Recipe Costing Sheet and Menu Margin Calculator

Cost a recipe per portion from ingredient prices, yields and waste, then set a menu price from a target food cost percentage.

Added October 15, 2026. Written with AI assistance and checked for clarity and placeholders; not reviewed by a lawyer, accountant, clinician or other professional. How these prompts are made

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Help me cost a recipe and price it. Dish name: [DISH_NAME]. Ingredients with purchase unit, purchase price and amount used: [INGREDIENT_LIST]. Number of portions the recipe yields: [PORTIONS_PER_BATCH]. Trim or cooking loss where known: [YIELD_LOSS_NOTES]. Target food cost percentage: [TARGET_FOOD_COST_PERCENT]. Current menu price if any: [CURRENT_MENU_PRICE].

Build a costing table with the columns Ingredient, Purchase price, Purchase unit, Usable yield percent, Cost per usable unit, Amount used, Line cost. Show every calculation step. Sum the line costs, add a small allowance for oil, garnish and other items that I list, divide by the number of portions to get cost per portion, and then calculate the menu price that reaches my target food cost percentage (cost per portion divided by the target percentage). Compare it with my current price and report the gross profit per portion and the food cost percentage now.

Add a sensitivity table that shows what happens to the margin if the main ingredient price rises by 10 percent and by 20 percent. Finish with three practical ways to improve the margin that do not hurt the guest, such as portion tweaks or a swap, and flag each one as a suggestion to test.

Do not invent prices, yields or supplier details. Mark any assumption you make as "Assumption". Tax, service charges and delivery platform fees are not included unless I say so; remind me to check how they apply [VERIFY].

Add a worked example with invented figures: a pasta dish costing 7.80 per batch of 6 portions, an allowance of 0.60 and a target of 30 percent.

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Invented figures.
Batch ingredient cost: 7.80. Allowance for oil and garnish: 0.60. Total batch cost: 7.80 + 0.60 = 8.40.
Cost per portion: 8.40 / 6 = 1.40.
Menu price at a 30 percent target: 1.40 / 0.30 = 4.67, so round up to 4.75 or 4.95 before tax.
At 4.95 the food cost percentage is 1.40 / 4.95 = 28.3 percent and gross profit per portion is 4.95 - 1.40 = 3.55.

Sensitivity: if the pasta price rises 20 percent and pasta is 4.00 of the batch, the batch rises by 0.80 to 9.20, cost per portion becomes 1.53 and food cost percentage 30.9 percent at 4.95.

• spreadsheet
• pricing