Plate cost
Example: A taqueria adds up the tortilla, carne, salsa, and garnish on one al pastor plate and finds it costs $2.80 to send to the pass, so it knows a $9 menu price leaves room for rent, labor, and margin.
the real ingredient cost of one finished plate
What it costs you in ingredients to send one plate of a dish to the pass, after trim, peel, bone, and shrink. Computed per ingredient as edible-portion cost × portion used, then summed and divided by the recipe's portion count for batch recipes. Excludes labour and overhead.
Why it matters
Plate cost is the missing input every other restaurant-numbers tool assumes the operator already has. Menu engineering needs it as food cost; prime cost needs it aggregated across the menu; menu pricing needs it as the floor. Most independents work from the chef's gut estimate or the accountant's aggregate percentage; computing it dish-by-dish typically reveals 3–5 points of food cost the operator was eating without knowing.
Frequently asked
What is plate cost?
Plate cost is what it costs you in ingredients to send one plate of a dish to the pass, after trim, peel, bone, and shrink. Computed per ingredient as edible-portion cost × portion used, then summed and divided by the recipe's portion count for batch recipes. Excludes labour and overhead.
Why does plate cost matter for a restaurant?
Plate cost is the missing input every other restaurant-numbers tool assumes the operator already has. Menu engineering needs it as food cost; prime cost needs it aggregated across the menu; menu pricing needs it as the floor. Most independents work from the chef's gut estimate or the accountant's aggregate percentage; computing it dish-by-dish typically reveals 3–5 points of food cost the operator was eating without knowing.
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