HowToCook-mcp

A Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that exposes a recipe/diet assistant backed by the HowToCook dataset, offering tools to query recipes, filter by categories, fetch recipe details, recommend a weekly menu based on constraints (e.g., allergies/avoid items/people count), and generate a menu for today.

Evaluated Mar 30, 2026 (21d ago)

Repo ↗ Ai Ml mcp recipe meal-planning food typescript nodejs desktop-extensions ai-tools

⚙ Agent Friendliness

/ 100

Can an agent use this?

🔒 Security

/ 100

Is it safe for agents?

⚡ Reliability

/ 100

Does it work consistently?

Score Breakdown

⚙ Agent Friendliness

MCP Quality

Documentation

Error Messages

Auth Simplicity

100

Rate Limits

🔒 Security

TLS Enforcement

Auth Strength

Scope Granularity

Dep. Hygiene

Secret Handling

No auth/authorization is described; the server can be run with different transports (stdio/http/sse) but the README does not document security controls (e.g., TLS requirements, auth for http/sse, request signing). Dependency list includes common packages; no CVE/security statements are provided in the provided content.

⚡ Reliability

Uptime/SLA

Version Stability

Breaking Changes

Error Recovery

Best When

You want an MCP toolset that can be plugged into an MCP-compatible client (e.g., Claude Desktop, Cursor) to recommend meals using a recipe database.

Avoid When

You need strict security controls (tenant isolation, signed requests, user-level auth) or you need documented rate-limits, pagination semantics, and robust error/retry/idempotency guarantees.

Use Cases

• Chatbot-assisted recipe discovery (search by category or name)
• Meal planning for a week with dietary constraints (allergies/avoid items) and group size
• Generating a single-day menu based on peopleCount
• Integrating an existing recipe knowledge base into any MCP-compatible AI client

Not For

• Production-grade personal health/medical guidance
• Applications requiring strong user authentication, authorization, or per-user data isolation
• Use cases needing comprehensive pagination/streaming guarantees for very large result sets

Interface

REST API

GraphQL

gRPC

MCP Server

Yes

SDK

Webhooks

Authentication

OAuth: No Scopes: No

No authentication is described in the README (tools appear available to any client that can connect/run the MCP server).

Pricing

Free tier: No

Requires CC: No

README mentions a hosted MCP URL for immediate experience, but no pricing or usage limits are stated.

Agent Metadata

Pagination

none

Idempotent

False

Retry Guidance

Not documented

Known Gotchas

⚠ README warns that querying all recipes can be problematic due to context size.
⚠ No documented rate limits, pagination semantics, or retry/error-handling behavior for each MCP tool.

Alternatives

Build a custom MCP server around the HowToCook dataset or another recipe API with an OpenAPI-defined backend Use a dedicated recipe/search API (REST) and connect it directly to your agent without MCP Use an LLM + curated recipe dataset retrieval (RAG) rather than an MCP server wrapper

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Scores are editorial opinions as of 2026-03-30.