Food service & costing

Recipe & Portion Cost Calculator

Combine entered ingredient, preparation and other batch costs, then allow for unusable portions before comparing with a selling price.

97 / COST EXPECTED PORTIONS

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INPUT GROUP 01

One prepared recipe batch

Total ingredient costPreparation labor cost for the batchOther batch costsPrepared whole portions before wastePrepared portions not usable or soldApplied once to portion yield, not again to cost.Price per usable portion

Check the assumptions before acting on a result.

Read the method and example

YOUR CALCULATION

Spread entered recipe-batch cost across expected usable portions.

Ingredients, preparation and other batch cost

$60.00

Expected usable portions after waste

Cost per expected usable portion

$3.33

Price less unrounded usable-portion cost

$4.67

Revenue if usable portions sell at entered price

$144.00

Batch revenue less entered batch costs

$84.00

Entered batch costs divided by revenue

41.67%

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Illustrative inputs loaded. Replace them with your own assumptions.

How the recipe & portion cost calculator works

Batch cost is the sum of ingredient, preparation labor and other entered batch costs. Expected usable portions equal prepared portions times one minus the waste fraction. This can be fractional because it is an expected average across batches.

Cost per usable portion divides total batch cost by expected usable portions. Contribution per portion subtracts that unrounded cost from price. Batch revenue assumes every usable portion sells at the same price; batch contribution deducts all batch costs. Monetary outputs round half-up to cents.

At 100% waste, no usable-portion ratio exists and the full batch cost remains a loss. This is a cost model rather than a recipe, nutrition, food-safety, market-price or sales recommendation. Include packaging and other delivery costs once; unentered overhead and taxes remain excluded.

Worked example

$40 ingredients, $15 preparation and $5 other costs total $60. Twenty portions with 10% waste leave 18 expected usable portions. Cost is $3.33 per usable portion; at $8 selling price, contribution per portion is $4.67 and batch contribution is $84. With zero waste, portion cost is $3.00.

Sources and assumptions

The source material explains the underlying calculation or pricing structure. Entered prices, costs, schedules and scenario choices are your assumptions; this tool does not obtain supplier quotes or predict actual results.

Penn State Extension: food-product unit costs and pricing

Calculation methods, testing and sources · Practical calculation guides