Cost every dish down to the plate.

Add up the cost of every ingredient in the recipe at the quantities you actually use, then divide by the number of servings it yields to get a cost per serving. The care is in the detail: convert purchase units to recipe units (a case to grams, a gallon to ounces), and account for trim, waste, and yield loss so the cost reflects what ends up on the plate, not just what you bought. A costing sheet makes this repeatable across every dish.

It varies by concept and region, but many operators target a food cost somewhere around a third of the menu price as a rough benchmark, running lower on high-margin items like drinks and appetizers and higher on signature or protein-heavy dishes. Rather than force every plate to one number, cost each dish, look at the blended food cost across the menu, and use high-margin items to balance the lower-margin ones. The tool shows each dish's percentage so you can price with intent.

A ready-to-use spreadsheet (Excel & Google Sheets): cost per serving, food-cost percentage, and gross profit for every recipe, with ingredient inputs you can update — delivered instantly after checkout. AI-assisted, human-built; not financial advice.