Reeper

This repository contains a self-hosted recipe web application implemented in Ruby On Rails.

Runtime docker images are available.

Requirements

• Ruby 3.4+
• PostgreSQL
• ImageMagick
• Redis (required for Sidekiq background jobs)
  • Recommended: Redis 6+
  • Start locally: docker run --rm -p 6379:6379 redis:6

Features

• Recipe management with images and OCR text recognition
• AI-powered recipe extraction with two methods:
  • Mistral + OpenAI: Image → Mistral OCR (markdown) → OpenAI parsing (structured recipe)
  • OpenAI Direct: Image → OpenAI (structured recipe)
• AI-powered OCR text cleanup using GPT-4 Mini
• Multiple recipes detection from single image
• Tagging and search functionality
• Auth0 authentication
• AWS S3 file storage
• Responsive UI with Tailwind CSS

Preparation for development

DB Setup

rake db:create
rake db:migrate

Restore dump

pg_restore -d reeper_development -h db -Upostgres file.dump

AWS credentials

Create .env.local file with AWS credentials

# .env.local
AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=AAAAAAA
AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=BBBBB

OpenAI API Key (for AI recipe extraction and OCR cleanup)

For the AI-powered recipe extraction and OCR cleanup features, configure your OpenAI API key:

Development:

# Option 1: Environment variable (recommended)
export OPENAI_API_KEY=your_openai_api_key_here

# Option 2: Rails credentials
EDITOR="code --wait" rails credentials:edit
# Add: openai_api_key: your_openai_api_key_here

Production/Dokku:

dokku config:set your-app-name OPENAI_API_KEY=your_actual_openai_api_key_here

# Optional: Override cleanup prompts per language
dokku config:set your-app-name OPENAI_CLEANUP_PROMPT_EN="Your custom English prompt..."
dokku config:set your-app-name OPENAI_CLEANUP_PROMPT_DE="Your custom German prompt..."

Optional Configuration:

• OPENAI_CLEANUP_PROMPT_EN: Override the default English cleanup prompt
• OPENAI_CLEANUP_PROMPT_DE: Override the default German cleanup prompt
• OPENAI_OCR_MODEL: Override the OpenAI model used for direct OCR (default: gpt-5.4-nano)
• OPENAI_OCR_PROMPT_FILE: Override the prompt file (in config/prompts/) used for direct OCR (default: openai_ocr.txt)
• OPENAI_MARKDOWN_MODEL: Override the OpenAI model used for markdown parsing (default: gpt-5.4-nano)
• OPENAI_MARKDOWN_PROMPT_FILE: Override the prompt file used for markdown parsing (default: openai_markdown.txt)
• OPENAI_URL_MODEL: Override the OpenAI model used for URL import parsing (default: gpt-5.4-nano)
• OPENAI_URL_PROMPT_FILE: Override the prompt file used for URL import parsing (default: openai_url.txt)

Mistral AI API Key (for two-phase OCR)

For the Mistral + OpenAI two-phase recipe extraction, configure your Mistral AI API key:

Development:

export MISTRAL_API_KEY=your_mistral_api_key_here

Production/Dokku:

dokku config:set your-app-name MISTRAL_API_KEY=your_actual_mistral_api_key_here

Note: The Mistral API key is only required if you plan to use the "Mistral + OpenAI" recognition method. The "OpenAI Direct" method only requires the OpenAI API key.

Jina AI API Key (for URL import)

For the URL-based recipe import feature, the app fetches web page content via Jina.ai reader. No API key is required for basic (free tier) usage.

Development:

# Optional: set for authenticated/paid-tier usage
export JINA_API_KEY=your_jina_api_key_here

Production/Dokku:

# Optional
dokku config:set your-app-name JINA_API_KEY=your_actual_jina_api_key_here

Note: Without JINA_API_KEY the free unauthenticated tier is used. Set the key to use your Jina.ai account quota and higher rate limits.

Start development server

Start dev-server, css build, js build

bin/dev
yarn build:css --watch
yarn build --watch

Start production via docker

Use provided docker-compose.prod.yml file for startup of postgres db and container for the rails app. Don't forget to set the following environment variables:

Required:

• AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID: AWS access key
• AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY: AWS secret key
• OPENAI_API_KEY: OpenAI API key for AI recipe extraction
• MISTRAL_API_KEY: Mistral AI API key (required for Mistral + OpenAI method)
• JINA_API_KEY: Jina.ai API key (optional, for authenticated URL import)
• Database passwords

Optional:

• MISTRAL_API_KEY: Mistral AI API key (only needed for "Mistral + OpenAI" method)
• S3_BUCKET_NAME: Override S3 bucket name (default: reeper)
• S3_BUCKET_REGION: Override S3 region (default: eu-central-1)
• OPENAI_OCR_MODEL / OPENAI_OCR_PROMPT_FILE: Custom model/prompt file for direct OCR
• OPENAI_MARKDOWN_MODEL / OPENAI_MARKDOWN_PROMPT_FILE: Custom model/prompt file for markdown parsing
• OPENAI_URL_MODEL / OPENAI_URL_PROMPT_FILE: Custom model/prompt file for URL import parsing