What justifies a full page modal navigation?

What arguments support having a full page modal acting as a hub that takes you to different actions / pages that are linked together?

For instance imagine an app where you manage recipes, you would have a button opening a modal menu with:

  • View list of recipes
  • Add a new recipe
  • View list of ingredients
  • Add an ingredient
  • Manage food orders
  • Create a new food order
  • Manage food preferences

This is completely fake.

My client tends to want modals everywhere. I get the feeling this initial button should rather lead to a "space" on the website about all the above, with a vertical menu giving you access to all these things.

I'm struggling to find arguments one way or the other. Any thoughts?