Markdown import

You can import recipes directly as Markdown files, or import a ZIP archive exported from another Mirepoix installation.

How to import

On your recipes list, tap Add Recipe, then choose From a file. A file picker opens. Add Recipe and From a file are there whether or not the deployment has an Anthropic API key. A key changes only how a single file gets read — covered below — not whether you can import files.

Pick one or more .md, .txt, .text, or .zip files. What happens next depends on how many you choose and what kind they are.

A single `.md`, `.txt`, or `.text` file

Pick one text file and Mirabel reads it into a Recipe draft you review before saving — the same draft you’d get by pasting a recipe or giving her a link. It’s a review step, not an instant import: nothing joins your recipes until you open the draft and save it.

A file already written in Mirepoix’s own recipe format is read exactly as written, with no AI and no charge against your allowance. Mirabel says so — “This is already in Mirepoix’s own format, so I read it exactly as written” — and the draft appears right away. You still review it and save it, like any other draft.

Anything else takes the same route as text you paste. Mirabel reads it herself first; when that read comes out uncertain she turns to AI, which needs a key and draws on your monthly AI allowance. Where AI isn’t available she gives you her own plain read anyway, flagged for a careful check, and only when she can’t find a recipe in the file at all does she say so instead of drafting one.

To bring in files without the review step, pick more than one at a time or put them in a ZIP — both take the direct route below.

When she does hand the file to AI, a substitution the recipe offers and an ingredient it marks optional come back as fields — a substitute row under the ingredient, and the line’s own optional mark — instead of a note in the footer.

A very large file won’t read as a single recipe. When that happens, paste just the recipe into the chat instead.

Several files at once

Choose more than one .md, .txt, or .text file together and they import right away, one recipe each — no draft, no AI, and no charge against your AI allowance. Each file must use the recipe format and include a # Title heading — a file without one fails to import.

ZIP archives

A .zip file is expected to come from Mirepoix Export. It can contain recipe files, recipe photos, QuickBites, the ingredient catalog, and aisle/category ordering.

An exported archive carries each recipe twice: a readable .md file, and a .json file in a recipes/ folder that records the recipe exactly. The import reads the .json and skips the matching .md, so a recipe comes back the way it left, down to the shapes the text format can’t spell. If a .json is damaged, the .md is read instead and the import summary says so. An older archive with no recipes/ folder still imports from its .md files.

Editing an exported .md offline takes one extra step, because the .json is what gets read — see edit a recipe offline.

You can also assemble a ZIP manually from .md recipe files if you’re migrating from another system. With no recipes/ folder in it, every .md is read.

An entry in the archive that Mirepoix doesn’t recognize is named in the import summary rather than passed over in silence. Housekeeping files your computer tucks into a ZIP are ignored without comment.

What happens on import

Recipes are created or updated based on their title.
Recipe photos are restored for the recipes the import creates or replaces — one photo per recipe. Imported photos go through the same checks as photos you add in the app, so a bad image in an archive is rejected and reported.
QuickBites are merged by name. An imported bite updates the one with the same name and adds any that are new, so the bites you already have are kept.
Categories and tags from front matter are created if they don’t exist.
Ingredient catalog data in the ZIP replaces existing entries with the same name.
Category ordering is restored. Your aisle order is filled in only if you haven’t set your own — a customized aisle order is never overwritten.

A single archive can’t be larger than the app’s per-file upload limit (about 10 MB). A kitchen with many photos can produce an export that’s too large to import in one piece for now.

Conflicts

If a recipe with the same title already exists, the imported version replaces it — there’s no merge, the existing recipe is overwritten.