Recipe & Food Costing System
Chefs price dishes based on intuition — margins are calculated in hindsight from the P&L, by which time a poorly priced dish has already run for a quarter.
CAPABILITIES // WHAT GETS BUILT
What this system delivers for your team
Standardised recipe cards with ingredient quantities, yield percentages, and preparation method
Live purchase price feed — update ingredient prices once and every recipe cost recalculates automatically
Sub-recipe nesting for bases, stocks, and sauces used across multiple dishes
Portion cost breakdown showing raw material cost, wastage cost, and target GP% per dish
Menu engineering matrix classifying dishes as Stars, Plows, Puzzles, or Dogs based on cost and sales volume
Variance report comparing theoretical food cost against actual purchase cost to identify wastage or theft
Every build is scoped to your organisation's workflow — features and modules may vary.
PROCESS // HOW I WORK
From scoping call to live system
Scoping Call
A 30–60 min free call to understand your workflow, team structure, and exact requirements. No commitment — just alignment.
Custom Build
I build the system to your specifications with weekly updates. All work is tracked — you see progress before final delivery.
Delivery & Handoff
Deployed to your infrastructure, your team trained, documentation handed over. Optional AMC for ongoing support.
FIT // WHO THIS IS FOR
Who this system is for
Executive Chef / F&B Manager / Restaurant Owner
Restaurant, cloud kitchen, hotel F&B outlet, or catering company with a kitchen team managing 30 or more menu items and wanting to bring food cost below 30 per cent with data rather than guesswork
Menu prices were set when ingredient costs were lower — raw material inflation has eroded margins on several dishes but the chef has no tool to see which ones are now loss-making without doing a manual calculation
- —Menu prices were set when ingredient costs were lower — raw material inflation has eroded margins on several dishes but the chef has no tool to see which ones are now loss-making without doing a manual calculation
- —Each outlet or branch uses slightly different quantities for the same dish — there is no standard recipe, so food cost varies by 4 to 6 percentage points between locations
- —Purchase quantities are estimated by the chef rather than calculated from recipe requirements — over-purchasing leads to wastage and under-purchasing causes stockouts during service
BEFORE
Recipes exist in the chef's head or in a Word document. Menu prices were set once and rarely reviewed. Food cost is calculated from the monthly P&L — if the number is bad, nobody knows which dish caused it. Purchase quantities are guessed. Wastage is not measured.
WITH THIS SYSTEM
Every dish has a standardised recipe with exact yields. The system calculates portion cost in real time as purchase prices update. Menu engineering reports show which dishes to promote and which to reprice or remove. Purchase quantities are generated from recipe needs and projected covers. Variance reports flag wastage weekly.
KEY OUTCOME
Food cost percentage: typically 32–38% before → 26–30% after systematic recipe costing and menu engineering.
BUILD // WHAT I DELIVER
What gets built for you
PROCESS // HOW IT WORKS
Every build starts with a scoping call. I understand your workflow, adapt the system to your team, and deliver a detailed price estimate before any work begins.
Ready to scope Recipe & Food Costing System?
Book a free scoping call. I'll map your workflow, align the build to your team, and provide a detailed price estimate based on your requirements.
WORKS WELL WITH
These systems are commonly scoped together or phased into a connected build. Let me know during the scoping call if you're considering a multi-system setup — I'll structure the engagement accordingly.