Give a Meal

A platform that connects meal donors with people experiencing food insecurity. Partner restaurants accept meal donations from customers, and individuals in need can browse and reserve available meals nearby.

How it works

1. Restaurants sign up and list meal items they offer
2. Donors contribute meals at partner restaurants (tracked via the platform)
3. People in need find nearby restaurants with available meals and reserve them using the Give a Meal app

The platform includes a public-facing website, a donor portal, a business management layer for restaurants, and an admin dashboard powered by Payload CMS.

Tech stack

• Next.js 15 (React 19, TypeScript)
• Payload CMS v3 — admin panel, auth, data modeling, background jobs
• MongoDB — database
• Google Maps API — location-based restaurant discovery
• Nodemailer — transactional emails (magic link login, donation confirmations)
• Expo Push Notifications — alerts for the companion mobile app

Getting started

Prerequisites

• Node.js >= 20
• MongoDB running locally (default: mongodb://localhost:27017)

Setup

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Copy the sample env file and fill in your values
cp .env.sample .env

# Start the dev server
npm run dev

The app runs at localhost:3000. The admin panel is at localhost:3000/admin.

Environment variables

Variable	Required	Description
PAYLOAD_SECRET	Yes	Any random string, used to sign auth tokens
DATABASE_URL	Yes	MongoDB connection string
NEXT_PUBLIC_BASE_URL	Yes	Where the app is hosted (http://localhost:3000 locally)
NEXT_PUBLIC_GOOGLE_MAPS_API_KEY	No	Google Maps JS API key (for location search)
GOOGLE_GEOCODING_API_KEY	No	Separate key for server-side geocoding (can match the above in dev)
OPENAI_API_KEY	No	For automated i18n translation
SMTP_USER / SMTP_PASS / SMTP_HOST	No	SMTP credentials for sending emails
INBOUND_EMAIL	No	Address shown as the sender

Scripts

npm run dev              # Start dev server
npm run build            # Production build
npm run lint             # Run ESLint
npm run translate        # Sync i18n dictionaries (requires OPENAI_API_KEY)
npm run generate:types   # Regenerate TypeScript types from Payload schema

i18n

The app supports English and Spanish. Dictionaries live in src/dictionaries/.

To add new copy: add the key to either language file, then run npm run translate. The script finds keys that exist in only one dictionary and translates them into the other using OpenAI.

Pages are generated for each language automatically at build time.

Project structure

src/
├── app/
│   ├── (frontend)/[lang]/   # Public pages (give-a-meal, get-a-meal, donors, restaurants)
│   ├── (payload)/            # Payload admin panel
│   └── api/custom/           # REST API routes (auth, donations, businesses, etc.)
├── collections/              # Payload data models (Users, Businesses, Donations, etc.)
├── components/               # React components
├── sections/                 # Landing page sections
├── dictionaries/             # i18n translation files (en.json, es.json)
├── lib/                      # API middleware, auth helpers, server actions
├── strategies/               # Magic link auth strategy
└── payload.config.ts         # Payload CMS config