against 42 for the overall leader" }, { "name": "Instacart Developer Platform API + MCP", "need": "Schema \u0026 documentation", "slug": "instacart", "why": "80/100 on schema \u0026 documentation, against 71 for the overall leader" }, { "name": "Instacart Developer Platform API + MCP", "need": "Agent ergonomics", "slug": "instacart", "why": "71/100 on agent ergonomics, against 54 for the overall leader" }, { "name": "Instacart Developer Platform API + MCP", "need": "Security \u0026 auth", "slug": "instacart", "why": "61/100 on security \u0026 auth, against 58 for the overall leader" }, { "name": "Eat This Much Partner API", "need": "Maintenance \u0026 community", "slug": "eat-this-much", "why": "58/100 on maintenance \u0026 community, against 31 for the overall leader" }, { "name": "spoonacular", "need": "Transparency \u0026 trust", "slug": "spoonacular", "why": "61/100 on transparency \u0026 trust, against 57 for the overall leader" }, { "name": "Edamam", "need": "A hosted MCP endpoint", "slug": "edamam", "why": "remote MCP server, nothing to install" } ], "ranked": 8, "shortlist": [ { "bestFor": "Agents that log meals from photos for a person and keep a nutrition history with goals, plans and manager oversight, within the EU.", "grade": "D", "name": "LogMeal", "position": 1, "price": "Paid", "score": 49.1, "slug": "logmeal", "strengths": [ "One image call returns segmented dishes with ranked candidates, serving size in grams and a path to ingredients and more than 35 nutrients", "Per-user and per-manager bearer tokens with a rotation endpoint, a password proof step and instant disabling of an end user", "Rate limits published with numbers and reported in RateLimit-* and X-Account-Credits-* headers, with documented exponential backoff on 429" ], "url": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/logmeal", "verdict": "Photo recognition that returns dishes, ingredients, grams and nutrients, with per-user tokens, rate-limit headers, backoff guidance and a 30-day trial with no card. No price is published, there is no status page, SLA or security programme, and submitted images are kept indefinitely and used to develop models unless the user asks for deletion.", "weaknesses": [ "No plan price is published; the pricing pages describe credits and limits and leave figures to the account", "No status page, SLA, security.txt, disclosure policy or certification found; support answers within 24 to 48 hours on weekdays", "Food images and nutrition data are retained without a time limit and used to develop models by default, and the terms let LogMeal train on submitted data" ], "where": "local", "x402": "no" }, { "bestFor": "Agents that need recipe search with diet and nutrient filters, ingredient substitutions and nutrition, and meal plans or shopping lists written to a connected user.", "grade": "D", "name": "spoonacular", "position": 2, "price": "$29 / mo", "score": 49, "slug": "spoonacular", "strengths": [ "Public OpenAPI 3.0 document with 97 paths, and generated SDKs in 24 languages under MIT", "Free plan of 50 points a day with no card, with public plan prices and per-point overage rates", "Quota and rate limits published with numbers, reported in three response headers on every call" ], "url": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/spoonacular", "verdict": "A broad recipe, ingredient, product and meal-plan API with a public OpenAPI document, 24 generated SDKs and a free 50-point day with no card. One key per account travels in the query string by default, the status page showed no data to our reader, and the terms allow caching for an hour at most.", "weaknesses": [ "One all-powerful key per account, documented in the `apiKey` query parameter and sent that way by the MCP server", "status.spoonacular.com answered with a data error and no history on 3 November 2026, and no incident record could be read", "No security.txt, disclosure policy or certification found, and the privacy policy's last revision is dated 2023" ], "where": "local", "x402": "no" }, { "bestFor": "Grocery list and recipe hand-off for meal planning and recipe agents in the US and Canada.", "grade": "D", "name": "Instacart Developer Platform API + MCP", "position": 3, "price": "Free", "score": 48.5, "slug": "instacart", "strengths": [ "Hosted MCP server at https://mcp.instacart.com/mcp with two tools, create-recipe and create-shopping-list, each with typed JSON Schema inputs", "Errors return an HTTP code, an internal error code and a meta key naming the field, with per-endpoint error tables", "Separate development and production hosts and keys, with key rotation and revocation documented" ], "url": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/instacart", "verdict": "Two compact MCP tools and a small REST API with structured errors let an agent turn a list into an Instacart cart link. The agent cannot search products, see prices, place an order or follow one, and production keys need a demo review that Instacart puts at 30 to 40 days. No status page or published rate figure was found.", "weaknesses": [ "No product search, price, order, order status or return endpoint. The person picks the store and checks out on Instacart", "Production keys need a screen-recorded demo and review, and Instacart puts access request to production at about 30 to 40 days", "No status page and no rate limit figure, only a 429 with advice to retry later" ], "where": "hosted", "x402": "no" }, { "bestFor": "Health, fitness, dietitian and healthcare apps that want generated meal plans and grocery lists under contract.", "grade": "E", "name": "Eat This Much Partner API", "position": 4, "price": "Paid", "score": 45.7, "slug": "eat-this-much", "strengths": [ "Public OpenAPI 3.0.3 (version 4.2.0) with curl samples, named response schemas and a per-operation credit cost", "Dated changelog with eight entries since 14 July 2026, breaking changes labelled, newest 15 October 2026", "Week, day or single meal generation to calories and macro ranges, with diet presets, exclusions by name or food id, a grocery list and HTML or PDF rendering" ], "url": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/eat-this-much", "verdict": "A public OpenAPI 3.0.3 document with credits and concurrency limits per operation, enum diet presets and a dated changelog describes a meal plan generator an agent can read well. Access needs a partner contract with no self-serve signup, no published price and no status page, and the API is in early access.", "weaknesses": [ "No self-serve signup. Partners are onboarded after a contract, the API is in early access and prices are tailored per partner", "No status page, SLA, Retry-After guidance or idempotency keys; generation is charged per call", "No official SDK, llms.txt or Markdown docs; the docs page is the OpenAPI document alone" ], "where": "local", "x402": "no" }, { "bestFor": "Agents that need recipe candidates filtered by diet, allergen and nutrient ranges with nutrition on each, or food and barcode nutrition through the MCP tools.", "grade": "E", "name": "Edamam", "position": 5, "price": "$9 / mo", "score": 42.2, "slug": "edamam", "strengths": [ "Public OpenAPI 3.0.3 documents for Recipe Search v2 and the Food Database, with typed enums for diet, health, cuisine, dish and meal filters", "`field` selection of 31 response fields and `_links.next` paging keep responses sized for a context window", "Hosted Food MCP server with two compact tools, included with Food Database plans, reachable with the same app credentials" ], "url": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/edamam", "verdict": "Recipe search with 36 health labels, nutrient range filters and field selection, documented in a public OpenAPI file, with a two-tool hosted MCP server for food nutrition and images. Web recipes carry no instructions, every plan is prepaid with human-only requests and tight caching rules, and the terms, privacy policy and any status page could not be read.", "weaknesses": [ "The API terms of use and privacy policy render by script and could not be read; no status page, security.txt or disclosure policy was found", "Web recipes return a source link and no cooking instructions; instructions need the $399 Plus plan's licensed set", "Credentials travel as `app_id` and `app_key` query parameters in the documented scheme, one pair per application with no scopes" ], "where": "hosted", "x402": "no" }, { "bestFor": "Agents logging foods and reading serving-level nutrients, allergens and barcodes for a person, with diaries written back; strongest outside the US on Premier with 62 regional datasets.", "grade": "E", "name": "fatsecret Platform API", "position": 6, "price": "Freemium", "score": 42, "slug": "fatsecret", "strengths": [ "OAuth 2.0 client credentials with seven scopes, 24-hour tokens and token requests limited to registered IP addresses", "Basic edition free on self sign-up with 5,000 calls a day and no card", "Serving-level nutrients with allergen and preference flags, barcode lookup and 212 region codes in 26 languages on Premier" ], "url": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/fatsecret", "verdict": "OAuth 2.0 client credentials with feature scopes, IP-restricted tokens, a free 5,000-call day with no card, and per-serving nutrients with allergen flags on branded and generic foods. The newest search and image methods need the sales-priced Premier edition, there is no status page, OpenAPI file or official SDK, and the privacy policy and blog could not be read.", "weaknesses": [ "Natural language, image recognition, autocomplete, barcode scanning and foods.search v5 are Premier Exclusive, priced on request by market", "No status page, SLA figures outside Premier, OpenAPI document, llms.txt, changelog or official SDK found", "No HTTP 429 or Retry-After documented; limits surface as error codes 11 and 12 in the body" ], "where": "local", "x402": "no" }, { "bestFor": "Agents that must place a real restaurant or grocery order in the US or Canada, or compare live prices across stores, and can hold a card on the account.", "grade": "E", "name": "MealMe API", "position": 7, "price": "$0.10 / call", "score": 38.4, "slug": "mealme", "strengths": [ "Search, inventory, cart, order, payment, tracking webhook and support chat in one API, covering restaurants and grocery stores in the US and Canada", "Per-call price published without login, $0.10 a successful call with no monthly minimum, or $250 a month unlimited", "Store search takes a projections list to size responses and pages through next_page; product search accepts UPC codes" ], "url": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/mealme", "verdict": "An agent can search stores and products, fetch live quotes and place a real order through one REST API priced at $0.10 a successful call. One all-powerful key, no rate limit figures, no status page, no idempotency key on orders and release notes that stop at 6 May 2025 are the limits.", "weaknesses": [ "One key with no scopes, read-only mode, expiry or rotation documented, sent in a custom Id-Token header", "No status page, SLA or rate limit figures; the 429 schema shows only an example message", "No idempotency key on Create Order, so a retried call can place a second order" ], "where": "local", "x402": "no" }, { "bestFor": "Agents that log meals from free text for a US or UK audience and need branded grocery and restaurant nutrition with UPCs, under a sales contract.", "grade": "F", "name": "Nutritionix API", "position": 8, "price": "Paid", "score": 33.6, "slug": "nutritionix", "strengths": [ "POST /v2/natural/nutrients parses phrases such as '1 cup rice' into serving weights, 11 summary nutrients and a full nutrient array in one call", "Branded foods, restaurant menu items and UPC lookup, with brand, region and claim filters on the instant endpoint", "Keys travel only in headers, with a per-user header that keeps billing off the key itself" ], "url": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/nutritionix", "verdict": "Free-text food logging and a branded-food and restaurant database behind four header-authenticated endpoints, documented in Markdown with an llms.txt index and backed by Syndigo's sub-processor list and disclosure programme. There is no public price or free tier since the open trial ended, no documented rate limit or 429, and the status, terms and pricing pages are closed to our reader.", "weaknesses": [ "No public free tier or published price; a limited trial is granted by sales after a form on www.nutritionix.com", "No rate limit figure, 429 or Retry-After documented; exceeded usage is reported as 401", "The status page, API terms and pricing page sit on hosts whose robots.txt disallows our reader, so none was read" ], "where": "local", "x402": "no" } ], "updated": "2026-11-03" }, "kind": "anchor.page", "links": { "api": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json", "html": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/cooking/", "json": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/cooking/index.json", "llms": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt", "markdown": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/cooking/index.md", "mcp": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp", "slim": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/cooking/index.min.md" }, "markdown": "All 8 ranked recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs on the Anchor benchmark, with a pick for each need and where each one falls short. Scores come from public evidence, re-checked as vendors change.\n\n- Ranked: 8 · agent-ready (BB or better): 0 · accept x402: 0 · hosted endpoints: 2\n- Full ranked table: https://www.anchorterminal.com/categories/cooking.md\n- Head-to-head comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cooking/index.md (28)\n- Methodology: https://www.anchorterminal.com/benchmark/index.md\n\n## The shortlist\n\n| # | Tool | Grade | Score | Best for | Price | Where |\n| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |\n| 1 | [LogMeal](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/logmeal.md) | D | 49.1 | Agents that log meals from photos for a person and keep a nutrition history with goals, plans and manager oversight, within the EU. | Paid | Local |\n| 2 | [spoonacular](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/spoonacular.md) | D | 49 | Agents that need recipe search with diet and nutrient filters, ingredient substitutions and nutrition, and meal plans or shopping lists written to a connected user. | $29 / mo | Local |\n| 3 | [Instacart Developer Platform API + MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/instacart.md) | D | 48.5 | Grocery list and recipe hand-off for meal planning and recipe agents in the US and Canada. | Free | Hosted |\n| 4 | [Eat This Much Partner API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/eat-this-much.md) | E | 45.7 | Health, fitness, dietitian and healthcare apps that want generated meal plans and grocery lists under contract. | Paid | Local |\n| 5 | [Edamam](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/edamam.md) | E | 42.2 | Agents that need recipe candidates filtered by diet, allergen and nutrient ranges with nutrition on each, or food and barcode nutrition through the MCP tools. | $9 / mo | Hosted |\n| 6 | [fatsecret Platform API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/fatsecret.md) | E | 42 | Agents logging foods and reading serving-level nutrients, allergens and barcodes for a person, with diaries written back; strongest outside the US on Premier with 62 regional datasets. | Freemium | Local |\n| 7 | [MealMe API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/mealme.md) | E | 38.4 | Agents that must place a real restaurant or grocery order in the US or Canada, or compare live prices across stores, and can hold a card on the account. | $0.10 / call | Local |\n| 8 | [Nutritionix API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/nutritionix.md) | F | 33.6 | Agents that log meals from free text for a US or UK audience and need branded grocery and restaurant nutrition with UPCs, under a sales contract. | Paid | Local |\n\n## Picks by need\n\n- Highest score overall: [LogMeal](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/logmeal.md), D, 49.1/100 on the benchmark. Also [spoonacular](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/spoonacular.md), D, 49/100.\n- Reliability: [spoonacular](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/spoonacular.md), 58/100 on reliability, against 42 for the overall leader.\n- Schema \u0026 documentation: [Instacart Developer Platform API + MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/instacart.md), 80/100 on schema \u0026 documentation, against 71 for the overall leader.\n- Agent ergonomics: [Instacart Developer Platform API + MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/instacart.md), 71/100 on agent ergonomics, against 54 for the overall leader.\n- Security \u0026 auth: [Instacart Developer Platform API + MCP](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/instacart.md), 61/100 on security \u0026 auth, against 58 for the overall leader.\n- Maintenance \u0026 community: [Eat This Much Partner API](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/eat-this-much.md), 58/100 on maintenance \u0026 community, against 31 for the overall leader.\n- Transparency \u0026 trust: [spoonacular](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/spoonacular.md), 61/100 on transparency \u0026 trust, against 57 for the overall leader.\n- A hosted MCP endpoint: [Edamam](https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/edamam.md), remote MCP server, nothing to install.\n\n## How to choose\n\n- Full recipe or a link: Check whether the API returns the method and quantities or only a title, a picture and a link to the publisher, since an agent cooking with a person needs the steps.\n- Diet and allergen filters: Check which diets and allergens the search can exclude and how the data was labelled, because a wrong label on an allergen is a harm, not an inconvenience.\n- Write the plan back: Check whether meal plans, pantry and shopping lists can be written through the API, so the agent's plan reaches the person's own app and shop.\n- Recipe text licence: Read what the terms say about storing, showing and reusing recipe text and images, as most recipe APIs licence the data for display only.\n\n- How the benchmark tests this category: In this run, public evidence against the published checklist. When the task suites run, the same pantry list and diet sent to each listing for a week of dinners, the shopping list read back and one meal's nutrition checked against a reference table. We check the recipes fit the pantry, the diet rule holds and what the terms let an agent keep.\n\n## Each one in detail\n\n### 1. LogMeal, D 49.1/100\n\nLogMeal's Food AI Engine is a REST API from AIGecko Technologies, a University of Barcelona spin-off, that recognises dishes in a photo, returns ingredients, quantities and nutrients, and logs intakes, goals and plans per end user.\n\n- Verdict: Photo recognition that returns dishes, ingredients, grams and nutrients, with per-user tokens, rate-limit headers, backoff guidance and a 30-day trial with no card. No price is published, there is no status page, SLA or security programme, and submitted images are kept indefinitely and used to develop models unless the user asks for deletion.\n- Best for: Agents that log meals from photos for a person and keep a nutrition history with goals, plans and manager oversight, within the EU.\n- Strength: One image call returns segmented dishes with ranked candidates, serving size in grams and a path to ingredients and more than 35 nutrients\n- Strength: Per-user and per-manager bearer tokens with a rotation endpoint, a password proof step and instant disabling of an end user\n- Strength: Rate limits published with numbers and reported in RateLimit-* and X-Account-Credits-* headers, with documented exponential backoff on 429\n- Weakness: No plan price is published; the pricing pages describe credits and limits and leave figures to the account\n- Weakness: No status page, SLA, security.txt, disclosure policy or certification found; support answers within 24 to 48 hours on weekdays\n- Weakness: Food images and nutrition data are retained without a time limit and used to develop models by default, and the terms let LogMeal train on submitted data\n- Price: Paid · Auth: API key · x402: No · Where: Local\n- Full assessment: https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/logmeal.md\n\n### 2. spoonacular, D 49/100\n\nspoonacular is a recipe and food REST API from skycraft GmbH in Dresden. It searches recipes by ingredients, diet and nutrients, analyses recipes and grocery products, builds meal plans and shopping lists, and has a small open-source MCP server.\n\n- Verdict: A broad recipe, ingredient, product and meal-plan API with a public OpenAPI document, 24 generated SDKs and a free 50-point day with no card. One key per account travels in the query string by default, the status page showed no data to our reader, and the terms allow caching for an hour at most.\n- Best for: Agents that need recipe search with diet and nutrient filters, ingredient substitutions and nutrition, and meal plans or shopping lists written to a connected user.\n- Strength: Public OpenAPI 3.0 document with 97 paths, and generated SDKs in 24 languages under MIT\n- Strength: Free plan of 50 points a day with no card, with public plan prices and per-point overage rates\n- Strength: Quota and rate limits published with numbers, reported in three response headers on every call\n- Weakness: One all-powerful key per account, documented in the `apiKey` query parameter and sent that way by the MCP server\n- Weakness: status.spoonacular.com answered with a data error and no history on 3 November 2026, and no incident record could be read\n- Weakness: No security.txt, disclosure policy or certification found, and the privacy policy's last revision is dated 2023\n- Price: $29 / mo · Auth: API key · x402: No · Where: Local\n- Full assessment: https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/spoonacular.md\n- Against #1: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/logmeal-vs-spoonacular.md\n\n### 3. Instacart Developer Platform API + MCP, D 48.5/100\n\nThe Instacart Developer Platform API and its hosted MCP server turn a recipe or shopping list into an Instacart Marketplace page, where the person picks a store and checks out. It also finds nearby retailers by postal code.\n\n- Verdict: Two compact MCP tools and a small REST API with structured errors let an agent turn a list into an Instacart cart link. The agent cannot search products, see prices, place an order or follow one, and production keys need a demo review that Instacart puts at 30 to 40 days. No status page or published rate figure was found.\n- Best for: Grocery list and recipe hand-off for meal planning and recipe agents in the US and Canada.\n- Strength: Hosted MCP server at https://mcp.instacart.com/mcp with two tools, create-recipe and create-shopping-list, each with typed JSON Schema inputs\n- Strength: Errors return an HTTP code, an internal error code and a meta key naming the field, with per-endpoint error tables\n- Strength: Separate development and production hosts and keys, with key rotation and revocation documented\n- Weakness: No product search, price, order, order status or return endpoint. The person picks the store and checks out on Instacart\n- Weakness: Production keys need a screen-recorded demo and review, and Instacart puts access request to production at about 30 to 40 days\n- Weakness: No status page and no rate limit figure, only a 429 with advice to retry later\n- Price: Free · Auth: API key · x402: No · Where: Hosted\n- Full assessment: https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/instacart.md\n\n### 4. Eat This Much Partner API, E 45.7/100\n\nThe Eat This Much Partner API generates a week, a day or a meal of recipes to calorie and macro targets and diet presets, builds the grocery list and renders the plan as HTML or PDF, under a partner contract.\n\n- Verdict: A public OpenAPI 3.0.3 document with credits and concurrency limits per operation, enum diet presets and a dated changelog describes a meal plan generator an agent can read well. Access needs a partner contract with no self-serve signup, no published price and no status page, and the API is in early access.\n- Best for: Health, fitness, dietitian and healthcare apps that want generated meal plans and grocery lists under contract.\n- Strength: Public OpenAPI 3.0.3 (version 4.2.0) with curl samples, named response schemas and a per-operation credit cost\n- Strength: Dated changelog with eight entries since 14 July 2026, breaking changes labelled, newest 15 October 2026\n- Strength: Week, day or single meal generation to calories and macro ranges, with diet presets, exclusions by name or food id, a grocery list and HTML or PDF rendering\n- Weakness: No self-serve signup. Partners are onboarded after a contract, the API is in early access and prices are tailored per partner\n- Weakness: No status page, SLA, Retry-After guidance or idempotency keys; generation is charged per call\n- Weakness: No official SDK, llms.txt or Markdown docs; the docs page is the OpenAPI document alone\n- Price: Paid · Auth: API key · x402: No · Where: Local\n- Full assessment: https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/eat-this-much.md\n- Against #1: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/eat-this-much-vs-logmeal.md\n\n### 5. Edamam, E 42.2/100\n\nEdamam sells nutrition REST APIs. Recipe Search covers about 2 million web recipes with diet and allergen filters, the Food Database adds barcode lookup and a Vision model, and Nutrition Analysis parses recipe text, with a hosted Food MCP server.\n\n- Verdict: Recipe search with 36 health labels, nutrient range filters and field selection, documented in a public OpenAPI file, with a two-tool hosted MCP server for food nutrition and images. Web recipes carry no instructions, every plan is prepaid with human-only requests and tight caching rules, and the terms, privacy policy and any status page could not be read.\n- Best for: Agents that need recipe candidates filtered by diet, allergen and nutrient ranges with nutrition on each, or food and barcode nutrition through the MCP tools.\n- Strength: Public OpenAPI 3.0.3 documents for Recipe Search v2 and the Food Database, with typed enums for diet, health, cuisine, dish and meal filters\n- Strength: `field` selection of 31 response fields and `_links.next` paging keep responses sized for a context window\n- Strength: Hosted Food MCP server with two compact tools, included with Food Database plans, reachable with the same app credentials\n- Weakness: The API terms of use and privacy policy render by script and could not be read; no status page, security.txt or disclosure policy was found\n- Weakness: Web recipes return a source link and no cooking instructions; instructions need the $399 Plus plan's licensed set\n- Weakness: Credentials travel as `app_id` and `app_key` query parameters in the documented scheme, one pair per application with no scopes\n- Price: $9 / mo · Auth: API key · x402: No · Where: Hosted\n- Full assessment: https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/edamam.md\n- Against #1: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/edamam-vs-logmeal.md\n\n### 6. fatsecret Platform API, E 42/100\n\nThe fatsecret Platform API is a REST API over fatsecret's verified food and nutrition database, with food search, barcode lookup, recipes, image recognition and natural-language food logging, plus per-user food, exercise and weight diaries, under OAuth 2.0 and OAuth 1.0.\n\n- Verdict: OAuth 2.0 client credentials with feature scopes, IP-restricted tokens, a free 5,000-call day with no card, and per-serving nutrients with allergen flags on branded and generic foods. The newest search and image methods need the sales-priced Premier edition, there is no status page, OpenAPI file or official SDK, and the privacy policy and blog could not be read.\n- Best for: Agents logging foods and reading serving-level nutrients, allergens and barcodes for a person, with diaries written back; strongest outside the US on Premier with 62 regional datasets.\n- Strength: OAuth 2.0 client credentials with seven scopes, 24-hour tokens and token requests limited to registered IP addresses\n- Strength: Basic edition free on self sign-up with 5,000 calls a day and no card\n- Strength: Serving-level nutrients with allergen and preference flags, barcode lookup and 212 region codes in 26 languages on Premier\n- Weakness: Natural language, image recognition, autocomplete, barcode scanning and foods.search v5 are Premier Exclusive, priced on request by market\n- Weakness: No status page, SLA figures outside Premier, OpenAPI document, llms.txt, changelog or official SDK found\n- Weakness: No HTTP 429 or Retry-After documented; limits surface as error codes 11 and 12 in the body\n- Price: Freemium · Auth: OAuth · x402: No · Where: Local\n- Full assessment: https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/fatsecret.md\n- Against #1: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/fatsecret-vs-logmeal.md\n\n### 7. MealMe API, E 38.4/100\n\nMealMe is a REST API from MealMe, Inc. that searches restaurants, grocery stores and products across the US and Canada, returns menus and inventory with live quotes, and places pickup or delivery orders with tracking and support chat.\n\n- Verdict: An agent can search stores and products, fetch live quotes and place a real order through one REST API priced at $0.10 a successful call. One all-powerful key, no rate limit figures, no status page, no idempotency key on orders and release notes that stop at 6 May 2025 are the limits.\n- Best for: Agents that must place a real restaurant or grocery order in the US or Canada, or compare live prices across stores, and can hold a card on the account.\n- Strength: Search, inventory, cart, order, payment, tracking webhook and support chat in one API, covering restaurants and grocery stores in the US and Canada\n- Strength: Per-call price published without login, $0.10 a successful call with no monthly minimum, or $250 a month unlimited\n- Strength: Store search takes a projections list to size responses and pages through next_page; product search accepts UPC codes\n- Weakness: One key with no scopes, read-only mode, expiry or rotation documented, sent in a custom Id-Token header\n- Weakness: No status page, SLA or rate limit figures; the 429 schema shows only an example message\n- Weakness: No idempotency key on Create Order, so a retried call can place a second order\n- Price: $0.10 / call · Auth: API key · x402: No · Where: Local\n- Full assessment: https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/mealme.md\n\n### 8. Nutritionix API, F 33.6/100\n\nThe Nutritionix API, run by Syndigo, turns free-text food and exercise descriptions into nutrition data and searches a database of grocery products, restaurant menu items and generic foods by name or UPC. Access is arranged through Syndigo's sales team.\n\n- Verdict: Free-text food logging and a branded-food and restaurant database behind four header-authenticated endpoints, documented in Markdown with an llms.txt index and backed by Syndigo's sub-processor list and disclosure programme. There is no public price or free tier since the open trial ended, no documented rate limit or 429, and the status, terms and pricing pages are closed to our reader.\n- Best for: Agents that log meals from free text for a US or UK audience and need branded grocery and restaurant nutrition with UPCs, under a sales contract.\n- Strength: POST /v2/natural/nutrients parses phrases such as '1 cup rice' into serving weights, 11 summary nutrients and a full nutrient array in one call\n- Strength: Branded foods, restaurant menu items and UPC lookup, with brand, region and claim filters on the instant endpoint\n- Strength: Keys travel only in headers, with a per-user header that keeps billing off the key itself\n- Weakness: No public free tier or published price; a limited trial is granted by sales after a form on www.nutritionix.com\n- Weakness: No rate limit figure, 429 or Retry-After documented; exceeded usage is reported as 401\n- Weakness: The status page, API terms and pricing page sit on hosts whose robots.txt disallows our reader, so none was read\n- Price: Paid · Auth: API key · x402: No · Where: Local\n- Full assessment: https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/nutritionix.md\n- Against #1: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/logmeal-vs-nutritionix.md\n\n## Head to head\n\n- [LogMeal vs spoonacular](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/logmeal-vs-spoonacular.md)\n- [Eat This Much Partner API vs LogMeal](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/eat-this-much-vs-logmeal.md)\n- [Edamam vs LogMeal](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/edamam-vs-logmeal.md)\n- [Eat This Much Partner API vs spoonacular](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/eat-this-much-vs-spoonacular.md)\n- [Edamam vs spoonacular](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/edamam-vs-spoonacular.md)\n- [Eat This Much Partner API vs Edamam](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/eat-this-much-vs-edamam.md)\n\n## Questions\n\n### What are the highest-rated recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs for AI agents?\n\nLogMeal has the highest benchmark score of the 8 ranked recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs, 49.1 (D). spoonacular is second with 49 (D).\n\n### How many recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs are agent-ready?\n\n0 of the 8 ranked here grade BB or better, the bar for agent-ready on the Anchor benchmark.\n\n### Which recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs accept x402 payments?\n\nNone of the ranked listings here accepts x402 for its main call yet.\n\n### How is this list ranked?\n\nBy the Anchor benchmark score out of 100, a weighted mean of the scored categories minus deductions for negative events, from public evidence re-checked as vendors change. Listings cannot pay for a place. The latest assessment behind this page is from 3 November 2026.\n\n## How this list is made\n\nThe order is the Anchor benchmark score, the same number as on each listing. Each listing is graded from public evidence against the benchmark checklist, and the picks are worked out from those grades, prices and facts. No listing pays for its place, and paid audits or listing help never change a score.\n", "meta": { "attribution": "Anchor Terminal (https://www.anchorterminal.com)", "attributionRequired": true, "credit": "CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link the page or API address you took it from (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)", "docs": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/docs/", "generatedAt": "2026-11-04", "license": "CC-BY-4.0", "method": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/benchmark/", "methodology": "0.7", "openapi": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/openapi.json", "preview": false, "run": "2026-10-01", "runLabel": "October 2026 research run", "terms": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data" }, "page": { "breadcrumbs": [ { "name": "Home", "url": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/" }, { "name": "Best of", "url": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/" }, { "name": "Cooking, recipes \u0026 meal planning", "url": "" } ], "description": "LogMeal (D), spoonacular (D) and Instacart Developer Platform API + MCP (D) lead the 8 ranked recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs. Picks by need, strengths, weaknesses and prices from the Anchor benchmark.", "facts": [ "LogMeal D", "spoonacular D", "Instacart Developer Platform API + MCP D" ], "h1": "Best recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs for AI agents", "image": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/assets/og/best-cooking.png", "path": "/best/cooking/", "published": "", "section": "tools", "title": "Best recipe, nutrition and meal planning APIs for AI agents in 2026", "toc": null, "updated": "2026-11-03", "url": "https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/cooking/" }, "tokens": { "markdown": 5350, "slim": 1430 }, "version": 1 }