You’ve priced a dish on a guess before. You picked a number that felt about right, and only found out later, once GST and the real cost of every ingredient were factored in, that the margin barely existed. A menu price built on instinct is hard to walk back once customers are used to paying it. Our recipe calculator works out your true food cost, your GST-inclusive cost, and your profit margin before the dish goes anywhere near a menu.
WHAT IS A RECIPE CALCULATOR?
A recipe calculator works out what a dish costs to make and what it needs to sell for to turn a profit. Some tools under that name are really a recipe converter, turning ounces and teaspoons into metric, or a recipe multiplier that scales quantities up or down, or a nutrition calculator returning the energy and carbohydrate count per serve. Ours is a recipe cost calculator. Enter your ingredient costs and servings, and you get a total cost, a cost per serve, and the margin behind your selling price.
HOW TO USE OUR RECIPE CALCULATOR
Enter your recipe name, method and serving size, and the number of servings the recipe makes.
Select “+ Add Ingredient” to build your ingredient list, then enter the quantity purchased and cost of goods for each item.
Enter the quantity your recipe actually uses for each ingredient, in grams, millilitres or each.
Select Calculate to see your total cost across the batch, plus the same figure with GST added and your cost per serve. This is where the calculator divides your total batch cost by your number of servings, converting it into a cost per portion.
Enter a Selling Price per serve to see your Food Gross Profit, Food Markup percentage and Total Generated Profit.
WHY FOODSERVICE BUSINESSES USE OUR RECIPE CALCULATOR
Cafes and quick service kitchens change their menus often, and costing a new dish properly before it launches matters more than costing it quickly. Catering and events businesses price the same recipe at different scales throughout the year, a function for ten one week and an event for two hundred the next. Enter the servings for each job, and the calculator handles that recipe scaling without you reworking your ingredient list from scratch.
Bakeries producing large batches need to know the per-unit cost still holds as bakery ingredient prices shift. Contract caterers working to a fixed per-meal budget, such as aged care or education providers, can check a recipe against that budget before it goes into a wider meal planner or seasonal menu.
Across all of these, the value is the same. You get a cost per serve and a margin you can trust, built from your actual supplier pricing rather than an estimate.
Browse our recipes for menu inspiration, then cost them here before you commit to a price.
WHAT MAKES OUR RECIPE CALCULATOR DIFFERENT
Most recipe cost calculators are standalone software with no link to where you actually buy. Ours sits within Goodman Fielder Food Service, a foodservice supplier. Once you’ve priced a recipe and know your numbers, you’re already talking to the team that supplies the ingredients themselves. If a margin looks tighter than expected, that’s a conversation about ingredient pricing you can have straight away.
If you want to work through pricing on a specific dish or menu, our team can help. Get in touch today.
ROASTED LAMB RUMP
Method
ROASTED LAMB RUMP
4 lamb rumps (approx. 200g each)
2 tbsp Olivani Extra Virgin Olive Oil
4 sprigs fresh rosemary
4 cloves garlic, smashed
Salt and cracked black pepper
ROSEMARY EVOO JUS
2 sprigs fresh rosemary
250ml (1 cup) good quality beef or lamb stock
60ml (¼ cup) red wine
1 tbsp Olivani Extra Virgin Olive Oil Salt and black pepper
MINT RANCH DRESSING
4 tbsp Oli & Vine Ranch Dressing
2 tbsp fresh mint leaves, finely chopped
1 tsp lemon juice
TO FINISH
Olivani Extra Virgin Olive Oil, to drizzle
- Combine the Oli & Vine Ranch Dressing, chopped mint and lemon juice in a small bowl. Stir well, taste and adjust with extra mint or lemon as needed. Refrigerate until ready to serve.
- Remove the lamb rumps from the fridge 30 minutes before cooking. Preheat the oven to 200°C fan-forced.
- Pat the lamb dry with a paper towel and season generously on all sides with salt and cracked black pepper. Heat the Olivani Extra Virgin Olive Oil in a large oven-safe frypan over high heat until just beginning to smoke. Sear the lamb rump fat side down first for 3 to 4 minutes until the fat cap is deeply golden and rendered. Turn and sear on all remaining sides for 1 to 2 minutes each. Add the rosemary sprigs and smashed garlic to the pan and baste the lamb briefly. Transfer the pan to the oven and roast for 10 to 12 minutes for medium, or until the internal temperature reaches 62°C. Rest on a warm plate loosely covered with foil for 8 minutes.
- While the lamb rests, make the jus. Discard the garlic and rosemary from the pan and place over medium-high heat. Add the red wine and scrape up any caramelised bits from the base of the pan. Add the stock and the fresh rosemary sprigs and simmer for 8 to 10 minutes until reduced by half and glossy. Remove the rosemary, remove from the heat and whisk in the Olivani Extra Virgin Olive Oil. Season with salt and pepper.
- Slice each lamb rump thickly and arrange on warmed plates. Spoon the rosemary EVOO jus over and around the lamb. Dot or drizzle the mint ranch dressing alongside.
- Finish with a drizzle of Olivani Extra Virgin Olive Oil. Serve with creamy potato mash or your favourite greens
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