food52

Food52 CLI

Search, browse, and read Food52 from your terminal — with offline FTS, pantry matching, recipe scaling, and the editorial signals other tools throw away.

Every recipe and article on Food52, queryable without a browser. Ships with pantry match (find recipes from what you already have), search (offline FTS over your synced cookbook), recipes top (Test-Kitchen approved + rating-floored), and scale (resize ingredient lists via JSON-LD). The only existing Food52 CLI is a 2018-era Ruby HTML scraper that no longer runs against today's Vercel-protected site; this is a clean rebuild on Surf with Chrome TLS impersonation.

Learn more at Food52.

Created by @tmchow (Trevin Chow).

Install

The recommended path installs both the food52-pp-cli binary and the pp-food52 agent skill (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, Gemini CLI, GitHub Copilot, and other agents supported by the upstream skills CLI) in one shot:

npx -y @mvanhorn/printing-press-library install food52

For CLI only (no skill):

npx -y @mvanhorn/printing-press-library install food52 --cli-only

For skill only — installs the skill into the same agents as the default command above, but skips the CLI binary (use this to update or reinstall just the skill):

npx -y @mvanhorn/printing-press-library install food52 --skill-only

To constrain the skill install to one or more specific agents (repeatable — agent names match the skills CLI):

npx -y @mvanhorn/printing-press-library install food52 --agent claude-code
npx -y @mvanhorn/printing-press-library install food52 --agent claude-code --agent codex

Without Node (Go fallback)

If npx isn't available (no Node, offline), install the CLI directly via Go (requires Go 1.26.4 or newer):

go install github.com/mvanhorn/printing-press-library/library/food-and-dining/food52/cmd/food52-pp-cli@latest

This installs the CLI only — no skill.

Pre-built binary

Download a pre-built binary for your platform from the latest release. On macOS, clear the Gatekeeper quarantine: xattr -d com.apple.quarantine <binary>. On Unix, mark it executable: chmod +x <binary>.

Install for Hermes

Install the CLI binary first. The installer writes binaries to a per-user managed bin directory by default: $HOME/.local/bin on macOS/Linux and %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\PrintingPress\bin on Windows.

npx -y @mvanhorn/printing-press-library install food52 --cli-only

Then install the focused Hermes skill.

From the Hermes CLI:

hermes skills install mvanhorn/printing-press-library/cli-skills/pp-food52 --force

Inside a Hermes chat session:

/skills install mvanhorn/printing-press-library/cli-skills/pp-food52 --force

Restart the Hermes session or gateway if the newly installed skill is not visible immediately.

Install for OpenClaw

Install both the CLI binary and the focused OpenClaw skill. The installer defaults binaries to a per-user bin directory ($HOME/.local/bin on macOS/Linux, %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\PrintingPress\bin on Windows):

npx -y @mvanhorn/printing-press-library install food52 --agent openclaw

Restart the OpenClaw session or gateway if the newly installed skill is not visible immediately.

Authentication

No Food52 sign-in required. Food52 sits behind Vercel bot mitigation, but the challenge is passive (TLS-fingerprint), not JS-active — Surf with Chrome impersonation clears it without cookies or setup. Search uses a Typesense search-only key the CLI auto-discovers from Food52's public JS bundle, so users never see a key prompt or env var.

Quick Start

# Live Typesense search; sub-second results.
food52-pp-cli recipes search "brownies" --limit 5 --json

# Full structured recipe (ingredients, steps, ratings, kitchen notes) for one recipe.
food52-pp-cli recipes get sarah-fennel-s-best-lunch-lady-brownie-recipe --json

# Seed the local store with two tags worth of recipes — required for offline search and pantry match.
food52-pp-cli sync recipes chicken vegetarian --limit 100

# Tell the CLI what's in your kitchen.
food52-pp-cli pantry add chicken garlic lemon thyme

# Find synced recipes you can mostly make right now.
food52-pp-cli pantry match --min-coverage 0.6 --json

# Clean cooking-friendly view, ready to pipe to lp or paste.
food52-pp-cli print sarah-fennel-s-best-lunch-lady-brownie-recipe

Unique Features

These capabilities aren't available in any other tool for this API.

Local state that compounds

• pantry match — Find Food52 recipes whose ingredients overlap your local pantry, ranked by coverage.

  Reach for this when the user asks 'what can I make with what I have' rather than searching for one dish at a time.

  food52-pp-cli pantry match --min-coverage 0.7 --json

• search — Full-text search across every recipe and article you have synced, with type filtering.

  Use this for lookups that can't justify a Typesense round trip or when offline.

  food52-pp-cli search "miso" --type recipe --json

• sync recipes — Pull recipes for one or more tags into the local FTS-indexed store.

  Run before pantry match or offline search to seed the local cookbook.

  food52-pp-cli sync recipes chicken vegetarian --limit 100

• articles for-recipe — Find synced articles that mention a given recipe in their relatedReading.

  Use when the user wants the editorial context behind a recipe they've found.

  food52-pp-cli articles for-recipe sarah-fennel-s-best-lunch-lady-brownie-recipe

Editorial signals others ignore

• recipes top — Show only Food52 Test-Kitchen-approved recipes for a tag, with a rating floor.

  Pick this over a broad search when the user wants 'a recipe Food52's editors signed off on,' not just any community recipe.

  food52-pp-cli recipes top chicken --min-rating 4 --limit 5 --json

Recipe transforms

• scale — Scale a recipe's ingredients to a different number of servings using its Schema.org recipeYield.

  Use when the user is cooking for a different headcount than the recipe's default yield.

  food52-pp-cli scale mom-s-japanese-curry-chicken-with-radish-and-cauliflower --servings 8 --json

• print — Render a recipe as ingredients + numbered steps with no nav, no images, no ads, no comments — ready to pipe to lp or paste into notes.

  Use when the user wants to actually cook from the recipe rather than browse it.

  food52-pp-cli print sarah-fennel-s-best-lunch-lady-brownie-recipe

Usage

Run food52-pp-cli --help for the full command reference and flag list.

Commands

articles

Browse and read Food52 stories (articles) from the food and life verticals

• food52-pp-cli articles browse - Browse the latest Food52 articles in a vertical (food, life)
• food52-pp-cli articles get - Get a Food52 article (story) by slug

recipes

Browse Food52 recipes by tag and fetch single recipe details (extracted from Next.js NEXT_DATA embedded in SSR HTML)

• food52-pp-cli recipes browse - Browse Food52 recipes filtered by a tag (e.g. chicken, breakfast, vegetarian)
• food52-pp-cli recipes get - Get full structured details for a single Food52 recipe by slug

Output Formats

# Human-readable table (default in terminal, JSON when piped)
food52-pp-cli articles get best-mothers-day-gift-ideas

# JSON for scripting and agents
food52-pp-cli articles get best-mothers-day-gift-ideas --json

# Filter to specific fields
food52-pp-cli articles get best-mothers-day-gift-ideas --json --select id,name,status

# Dry run — show the request without sending
food52-pp-cli articles get best-mothers-day-gift-ideas --dry-run

# Agent mode — JSON + compact + no prompts in one flag
food52-pp-cli articles get best-mothers-day-gift-ideas --agent

Agent Usage

This CLI is designed for AI agent consumption:

• Non-interactive - never prompts, every input is a flag
• Pipeable - --json output to stdout, errors to stderr
• Filterable - --select id,name returns only fields you need
• Previewable - --dry-run shows the request without sending
• Read-only by default - this CLI does not create, update, delete, publish, send, or mutate remote resources
• Offline-friendly - sync/search commands can use the local SQLite store when available
• Agent-safe by default - no colors or formatting unless --human-friendly is set

Exit codes: 0 success, 2 usage error, 3 not found, 5 API error, 7 rate limited, 10 config error.

Use as MCP Server

This CLI ships a companion MCP server for use with Claude Desktop, Cursor, and other MCP-compatible tools.

Claude Code

claude mcp add food52 food52-pp-mcp

Claude Desktop

Add to your Claude Desktop config (~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "food52": {
      "command": "food52-pp-mcp"
    }
  }
}

Health Check

food52-pp-cli doctor

Verifies configuration and connectivity to the API.

Configuration

Config file: ~/.config/food52-pp-cli/config.toml

Troubleshooting

Not found errors (exit code 3)

• Check the resource ID is correct
• Run the list command to see available items

API-specific

• HTTP 429 or 'Vercel Security Checkpoint' on every request — Confirm you are running the printed CLI (which uses Surf + Chrome impersonation) and not your own curl. Plain HTTP is blocked by design; the CLI's transport handles it.
• recipes search returns 'Typesense key discovery failed' — Run food52-pp-cli doctor — it re-fetches the public _app.js bundle. Food52 rotates the bundle hash on each deploy; the CLI auto-recovers.
• recipes get returns 404 for a slug that exists — Food52 sometimes renames slugs. Try recipes search '<title-fragment>' to find the current canonical slug.
• pantry match returns nothing — Run sync recipes <tag> first — pantry match operates on the synced store, not the live site. Try food52-pp-cli search to confirm sync wrote rows.

HTTP Transport

This CLI uses Chrome-compatible HTTP transport for browser-facing endpoints. It does not require a resident browser process for normal API calls.

Discovery Signals

This CLI was generated with browser-captured traffic analysis.

• Target observed: https://food52.com/
• Capture coverage: 0 API entries from 0 total network entries
• Reachability: browser_http (95% confidence)
• Protocols: ssr_embedded_data (100% confidence), next_data_json (100% confidence), rest_json (100% confidence), schema_org_jsonld (100% confidence)
• Auth signals: none
• Protection signals: vercel_bot_mitigation_passive_tls (100% confidence)
• Generation hints: browser_http_transport
• Candidate command ideas: recipes search; recipes browse; recipes get; tags list; verticals list; articles browse; articles get

Warnings from discovery:

• scope_note: Hotline (/hotline, /hotline/questions/) returns only siteSettings in pageProps and renders no question/answer data in the DOM. The community Q&A is effectively unreachable for unauthenticated read scrapers. Excluded from CLI scope.
• scope_note: Shop endpoints exist on shop.food52.com and food52.myshopify.com/api/2025-01/graphql.json but require Shopify Storefront API token discovery; deferred from v1.
• scope_note: buildId (Pq8fQj0nm7uTx90i5u0si at the time of browser-sniff) and _app.js bundle hash change on every Food52 deploy. The CLI's runtime discovery (buildId from NEXT_DATA.buildId, key from regex over the active _app-.js) handles rotation transparently.
• scope_note: Typesense /collections endpoint requires the admin key (search-only key returns 403 there). The CLI does not list collections; it queries the known collection name 'recipes_production_food52_current' directly.

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Sources & Inspiration

This CLI was built by studying these projects and resources:

• hhursev/recipe-scrapers — Python (1900 stars)
• imRohan/food52-cli — Ruby

Generated by CLI Printing Press