I made an app 😜

December 31, 2025 — Comments — life, tinker, tech, software, apps — 5 min read

App Screenshot — Dashboard in Light and Dark Mode

What do you get when you mix a software engineer (husband) with a night-shift-working respiratory therapist (wife) -- who can't find a calorie tracker that fits their needs?

Another calorie tracker app, of course!

Most, if not all, apps out there today have a fixed "breakfast-lunch-dinner-snack" meal structure. This doesn't work for people who work non-traditional hours, like my wife. So I set out to build an app that allows users to define their own meal structure. This app has a timeline of feedings and no arbitrary buckets. You can set when your day transitions, and add feedings wherever you want along that timeline. No having to fit into a pre-defined mold. Do you eat "lunch" at 2 am? No problem! You don't have to worry about what slot to log your meal into -- log it whenever it fits on your timeline.

I also use this app to track my own food intake as well, and I love the flexibility it provides. My goals are not to lose weight, but to grow muscle mass, so I need to make sure my protein and carbs are high enough and balanced with my energy expenditure. This app helps me do that.

I also wanted an excuse to play with some new ideas, so I built this with Expo and react-native for the front-end and Firebase for the backend. It's been a fun experience so far, and I am pleased with how it's progressing. Here are some technical details and screenshots of the app.

Built with React-Native on Expo
Uses TypeScript throughout
Serverless Backend with Firebase (Authentication, Firestore, Storage, Remote-Config, Functions)
Can be deployed to iOS and Android app stores (currently only on TestFlight for my wife and me to use)
Expo-Router / TanStack Query to manage state
NativeWind / Tailwind layout & style engine
Gluestack UI components
Food data is sourced from the USDA FoodData Central database and the Nutritionix API.

Dashboard Example — Dashboard Light Mode

Timeline Example1 — Top of Timeline with sample data

Timeline Example2 — Timeline scrolled down with sample data

Timeline Example3 — Sample entry details on the timeline

basket example — The logging basket when empty

basket example2 — The logging basket with two items

basket example3 — The logging basket as a meal

basket example4 — The logging basket as a recipe

Food List Example — Screen showing recipes (yours and your following)

new recipe Example — Recipe creation screen

new recipe Example2 — Recipe creation screen with pasting option

Food List Example2 — Screen of created foods/items not found in the db

What does this app do? (besides the opening premise? 😉) Well, I'm glad you asked! 😁

Searching and logging foods is easy with a comprehensive food database, barcode scanner, nutrition-label scanner, and the ability to save bespoke foods and recipes. You can set daily calorie and macro-nutrient goals, and track your progress with detailed stats and visualizations. It syncs with Health to read active calories and weight/body-fat-percentage. There is a calendar view to see your history. You can take progress photos for comparisons over time. You can join other users to share recipes and foods. There are a lot of features packed in! However, I'm still adding and refining features all the time.

scanner example — Example of barcode scanner

scanner example2 — Nutrition label scanner

scanner example3 — Nutrition label scanner example 2

scanner example4 — Nutrition label scanner example 3

progress photos example — Progress photos for comparison over time

team example — Social: list of who you are following

team example3 — Social: user search for people to follow¹

This is a full-fledged app that my wife and I are actively using. I can't afford to open it to the public, but if there is enough interest, I may consider it. Feel free to reach out if you'd like to know more or see a demo!

Social features are designed for me and my wife to share foods and recipes, but could be expanded to a wider audience in the future. The current implementation is basic and far from what I would include in a production app with many users. The user-discoverability is obviously too permissive for a public app. ↩

I made an app 😜

Footnotes