Mealie

Description / name	Input element
Container Registry
Container Configuration Root Path
Timezone
User ID
Group ID
Mealie Host Port
Mealie /config Path

Intuitive self-hosted recipe management app designed to be the best recipe management experience on the web.


Port	`9000`
Registry	`ghcr.io/daemonless/mealie`
Daemonless	daemonless/mealie
Source	mealie-recipes/mealie
Website	mealie.io

Version Tags

Tag	Description	Best For
`latest`	Upstream Binary. Built from official release.	Most users — recommended.

Before deploying, ensure your host environment is ready. See the Quick Start Guide for host setup instructions, including the security model for host vs. container privileges.

Deployment

Podman AppJail Bastille

Compose CLI Ansible

services:
  mealie:
    image: "ghcr.io/daemonless/mealie:latest"
    container_name: mealie
    environment:
      - BASE_URL=http://localhost:9000  # The base URL for the application (e.g. https://mealie.example.com)
      - PUID=1000  # User ID for the application process
      - PGID=1000  # Group ID for the application process
      - TZ=UTC  # Timezone for the container
    volumes:
      - "/path/to/containers/mealie:/config"
    ports:
      - "9000:9000"
    # always (not unless-stopped) so FreeBSD's podman rc.d auto-starts it at boot
    restart: always

Save as compose.yaml, then run podman-compose up -d.

podman run -d --name mealie \
  -p 9000:9000 \
  -e BASE_URL=http://localhost:9000 \
  -e PUID=1000 \
  -e PGID=1000 \
  -e TZ=UTC \
  -v /path/to/containers/mealie:/config \
  ghcr.io/daemonless/mealie:latest

Save as run.sh, then run sh run.sh.

- name: Deploy mealie
  containers.podman.podman_container:
    name: mealie
    image: "ghcr.io/daemonless/mealie:latest"
    state: started
    restart_policy: always
    env:
      BASE_URL: "http://localhost:9000"
      PUID: "1000"
      PGID: "1000"
      TZ: "UTC"
    ports:
      - "9000:9000"
    volumes:
      - "/path/to/containers/mealie:/config"

Save as mealie-deploy.yaml, then run ansible-playbook mealie-deploy.yaml.

Warning

Exposing ports in AppJail means that your service can be reached from remote hosts. If that is not your intention, do not expose the ports and communicate with the service using the jail's IPv4 address or hostname assigned by the virtual network.

Director CLI

# .env

DIRECTOR_PROJECT=mealie
BASE_URL=http://localhost:9000
PUID=1000
PGID=1000
TZ=UTC

# appjail-director.yml

options:
  - virtualnet: ':<random> default'
  - nat:
services:
  mealie:
    name: mealie
    options:
      - container: 'args:--pull'
      - expose: '9000:9000 proto:tcp'
    oci:
      user: root
      environment:
        - BASE_URL: !ENV '${BASE_URL}'
        - PUID: !ENV '${PUID}'
        - PGID: !ENV '${PGID}'
        - TZ: !ENV '${TZ}'
    volumes:
      - MEALIE_CONFIG_PATH: /config
volumes:
  MEALIE_CONFIG_PATH:
    device: '/path/to/containers/mealie'

# Makejail

ARG tag=latest

OPTION container=boot
OPTION overwrite=force
OPTION from=ghcr.io/daemonless/mealie:${tag}

Save the files above, then run appjail-director up.

appjail oci run -Pd \
  -o overwrite=force \
  -o container="args:--pull" \
  -o virtualnet=":<random> default" \
  -o nat \
  -o expose="9000:9000 proto:tcp" \
  -e BASE_URL=http://localhost:9000 \
  -e PUID=1000 \
  -e PGID=1000 \
  -e TZ=UTC \
  -o fstab="/path/to/containers/mealie /config <pseudofs>" \
  ghcr.io/daemonless/mealie:latest mealie

Save the files above, then run sh run.sh.

Experimental

Bastille's OCI support is experimental. It requires buildah and shares the host network stack (inherit). Mount volumes with --volume HOST JAIL; without it, image-declared volumes are stored under ${bastille_volumesdir}/${jail}.

Compose CLI

services:
  mealie:
    name: mealie
    image: "ghcr.io/daemonless/mealie:latest"
    network:
      - mode: host
    environment:
      - BASE_URL=http://localhost:9000
      - PUID=1000
      - PGID=1000
      - TZ=UTC
    volumes:
      - "/path/to/containers/mealie:/config"

Save as bastille-compose.yml, then run bastille up.

bastille create -O \
  --env BASE_URL=http://localhost:9000 \
  --env PUID=1000 \
  --env PGID=1000 \
  --env TZ=UTC \
  --volume /path/to/containers/mealie /config \
  mealie ghcr.io/daemonless/mealie:latest inherit

Access at: http://localhost:9000

Interactive Configuration

Parameters

Environment Variables

Variable	Default	Description
`BASE_URL`	`http://localhost:9000`	The base URL for the application (e.g. https://mealie.example.com)
`PUID`	`1000`	User ID for the application process
`PGID`	`1000`	Group ID for the application process
`TZ`	`UTC`	Timezone for the container

Volumes

Path	Description
`/config`	Data directory (database, images)

Ports

Port	Protocol	Description
`9000`	TCP	Web UI

Using PostgreSQL

By default, Mealie uses SQLite. For better performance with multiple users, use PostgreSQL:

services:
  mealie:
    image: ghcr.io/daemonless/mealie:latest
    container_name: mealie
    environment:
      - BASE_URL=http://localhost:9000
      - PUID=1000
      - PGID=1000
      - TZ=UTC
      - DB_ENGINE=postgres
      - POSTGRES_USER=mealie
      - POSTGRES_PASSWORD=changeme
      - POSTGRES_SERVER=localhost
      - POSTGRES_PORT=5432
      - POSTGRES_DB=mealie
    volumes:
      - "/path/to/containers/mealie:/config"
    ports:
      - "9000:9000"
    depends_on:
      - postgres
    network_mode: host
    restart: unless-stopped

  postgres:
    image: ghcr.io/daemonless/postgres:latest
    container_name: mealie-postgres
    environment:
      - POSTGRES_USER=mealie
      - POSTGRES_PASSWORD=changeme
      - POSTGRES_DB=mealie
    volumes:
      - "/path/to/containers/mealie-postgres:/config"
    network_mode: host
    restart: unless-stopped

Note: With network_mode: host, use localhost for POSTGRES_SERVER.

Migrating from Linux

SQLite: No issues, just copy your data.

PostgreSQL: You cannot copy the postgres data directory between Linux and FreeBSD due to locale incompatibilities. Use pg_dump/pg_restore instead:

# On Linux
podman exec mealie-postgres pg_dump -U mealie mealie > mealie.sql

# On FreeBSD (start fresh postgres first, then restore)
cat mealie.sql | podman exec -i mealie-postgres psql -U mealie -d mealie

See daemonless/postgres README for details.

Implementation Details

Architectures: amd64
User: bsd (UID/GID set via PUID/PGID). Defaults to 1000:1000.
Base: Built on ghcr.io/daemonless/base (FreeBSD 15.1).

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