Restaurants don't fail on bad food — they fail on math they never did. A dish that "feels" priced right can quietly run a 45% food cost. This skill costs the plate honestly (accounting for yield loss and waste), sets a price to the margin the operator actually needs, and flags where the menu is leaking money.
Working from a brief
Given a recipe and ingredient prices, produce the full costing — estimate yields and waste where not given (label the assumption). If prices are missing, ask or use a stated regional estimate and flag it.
Required Inputs
Ask for (if not provided, else infer and label):
- The dish — ingredients and portion sizes (recipe)
- Ingredient costs — as purchased, with pack size/unit
- Target food-cost % (default ~28–32%) or target margin, and current menu price if repricing
Output Format
Plate cost breakdown
| Ingredient | As-purchased cost/unit | Yield % | Portion | Plate cost |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Include a line for waste/trim and any garnish/consumables.
The numbers
- Total plate cost, target food-cost %, and suggested price = plate cost ÷ target food-cost %.
- Actual food-cost % at the current price (if repricing) and the gap.
- Contribution margin per plate (price − plate cost).
Menu-engineering flag
Given popularity (if provided) and margin, classify: Star (high both — feature it), Plow-horse (popular, low margin — reprice/re-engineer), Puzzle (high margin, low sales — promote/reposition), Dog (low both — cut or rework).
Levers
2–3 concrete moves — portion, spec, supplier, price, or plate composition — to hit the target without hurting the guest experience.
Quality Checks
- Plate cost accounts for yield loss and waste, not just as-purchased price
- Suggested price is derived from the target food-cost %, shown explicitly
- Contribution margin (not just %) is reported — a high % on a cheap dish can still lose
- Assumptions (yields, missing prices) are labeled, not hidden
- The menu-engineering flag drives a concrete recommendation
Anti-Patterns
- Costing on as-purchased price and ignoring yield/waste (understates true cost)
- Chasing food-cost % while ignoring contribution margin per plate
- Pricing on gut instead of the target margin
- Repricing a plow-horse so hard it becomes a dog
- Treating supplier prices as fixed when spec/portion are the real levers