Alchm Kitchen

Alchm.kitchen MCP Server

Version 1.4.0 exposes eight tools over stdio: live transits, curated ingredient analysis, recipe search, natal overlays, triplicate pricing, evidence snapshots and recipe reflections. It uses the maintained MCP TypeScript SDK v1 line and supports existing MCP initialization handshakes. It does not expose an HTTP/SSE server.

Install or run

bunx @alchm/mcp-server

Node.js alternative (Node 18+)

npx -y @alchm/mcp-server

From this repository

bun install --cwd mcp-server bun run mcp-server/src/index.ts

Distributable Node bundle and standalone Bun sidecar

bun run --cwd mcp-server build bun run --cwd mcp-server build:binary

The bundle is mcp-server/dist/index.js; the sidecar is mcp-server/bin/alchm-mcp. The binary build disables working-directory dotenv/bunfig autoloading and repairs/verifies its ad-hoc signature on macOS. Building prepares local artifacts; publishing npm, registry metadata and sidecar releases are separate release steps.

Tools

Anonymous callers can use read tools in demo mode. Recipe search and evidence snapshots debit authenticated callers; reflection publication requires authentication. Invalid supplied credentials are rejected. An operator must configure DATABASE_URL to validate API keys and apply billing. An API key alone does not connect this stdio process to a hosted authentication service.

Tool annotations identify paid calls and reflection publication as mutations. The catalog declares bounded inputs; validation runs before authentication, billing and handler work. Coordinates must be within latitude/longitude bounds, ingredient lists contain 1–100 strings, reflections are 1–4000 characters (the stored column's limit), and natal charts/amounts/timestamps must match their published schema.

Billing and safe retries

Paid reads are charged on delivery: the tool runs first, and only a successful result is settled. A failed search or a partial snapshot (an error) is never charged, a caller that cancels before settlement is not charged, and a refused settlement withholds the result (QUOTA, or UNAVAILABLE when billing cannot be reached). A reflection's debit and its recipe_reflections row commit in one transaction, so a caller is never charged for a reflection that was not stored. Feed publication runs inside the same transaction behind a savepoint: if it fails, the reflection and its charge stand and the receipt reports published: false.

Without an idempotency key every call charges again and every reflection call stores another reflection. Pass _meta.idempotencyKey (1–200 characters from A-Z a-z 0-9 . _ : ~ -) to make a paid call safe to retry:

• A retry with identical arguments within 24 hours is not charged again (billing.status: "replayed"). A recipe search or snapshot is recomputed, so a replayed snapshot carries a new snapshotId and observation time; a reflection retry returns the stored reflection (replayed: true) and re-attempts a feed publication that previously failed, unless the reflection has since been moderated (hidden, deleted or rejected).
• Reusing a key with different arguments, or after 24 hours, returns CONFLICT. Credentials and correlation fields in _meta are not part of the comparison.
• Keys are scoped to the paying account and tool, and concurrent retries of one key wait for the first attempt and then replay it. The ESMS ledger stores the key only as a hash; invocation telemetry keeps the raw key with the call's other arguments for its seven-day retention.

Once a paid call reaches settlement, its result reports what happened in a billing field (errors before that point, such as invalid arguments, authentication failures or BUSY, carry none): status (charged, replayed or not_charged, with a reason such as anonymous-caller, synthetic-probe-exempt or not-delivered), the amounts debited by this call, and the echoed idempotencyKey.

Results

Results include both structuredContent and the same JSON serialized in a text content block, with a correlationId. Every tool publishes an outputSchema that accepts its success payload or the shared error envelope, so clients that validate structured results (the TypeScript and Python SDK clients do) accept both. Failed evidence snapshots retain available data and component provenance under the error payload's data field. Tool failures set isError: true with a stable errorCode and message; RATE_LIMIT and BUSY include retryAfterSec. Diagnostic output goes to stderr; stdout contains JSON-RPC messages only. SIGINT, SIGTERM and stdin closure perform a bounded one-second telemetry drain before exit.

Configuration

ALCHM_MCP_BACKEND_URL=https://alchm.kitchen

MCP_USER_API_KEY=sk_alchm_...

ALCHM_MCP_USER_API_KEY is also accepted for sanitized Planetary Agents environments.

DATABASE_URL=postgresql://... # operator-only: key validation, billing, cache and telemetry

Chart/transit requests POST to /api/astrologize. Explicit ALCHM_MCP_BACKEND_URL, NEXT_PUBLIC_SITE_URL, SITE_URL or Vercel URL settings take precedence. Bundled/compiled artifacts default to https://alchm.kitchen; source runs default to http://localhost:3000. Source development therefore needs the local app running or an explicit reachable backend URL.

Mint and revoke API keys at /profile/api-keys. Keys are stored as SHA-256 hashes; plaintext is shown once when created.

Every tool accepts _meta inside its arguments:

{

"name": "generate_cosmic_recipe", "arguments": { "prompt": "spicy", "cuisine": "thai", "_meta": { "apiKey": "sk_alchm_live_REPLACE_ME", "caller": "claude-desktop", "correlationId": "dinner-plan-123", "idempotencyKey": "dinner-plan-123-search" } } }

The environment key supplies a default for single-user installs. Legacy _meta.authKey, _authKey and _apiKey argument aliases remain supported. Synthetic probes supply _meta.internalSecret matching the server's INTERNAL_API_SECRET; SYNTHETIC_PROBE_USER_ID is optional attribution. Setting the server secret alone never authenticates an external call as a probe. Synthetic calls cannot publish reflections.

Connect Claude Desktop or Cursor

Use the same mcpServers configuration shape in Claude Desktop's claude_desktop_config.json or Cursor's .cursor/mcp.json:

{

"mcpServers": { "alchm-kitchen": { "command": "npx", "args": ["-y", "@alchm/mcp-server"], "env": { "MCP_USER_API_KEY": "sk_alchm_live_REPLACE_ME" } } } }

For a local source checkout use "command": "bun" and "args": ["run", "/absolute/path/to/WhatToEatNext-master/mcp-server/src/index.ts"]. Database configuration belongs to the operator running the server. See the source-run templates in claude-desktop.config.example.json and cursor.mcp.example.json.

Verification and operations

bun run --cwd mcp-server typecheck

bun run jest src/lib/mcp/tests/ --runInBand bun run --cwd mcp-server test:stdio MCP_E2E=1 MCP_E2E_ENTRY=mcp-server/dist/index.js bun test mcp-server/src/tests/ MCP_E2E=1 MCP_E2E_ENTRY=mcp-server/bin/alchm-mcp bun test mcp-server/src/tests/

The stdio tests spawn real source/bundle/binary processes, initialize a session, send notifications/initialized, inspect all eight tools, call local tools, and exercise validation and errors. They reject any non-JSON-RPC stdout line and do not require a live database or production backend. sdkClient.test.ts repeats the calls through the official SDK client, which validates every result, errors included, against the advertised outputSchema.

Settlement has a real-PostgreSQL proof: src/lib/mcp/__tests__/settlement.postgres.test.ts runs the ledger, idempotent replay, concurrent retries and the reflection transaction (including recovery from a failed feed insert) against a disposable database holding every migration. Its header lists the setup; it is skipped unless MCP_TEST_DATABASE_URL names a loopback mcp_test* database.

Database-backed invocations feed mcp_invocations, the admin MCP status surface, agent telemetry and the synthetic MCP probe. Telemetry is best effort; calls still work when logging is unavailable. Retention is seven days via the observability prune job. Per-key rate limits and a four-call process concurrency cap bound workload; calls receive a cancellation signal after 20 seconds and receive MCP cancellation signals. A timeout does not guarantee that already-started downstream side effects have rolled back.

See ARCHITECTURE.md for ownership and data flow.