Food Cost Analysis & Menu Costing

Track food cost percentage per menu item and across the menu, set targets, find part-costed items, and use the Qvi cost doctor to fix the recipes behind a bad number.

Food Cost Analysis shows what each dish costs to make as a percentage of what you sell it for, against the target you set. Cost Alerts surface items running over target, and trends show whether the picture is improving. The percentage is calculated net of tax, so it compares like with like. A green number can still be wrong if the recipe behind it is only part-costed.

Last updated 24 August 2026

What the page shows

Restaurant Setup → Food Cost Analysis gives you:

Food Cost Performance — the headline position across the menu
Cost Alerts — items Over Target that need attention. No critical alerts means nothing is currently breaching
Menu Item Food Costs — every item with its Cost %
Food Cost Trends — the direction of travel over Last 7 Days, Last 30 Days or Last 90 Days

How the percentage is calculated

Food cost percentage is the cost of the recipe divided by the selling price, net of tax. Using the tax-inclusive price would flatter every dish by the tax rate and make comparisons between differently-taxed items meaningless.

The recipe cost comes from Kitchen Stock — ingredient costs, converted into recipe units. Everything on this page is downstream of that layer being correct.

A green number can be a lie

If a recipe has ten ingredients and only six carry a cost, the dish still shows a food cost percentage — a low, healthy-looking one, because four ingredients are missing from the calculation. These appear as Part-costed. Treat a part-costed item as uncosted, not as good news. Fix the ingredients in Kitchen Stock and the true number appears.

Common Tasks

The regular pass — usually weekly, or after supplier prices move.

Go to Restaurant Setup → Food Cost Analysis in the left sidebar
Read Food Cost Performance for the overall position
Check Cost Alerts for items marked Over Target
Open Menu Item Food Costs and sort by Cost % to see the worst offenders
Switch Food Cost Trends between Last 7 Days, Last 30 Days and Last 90 Days to see whether a problem is new or long-standing

Result: You know which dishes are eroding margin and whether the trend is improving or worsening.

Note: A dish over target is not automatically a problem — a loss-leader can be deliberate. What matters is whether it is intentional.

How to Set a Food Cost Target (target food cost, cost percentage goal, set target)

Targets are what turn a percentage into an alert. Without one, nothing can be over target.

Go to Restaurant Setup → Food Cost Analysis
Open the item you want to set a target for
Enter the target cost percentage for that item
Save

Result: The item is measured against its own target, and appears under Cost Alerts when it breaches.

Note: Targets are sensibly set per item rather than one figure for the whole menu — a 30% target makes sense for a main course and none at all for a soft drink.

How to Fix a Dish With a Bad Food Cost (dish costs too much, fix food cost, cost doctor, Qvi cost)

Diagnose before you re-price — most bad numbers are a data problem, not a margin problem.

Go to Restaurant Setup → Food Cost Analysis and open the item
Check whether it is Part-costed. If it is, the number is not real yet — fix the missing ingredient costs first
Review the recipe’s ingredients and quantities. A mistyped quantity is a common cause
Check the conversion factors on the expensive ingredients in Kitchen Stock
If the cost is genuinely correct, decide between re-pricing the dish, changing the recipe, or accepting the margin

Result: Either the data is corrected and the true cost appears, or you have confirmed a real margin problem and can act on it.

Note: Work in that order. Re-pricing a dish because of a wrong conversion factor pushes away customers to fix a typo.

How to Find Items That Are Not Properly Costed (part-costed, uncosted items, missing recipe cost)

Before trusting any food cost figure, find out how much of the menu is actually costed.

Go to Restaurant Setup → Food Cost Analysis
Open All Items and look for items flagged Part-costed
Note items with no recipe linked at all — these produce no cost figure
Work the list back through Kitchen Stock to add the missing ingredient costs
Return here and re-check

Result: The proportion of the menu that is genuinely costed rises, and the headline figures become trustworthy.

Menu Engineering — combines cost with how well an item sells, which is the more complete picture
Recipes — where the cost of a dish is actually built
Replenish → Price Watch — the early warning that an ingredient cost has moved

Troubleshooting

A dish shows a suspiciously low food cost

Cause: The recipe is part-costed — some ingredients have no cost, so they contribute nothing to the calculation.

Fix: Check whether the item is flagged Part-costed. Open its recipe and set costs for the missing ingredients in Kitchen Stock.

An item shows no food cost at all

Cause: No recipe is linked to the menu item.

Fix: Open the menu item and link a recipe to it. Without a recipe there is nothing to cost against.

Food cost jumped overnight across many dishes

Cause: A shared ingredient’s cost changed — usually a delivery at a higher price, or a corrected conversion factor.

Fix: Check Replenish → Price Watch for supplier price movements. If a conversion factor was corrected, the new figure is the accurate one and the old one was understating cost.

The percentage does not match my own calculation

Cause: Food cost here is calculated against the tax-exclusive selling price.

Fix: Recalculate using the price net of tax. Comparing recipe cost against a tax-inclusive price understates food cost by the tax rate.

Nothing appears under Cost Alerts even though margins are poor

Cause: No targets have been set, so nothing can breach one.

Fix: Set a target cost percentage on your main items. Alerts are measured against targets, not against an assumed industry norm.