user preferences
grocery list
meal planner
main dashboard
approve meal
recommend new meal
meal nutrients
user preferences
grocery list builder
main dashboard
recommend new meal
approve meal
photon user dashboard
photon imessage reminder to eat your meal

WhatsCooking.ai

Cook what you already have, in the hour you actually have.

What it does

College students buy groceries they never eat. Dinner fails when the fridge and the calendar never meet. WhatsCooking.ai turns a grocery list or a fridge photo into meals that fit your preferences and the open time on your day, then texts you before the slot so you cook it or pick something else. Built for people whose schedule moves faster than their meal plan.

Key features

Smart schedule sync — Apple or Google Calendar import, plus meal slots that fit open time on your day
Fridge photo scanning — Snap the fridge; WhatsCooking.ai logs ingredients and suggests meals
Context-aware filtering — Schedule, groceries, diet, likes/dislikes, cuisines, and budget shape every suggestion
Swipe meal matching — Discover personalized recipes by swiping options for your mood and window
Grocery list — Track what you still need to buy, with USDA nutrient checks when configured
Campus dining fallback — Route to nearby open UW dining when cooking is not realistic
Voice + AI assistant — Talk or type with WhatsCooking for planning help and onboarding
iMessage reminders — Spectrum texts you before a planned meal or open slot

How we built it

React and Vite frontend, FastAPI backend, Postgres for plans and reminders, Spectrum iMessage for delivery, and Google Calendar OAuth for a read-only import of the day you already have.

Quick Start

git clone https://github.com/saanvikrishan/Dubhacks-26.git
cd Dubhacks-26/whatscooking
python -m pip install -r backend/requirements.txt
npm ci --prefix frontend && npm install --prefix photon

Copy secrets into backend/.env (see whatscooking/README.md). Then run these in three terminals from backend/, frontend/, and photon/:

python -m uvicorn main:app --reload --host 127.0.0.1 --port 8000
npm run dev -- --host 127.0.0.1
node remind.mjs

Open the Local URL Vite prints (usually http://127.0.0.1:5173/). API docs: http://127.0.0.1:8000/docs

Full setup, environment variables, and architecture: whatscooking/README.md

Challenges we ran into

Google's OAuth dance uses PKCE, and the code verifier was gone by the time the redirect came back, so a valid client still could not finish the token exchange. We keep the in-flight flow keyed by OAuth state so the verifier is still there when Google returns.

The calendar lives in the browser and can arrive from three sources, while reminders are sent by a separate poller that only sees Postgres. We built a sync bridge that writes internal, Google, and Apple events into one reminder table, with a stable key per event and day so each slot is texted once and an edit can send again.