Plans

A plan is a store, not a menu: the pack quantities that would feed the people you name for the days you name. Auto Prepped compares it with what you already have in date and shows you only what is missing.

Every figure in a plan is arithmetic over the calorie and protein values printed on labels and the UK reference intakes for the people in your household. It is not dietary advice, and a plan that meets its target is not a claim that it is nutritionally adequate.

Make a plan

Open Plan. The form is filled in from your household:

• People is the number of people in your household. Change it to plan for more or fewer; each extra person adds the household average.
• Days is how long the store should last. It starts at the cover you said you wanted, or thirty days.
• Budget ceiling is optional. It only has an effect where the catalogue holds a price, which most supermarket items do not, and no price is shown anywhere.
• Space in litres is optional. The plan's approximate volume is shown against it; it does not change what is chosen.
• Buy it at limits the plan to products those shops normally stock. Leave every box clear to draw on the whole catalogue.

Your allergies and dietary needs are not asked for again. They are read from your household every time a plan is generated and shown above the button, with a link to change them. Where you recorded them decides whom they apply to:

• Recorded for the whole household. A product carrying one of these allergens, or without the label mark one of these needs asks for, never enters a plan. The panel says so: "Recorded for the whole household: no peanuts (applies to everyone)".
• Recorded for one person. That person's share of the plan's energy comes from products they can eat: free of their allergens and carrying the label marks their needs ask for. The rest of the store is not restricted. The panel lists each person by name with their needs and their share of the household's day, for example "Sam: no tree nuts, vegetarian, about 2,100 kcal a day of the household's 9,600".

The cupboard is shared, so a plan can hold something one person must not eat. Every line says who it is for and who it is not for, and why: "Not for Sam: contains peanuts". You will see that on the plan, in the gap, in shop mode and on every swap. A line that suits everyone says "For everyone". If the catalogue cannot supply someone's share from products they can eat, the plan says how much it could fill for them rather than hiding it.

Halal and kosher are not recorded on labels, so the catalogue cannot check them; a plan for a household that declares either, for everyone or for one person, says so and asks you to check each item.

Press Generate the plan. Each generation is saved as a new version, and earlier versions stay.

Read a plan

The gap comes first. The heading says how many packs are left to buy once what your pantry already holds in date has been subtracted. Items past their date or waiting for a date do not count as held. If you already hold everything, the page says so.

Cover shows three figures from the same arithmetic as the pantry page: your cover today, your cover once the gap is bought, and what the plan's lines would give on their own. The protein share of the plan sits beneath, against a provisional band, as a figure and not a verdict.

Variety. A store is spread across different products rather than piled on one. No product carries more than 8% of the plan's energy, no product runs past 4 packs per person per week, and each kind of food is spread across at least 3 products for a plan of up to a fortnight, 5 for up to a month and 8 beyond. A line held back by one of these says so: "Capped at 8 per cent of energy for variety". These figures are provisional and may change.

The plan can only spread across what the catalogue holds. Where a kind of food has too few products for the length of your plan, the page says so in a note above the lines, by kind and by how many more the catalogue needs, with a link to search the catalogue and add what you have by hand. An item you add is checked by the catalogue editor before the planner can use it. Locked lines are yours and are never capped.

A pack that is far bigger than the plan allows one product, a bucket of hundreds of servings in a fortnight's plan, is never chosen for you. The page lists any such item by name with how many times the plan's energy one pack holds. If you want one, swap a line for it and lock it. A plan never runs more than about a tenth over the energy it was asked for; the cover figure on the page shows what it gives.

Every line shows the product, the number of packs, its share of the plan's energy, who it is for, why it was chosen, and where it is normally stocked. Under each line you can:

• Set packs to change the quantity. Zero removes the line.
• Swap for another product in the same group that passes the same checks and suits everyone this line suits, sized to carry about the same energy.
• Remove the line.
• Lock the line so it is kept, at that quantity, when you regenerate.
• Report not at a shop, if the catalogue is wrong about where it is stocked. The report goes to the catalogue editor.

Regenerate, keeping locked lines makes a new version from the same inputs. The Plan page lists every version with what changed.

Shop

Shop this list shows the gap in aisle order. As each item goes in the trolley, press In the trolley: the item is ticked and the camera opens for its printed date, so it goes into your pantry as it goes into the trolley. With no readable date, go on to the estimate as you would for any item. The list stays ticked if you reload or pick up another phone. Put it back takes an item off the list without touching the pantry.

There is no export and no print. The product does not sell food: a plan says where an item is known to be stocked and never takes you to a checkout.

Meal ideas

Meal ideas on the plan page opens a list, day by day, of simple things to make from what the plan holds: one for breakfast, one main and one for morale each day where the store allows, each naming the products and how much of each to use, with a short method. Switch to the pantry, in date to draw on what your cupboard holds today instead; each item then shows the date on the tin or bag it comes from, marked read, confirmed, estimated or entered by hand as every date is.

These are combinations of items you hold, with quantities worked out from the weights printed on labels. They are not dietary advice, and a day of them is not a claim that it is nutritionally adequate. The page says so at the top and again beside the upgrade prompt.

The ideas never use more of anything than you hold. When there is only enough for a smaller portion the idea says so, and when nothing fits what is left, the day says that instead. The same idea is not offered on two days running while there is another that fits.

Mark as made logs each item as used against your pantry, taking it from the tin or bag with the soonest date first, exactly as Log as used does on the pantry page. Anything the idea names that your pantry does not hold in date is listed and not logged. Undo is on the pantry page, inside the usual window.

On the free tier you see one idea a day for the first tenth of the plan's days, rounded up and at least one day; a thirty-day plan shows three days. The paid tier shows every day, all three ideas a day, and the pantry source. Nothing about the trial is time-limited.