Schedule Trigger Automate

For the Schedule Trigger Automate, this workflow generates weekly dinner meal plans every Friday at 8 PM by randomly selecting recipes from the Mealie API. It simplifies meal planning, ensuring variety and convenience while saving time on recipe selection. Users can easily configure the number of recipes and plan offset days to tailor their meal prep needs.

7/8/2025
10 nodes
Medium
schedulemediumschedule triggersticky noteautomationcronapiintegration
Categories:
Schedule TriggeredMedium Workflow
Integrations:
Schedule TriggerSticky Note

Target Audience

Home Chefs and Meal Planners: This workflow is ideal for individuals or families who are looking to simplify their meal planning process. It caters to busy professionals, parents managing household meals, or anyone interested in organizing their weekly dinner recipes efficiently. By automating the meal planning process, users can save time and reduce the stress of deciding what to cook each week.

Problem Solved

This workflow addresses the challenge of weekly meal planning by automating the process of creating a meal plan based on user-defined parameters. It pulls recipes from the Mealie API, randomly selects a specified number of recipes, and schedules them for upcoming days. This eliminates the need for manual planning and ensures a variety of meals while saving time.

Workflow Steps

  • Schedule Trigger: The workflow is set to automatically run every Friday at 8 PM, ensuring meal planning is done at a consistent time each week.
    2. Configuration Setup: Initial parameters like the base URL for the Mealie API, the number of recipes to generate, and the offset days for planning are defined.
    3. Recipe Retrieval: The workflow fetches a list of all available recipes from Mealie, allowing users to specify categories if desired.
    4. Random Selection: A JavaScript code node randomly selects the specified number of recipes from the retrieved list, ensuring that users receive a varied meal plan.
    5. Meal Plan Creation: Finally, the selected recipes are formatted into a structured meal plan, ready to be used for the upcoming days.

    • Customization Guide

    To customize this workflow:
    - Adjust the Schedule: Modify the schedule trigger to run at a different time or frequency according to your needs.
    - Change Recipe Parameters: Update the number of recipes or offset days in the configuration node to fit your meal planning preferences.
    - API Configuration: Change the Mealie base URL to point to your specific Mealie instance and ensure your API token is correctly set up in the credentials.
    - Recipe Categories: If you want to focus on specific types of recipes, update the mealieCategoryId in the configuration node to filter recipes accordingly.