I wanted to add nutrition tracking to a fitness app. Every API I found either:

• Charged $449/month (Nutritionix)
• Hid protein data behind paywalls
• Returned incomplete data

So I did what any reasonable developer would do: I built my own.

Here’s the honest journey.

Month 1: The Naive Beginning

Goal: "Just wrap the USDA API, how hard can it be?"

Reality: Very hard.

The USDA API is powerful but raw. To make it developer-friendly, I needed:

• Natural language parsing
• Unit conversion (cups to grams)
• Multi-ingredient aggregation
• Error handling for thousands of edge cases

I underestimated every single part.

Month 2: The Architecture Decision

I chose Cloudflare Workers because:

• Edge computing = fast
• Generous free tier
• D1 database included
• No cold starts

The tech stack:

• Runtime: Cloudflare Workers (TypeScript)
• Database: D1 (SQLite) + KV (cache)
• API Gateway: RapidAPI (monetization)

Result: <100ms for 98% of requests.

Month 3: The Data Quality Crisis

Users found bugs:

• "Fat values don’t add up"
• "Missing vitamins for some foods"
• "100g chicken has 500 calories??"

I spent an entire month on data validation:

• Cross-checking against USDA
• Adding hierarchical fat breakdown
• Building nutrient schema validation

Month 4: Launch Prep

Created:

• Landing page (GitHub Pages, free)
• Documentation
• SDKs (Python, JavaScript, Java)
• RapidAPI listing

What Actually Worked

1. Reddit posts - 70% of my traffic
2. Comparison table - Shows clear value
3. Free tier that works - 25 nutrients, not 5
4. Fast responses - People notice <100ms

Lessons for Other Builders

1. Solve your own problem - You understand it best
2. Don’t over-engineer - Ship, then improve
3. Free tier matters - Let people try before buying
4. Community is everything - Reddit, Indie Hackers, Twitter

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Get the Code

Nutrition Tracker API - SDK : GitHub

Building something? I’d love to hear about it in the comments.

If you want to try the API: Nutrition Tracker API on RapidAPI