Controlling Food Cost in Production

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Controlling Food Cost in Production
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• Controlling Foodservice Costs

OH 7-1
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Chapter Learning Objectives

• Develop a food production chart.
• Describe how a waste report helps control food
  costs.
• Use a conversion factor to calculate a new yield
  for an existing recipe.
• Determine a recipes yield and the number of
  portions it will produce.

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Monitoring Standards

• Tasting foods regularly is one way to ensure
  standards are met. The use of standardized
  recipes is another.

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Food That Does Not Meet the Restaurants
Standards

• Should not be served
• Should be salvaged (all or part), if possible
• Should be discarded if not salvageable
• Increase costs
• Reduce profits

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Questions to Ask When Food Fails to Meet
Standards

• Is the recipe clearly written?
• Did the cook understand the recipe?

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Questions to Ask When Food Fails to Meet
Standards continued

• Are ingredients used in the recipe clearly
  labeled?
• Are the appropriate ingredients in the proper
  containers? (Do ingredients in containers match
  the containers labels?)

OH 7-6
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Determining Quantity to Produce

• Accurate food production schedules are important
  because
• Overproduction causes excessive leftovers and
  waste.
• Underproduction causes production shortages and
  unhappy customers.
• Both situations reduce profits!

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Determining Quantity to Produce continued

• To maximize guest satisfaction, managers help
  their production staff know how much to prepare
  on the proper day and at the proper time.

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To Ensure Proper Production

• Professional managers always use food production
  charts!

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Sample Production Chart
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Food Production Charts

• Created by studying past sales (sales histories)
• Generally, the best predictor of what guests will
  buy in the future is what they purchased in the
  past.
• Created based upon managements estimate of
  future sales

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When Using Production Charts

• Prepare an estimate of the number of guests to be
  served.
• Indicate the actual number of items to be
  produced.
• Post the production chart where it can be seen
  easily.

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When Using Production Charts continued

• Ensure the required standardized recipes are
  readily available.
• Periodically check the actual recipe yield
  against that listed on the standardized recipe.

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Waste Reports

• Critical to food cost control
• Easily completed
• Should be maintained for each shift
• May indicate
• Where training is needed
• Production concerns that require attention

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Sample Waste Report
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Analysis of Waste Reports

• Determine why each item had to be discarded.
• Develop a strategy to prevent similar future
  losses.
• Share findings with those who need to know.

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Recipe Conversions

• Step 1 Compute the conversion factor.

Desired yield Current recipe yield Conversion factor
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Recipe Conversions continued

• Step 1 Example
• Current yield, fifty portions
• Desired yield, forty portions

Desired yield Current recipe yield Conversion factor
40 50 40 50 40 50 0.80
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Recipe Conversions continued

• Step 2 Convert ingredients into units that can
  be easily multiplied or divided.
• Convert weights to ounces.
• Convert cups, pints, and quarts to fluid ounces.

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Recipe Conversions continued

• Step 3 Multiply each ingredient by the
  conversion factor.
• Example

96 oz x 0.80 76.8 oz
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Recipe Conversions continued

• Step 4 Convert ingredient amounts back to
  normally used units.
• Example

76.8 oz 8 oz 9.6 c or 2 qt, 1½ c
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Recipe Yields

• Recipe yields must be known.
• Accurate costing of menu items is not possible
  without known and consistent yields from
  standardized recipes.
• Effective production planning is also impossible
  without known recipe yields.

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Recipe Yields continued

• To calculate a recipe yield, compute the total
  volume of the recipe by
• Weightfor those recipes where portion size is
  determined by weight.
• Volumefor those recipes where portion size is
  determined by volume.

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Calculating Recipe Yield

• Weigh or measure only the major ingredients.
• Account for cooking loss, especially for
• Meats
• Vegetables
• Fruit

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How Would You Answer the Following Questions?

• It (is/is not) possible for a cook using a
  standardized recipe to create a substandard menu
  item.
• Waste reports indicate when employees overportion
  and waste food. (True/False)
• How many steps does the recipe conversion process
  have?
• Three
• Four
• Five
• Six
• A recipe (yield/portion conversion) test is a
  calculation of the number of portions produced by
  a standardized recipe.

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Key Term Review

• Conversion factor
• Food production chart
• Recipe conversion
• Recipe yield
• Taste test
• Waste report

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Chapter Learning Objectives What Did You Learn?

• Develop a food production chart.
• Describe how a waste report helps control food
  costs.
• Use a conversion factor to calculate a new yield
  for an existing recipe.
• Determine a recipes yield and the number of
  portions it will produce.