Calculate food cost percentage, cost per serving, menu price, gross profit, markup, margin, waste cost, labor cost, and overhead for recipes, restaurants, catering, meal prep, and food businesses.
Enter food cost:
Add the ingredient cost for one menu item, recipe batch, or serving.
Enter menu price:
Add the selling price to calculate the current food cost percentage and gross profit.
Set pricing targets:
Use target food cost, profit margin, or markup to estimate a suggested selling price.
A food cost calculator helps restaurants, bakers, caterers, food trucks, and meal prep businesses price menu items more accurately.
This is useful for menu pricing, recipe costing, cost control, profitability, catering quotes, bakery pricing, meal prep pricing, and restaurant margin planning.
Your result shows food cost percentage, cost per serving, waste-adjusted cost, gross profit, gross margin, suggested price, markup, break-even price, and estimated net profit after labor, overhead, packaging, and fees.
Divide the food or ingredient cost by the menu price, then multiply by 100. For example, $6 food cost divided by an $18 menu price equals 33.33%.
Many food businesses target food cost around 25% to 35%, but the best target depends on labor, rent, overhead, food type, pricing strategy, and local market conditions.
Start with ingredient cost, add waste, labor, packaging, and overhead, then choose a target food cost percentage, profit margin, or markup to calculate a selling price.
They are related. Recipe cost usually totals the ingredients used in a recipe, while food cost percentage compares that cost to the selling price.