Patent ID: 8226414

Claim:
A method for generating meal plans, the method comprising the steps of: responsive to receiving a request for a set of meal plans for a plurality of users, determining, by a processing unit, nutritional requirements specified by a set of nutritional policies, wherein a nutritional policy in the set of nutritional policies specifies the nutritional requirements for a user in the plurality of users; identifying, by a processing unit, a plurality of potential meal plans in response to determining the nutritional requirements specified by the set of nutritional policies, wherein each potential meal plan in the plurality of potential meal plans satisfies all nutritional requirements for each user in the plurality of users; responsive to receiving a selection of a potential meal plan to form a selected meal plan, determining, by a processing unit, a listing of ingredients required by the selected meal plan; for each ingredient in the listing of ingredients: determining, by a processing unit and utilizing an item identifier, a quantity of the ingredient in a set of storage units by subtracting a known empty mass of a container of the ingredient from a mass of an item, wherein the mass of the item includes the mass of the ingredient, and wherein the ingredient is one of a plurality of ingredients located on a mass sensor shelf in the set of storage units, and wherein the mass of the ingredient is determined by receiving mass sensor data from a plurality of mass sensors in the mass sensor shelf and associating the mass sensor data from a portion of the plurality of mass sensors with the container of the ingredient based on a surface of the container that is resting on the mass sensor shelf; locating, by a processing unit, the container of the ingredient on the mass sensor shelf by triangulating location data received from two or more item identifier sensors in the set of storage units to form a location of the ingredient on the mass sensor shelf; receiving, by a processing unit, the mass sensor data for the item at the location of the container of the ingredient on the mass sensor shelf; determining, by a processing unit, the mass of the item based on the mass sensor data; and generating, by a processing unit, a listing of ingredients required by the selected meal plan that is unavailable in a current inventory in an amount required by the selected meal plan based on the quantity determined for each ingredient in the listing ingredients in the set of storage units.