Probably Snow Crash

Holy crap, I have this exact same server that I got for free and I have been trying to get rid of it

I was in the exact same boat as you, but its pretty much there now. You can set a specific user group (i.e. Default) to have its recipes be public and then redirect index to that page.

Also I recommend upgrading because IIRC there’s a security vuln with that old version of Mealie