Percy Plate is a web-based food cost calculator for food trucks, caterers, cottage food producers, and small restaurant owners. It lets you enter your ingredients and what you pay for them, build recipes, and instantly see the cost per serving and recommended sell price based on your target food cost percentage.

Yes. Percy Plate has a free plan that lets you create up to 10 ingredients and 5 recipes to calculate food cost. A paid subscription ($14.99/month or $119.99/year) unlocks unlimited ingredients and recipes plus inventory tracking, revenue reporting, menu engineering, Prime Cost, AI invoice scanning, FDA nutrition facts labels, FDA ingredient labels, and label printing.

How does Percy Plate calculate food cost?

You enter each ingredient, the unit you buy it in (lb, oz, gallon, etc.), and what you pay per unit. When you build a recipe, Percy Plate converts the recipe quantities to your purchase units, calculates the cost of each ingredient used, and divides by the number of servings to give you a cost per serving. It also shows the food cost percentage and a suggested sell price.

Can Percy Plate generate nutrition facts labels?

Yes. Percy Plate can look up nutrition data from the USDA FoodData Central database for each ingredient, then automatically calculate the per-serving nutrition for a recipe. It generates an FDA-format Nutrition Facts panel that can be printed directly to thermal labels (Brother, Dymo, Zebra) or Avery sheet labels in sizes 2x4 inch and 3.33x4 inch.

Can Percy Plate generate an ingredient list label?

Yes. Percy Plate generates an FDA-compliant ingredient label that lists ingredients by weight (heaviest first), automatically detects the top 9 FDA allergens, and includes your business name and net weight. Labels can be printed to thermal printers or Avery sheet labels.

What label printers work with Percy Plate?

Percy Plate supports thermal label printers including Brother QL series (DK-1202 2x4 inch labels), Dymo LabelWriter (30334 and similar), and Zebra desktop printers. It also supports Avery 5163 (2x4 inch) and Avery 5164 (3.33x4 inch) sheet labels for standard desktop printers.

Who is Percy Plate designed for?

Percy Plate is designed for small food business owners including food truck operators, cottage food producers, caterers, small restaurant owners, and anyone who sells homemade or prepared food and needs to track ingredient costs, price their menu, and produce product labels.

Does Percy Plate work on mobile?

Yes. Percy Plate is a web application that works on any device with a modern browser, including phones and tablets. You can look up ingredient costs, update recipe quantities, and check your food cost percentage from anywhere.

How do you calculate food cost percentage?

Food cost percentage = (ingredient cost per serving ÷ menu price) × 100. For example, if your ingredients cost $3.50 and you sell the dish for $12.00, your food cost percentage is 29.2%. Most food businesses target 28–35%. To set a price from a target, divide ingredient cost by your target: $3.50 ÷ 0.30 = $11.67 suggested price at 30% food cost.

What is a good food cost percentage for a small food business or bakery?

Most food businesses target a food cost percentage between 28% and 35%. Bakeries and cottage food producers often achieve lower food cost percentages (20–28%) because flour, sugar, and butter are inexpensive relative to retail prices. Full-service restaurants tend to run 30–35%. The right target depends on your labor costs, overhead, and pricing power in your market.

How do I calculate the cost per serving of a recipe?

Add up the ingredient cost for the full batch, then divide by the number of servings. For each ingredient, multiply the quantity used by the cost per unit (converting units as needed). For example: 8 oz flour at $0.89/lb = $0.89 ÷ 16 × 8 = $0.44. Sum all ingredient costs, then divide by servings. Percy Plate does this calculation automatically once you enter your ingredient prices and recipe quantities.

How does yield percentage affect recipe costing?

Yield percentage accounts for trim loss, cooking shrinkage, and waste. If you buy 1 lb of chicken but only 0.75 lb is usable after trimming, your yield is 75%. To get accurate food costs, divide the as-purchased cost by the yield percentage: $4.00/lb ÷ 0.75 = $5.33 per usable pound. Percy Plate lets you set a yield percentage (AP to EP) on any ingredient so your recipe costs reflect what you actually use.

What is the best recipe costing software for a small food business?

The best recipe costing software for a small food business depends on your needs. Percy Plate ($14.99/month) is built specifically for cottage food producers, food trucks, caterers, and small restaurants — it includes recipe costing, menu pricing, FDA ingredient labels, nutrition facts labels, inventory tracking, and revenue reporting. Competitors like meez start at $24/month and scale to $199/month. Square and Toast do not include recipe costing natively.

Is there free recipe costing software for home bakers or cottage food businesses?

Yes. Percy Plate has a free plan that includes recipe food cost calculation and menu pricing suggestions. The free plan lets you create up to 10 ingredients and 5 recipes. For unlimited recipes, FDA labels, nutrition facts, and inventory tracking, the paid plan is $14.99/month or $119.99/year. No credit card is required to start.

How do I price homemade baked goods to make a profit?

Start with your ingredient cost per batch, then divide by the number of units to get ingredient cost per item. Add packaging (boxes, bags, labels) as a per-unit cost. Then set a target food cost percentage — most cottage food bakers aim for 25–35% — and divide your total ingredient cost by that percentage to get a minimum price. For example: $0.85 ingredient cost per cookie ÷ 0.30 = $2.83 minimum price at 30% food cost. Factor in your time and overhead to ensure you are actually profitable, not just covering ingredients.

What are the labeling requirements for cottage food products?

Most states require cottage food labels to include: (1) the product name, (2) your name and home address, (3) a list of ingredients in descending order by weight, (4) a disclosure statement such as 'Made in a home kitchen not inspected by the state or local health department,' and (5) allergen declarations for any of the 9 major FDA allergens present. Some states also require net weight. Requirements vary by state — check your state's cottage food law for specifics. Nutrition Facts panels are generally not required for cottage food operations below a certain revenue threshold.

Do I need a nutrition facts label on my cottage food products?

Most cottage food producers are exempt from FDA Nutrition Facts label requirements under the small business exemption (fewer than 100 full-time employees and fewer than 100,000 units sold annually). However, you must still list ingredients in descending order by weight and declare all major allergens. Some states impose additional requirements. When in doubt, check your state's cottage food law and the FDA's small business labeling exemptions.

What allergens must I disclose on a homemade food label?

FDA requires disclosure of 9 major food allergens: milk, eggs, fish, shellfish, tree nuts, peanuts, wheat, soybeans, and sesame. These must be declared on all food labels, including cottage food products — even if a full Nutrition Facts panel is not required. The standard format is a 'Contains:' statement after the ingredient list, for example: 'Contains: Wheat, Eggs, Milk.' Percy Plate detects all 9 allergens automatically from your ingredient names.

How do I create a nutrition facts label for homemade food?

To create a Nutrition Facts label for homemade food: (1) look up the nutrition data for each ingredient using the USDA FoodData Central database, (2) calculate the per-serving amounts for calories, fat, carbohydrates, protein, sodium, and other nutrients, (3) format the panel according to FDA guidelines with serving size, servings per container, and daily value percentages. Percy Plate automates this — it looks up USDA nutrition data for your ingredients, calculates per-serving totals, and generates a print-ready FDA-format Nutrition Facts label for thermal or sheet labels.

How do I list ingredients in the correct order on a food label?

FDA regulations require ingredients to be listed in descending order by weight — the ingredient present in the greatest amount by weight must appear first. For example, if your muffin contains more flour than sugar, flour must be listed first. Sub-ingredients (like those in a chocolate chip) must be listed in parentheses immediately after the component. Percy Plate sorts ingredients automatically by weight when generating your label.

What information is required on a homemade food product label?

A complete homemade food label generally requires: (1) the name of the food, (2) the net quantity (weight or count), (3) an ingredient list in descending order by weight, (4) allergen declarations for all 9 major FDA allergens, (5) your business name and address, and (6) for cottage food specifically, a state-required disclosure statement such as 'Made in a home kitchen not inspected by the state health department.' Nutrition Facts panels are usually optional for small cottage food producers below certain revenue thresholds.

The Prep Sheet and Line Check Checklist Every Kitchen Needs

By Heidi Macomber · July 21, 2026 (updated July 31, 2026)

If you have ever walked into your kitchen at the start of a shift and found the line half-set, the sauces low, and nobody sure whether the chicken was portioned, you already know why prep sheets and line checks exist. They are the two cheapest, highest-leverage tools in restaurant operations, and almost no small food business uses them well.

This guide breaks down exactly how to build a prep sheet, how to run a line check that actually catches problems, and how both connect directly to your food cost percentage and your prime cost. We will keep it practical, give you templates you can copy, and show you the mistakes that quietly drain margin every single shift.

Why Prep Sheets and Line Checks Matter

A prep sheet tells your team what to make, how much to make, and when to have it ready. A line check confirms that everything is actually ready before service starts. Together they do three things:

They prevent running out. Nothing wrecks a dinner rush like running out of rice at 7 PM. A prep sheet sized to your expected covers makes that close to impossible.
They prevent over-prepping. Over-prep is the silent killer of food cost. Every pan of unused mise en place is money that gets thrown away, composted, or slowly degraded in the walk-in.
They create accountability. When prep is written down and checked off, you can see who did what, what got missed, and where the breakdown happened.

The operators who track this consistently see a meaningful drop in waste within the first few weeks. We have watched kitchens trim their food cost percentage by one to three points just by tightening prep and line check discipline, with no other changes.

What Is a Prep Sheet?

A prep sheet is a daily (and sometimes shift-based) list of every item that needs to be prepped for service, with quantities, assignees, and deadlines. It lives in the kitchen, gets updated throughout the day, and feeds directly into the line check.

A good prep sheet answers four questions for every item:

What needs to be prepped?
How much (in a unit you can actually count or weigh)?
Who is responsible?
By when does it need to be done?

The "how much" piece is where most kitchens fail. They write "prep onions" instead of "prep onions: 4 quarts diced, 2 quarts sliced." Vague quantities lead to over-prep, under-prep, and inconsistent food cost from shift to shift.

How to Build a Prep Sheet That Actually Works

Start by listing every item your kitchen preps. Group them by station: hot line, cold line, fryer, grill, garde manger, pastry. For each item, determine your pars, the minimum quantity you must have on hand to get through a shift without scrambling.

Pars are not guesses. They come from your sales history. If you average 80 covers on a Friday and each cover uses roughly 3 ounces of diced onions, your Friday onion par is around 15 pounds. Build in a small safety buffer, maybe 10 to 15 percent, but do not double it. Over-buffering is how walk-ins fill up with surplus that never gets used.

Once you have pars for each item per shift, build the sheet. Here is a simple format you can copy into a spreadsheet, a printed template, or a whiteboard:

PREP SHEET: Friday Dinner Service
Station: Grill

Item               | Par        | Have On Hand | Need to Prep | Assigned To | Done
-------------------|------------|--------------|--------------|-------------|-----
Diced onions       | 15 lb      | 4 lb         | 11 lb        | Maria       | [ ]
Sliced onions      | 8 lb       | 2 lb         | 6 lb         | Maria       | [ ]
Portioned burger   | 60 patties | 20 patties   | 40 patties   | Diego       | [ ]
Marinated chicken  | 30 lb      | 10 lb        | 20 lb        | Diego       | [ ]

The "Have On Hand" column gets filled in at the start of the shift by counting what is already in the walk-in. "Need to Prep" is just Par minus Have On Hand. This forces an actual count, which is where the food cost savings come from. Kitchens that guess at on-hand quantities consistently over-prep.

Update your pars monthly. Menus change, seasons shift, and your covers grow. A par that was right in March is probably wrong by July.

What Is a Line Check?

A line check is the walk-through your kitchen lead does before service starts, confirming that every station is set, stocked, and ready. It is the last line of defense between a smooth service and a chaotic one.

A line check is not a vibe check. It is a structured checklist with specific items, quantities, and quality standards. The lead physically looks at, touches, or tastes items to confirm they are ready. If something is missing or sub-par, it gets fixed before the first ticket fires.

The line check should happen 15 to 30 minutes before service, every shift, no exceptions. Skipping it because "we are busy" is exactly when you need it most.

How to Run a Line Check That Actually Catches Problems

A strong line check covers four categories:

1. Prep and Stock Levels

Walk the line and confirm every station has its pars met. Sauces filled to the line, proteins portioned and in the reach-in, garnishes cut and labeled. If anything is short, that is a prep sheet failure, flag it so the pars get adjusted.

2. Quality and Freshness

Line check is when you taste and inspect. Are the dressings tasting right today? Is the fish still good, or did it turn overnight? Are the fried items held at the right crispness? Quality checks catch problems before a guest does. Toss anything that is off, log it on your waste sheet, and fix the root cause.

3. Temperature and Food Safety

Every line check should include a temperature sweep. Confirm hot holding is above 135°F (57°C), cold holding is below 41°F (5°C), and that reach-ins and walk-ins are holding their targets. This is also your best prep for a health inspection, because if you run line checks daily, you are essentially doing a mini self-inspection every shift. Log the temps on a simple sheet so you have a record.

4. Equipment and Station Readiness

Are the burners lit and holding temp? Is the flat top clean and seasoned? Are tickets printers loaded? Are sanitizer buckets mixed to the right concentration? These seem trivial until a burner goes out mid-rush and nobody noticed.

Here is a compact line check template:

LINE CHECK: Friday Dinner: Lead: Sam

PREP & STOCK
[ ] Grill station at pars (onions, proteins, buns)
[ ] Cold line at pars (greens, dressings, garnish)
[ ] Fryer station at pars (breading, baskets, oil level)
[ ] Backup reach-in stocked

QUALITY
[ ] Dressings tasted, seasoned correctly
[ ] Proteins fresh, no off smell or texture
[ ] Fried items holding crisp

TEMP & SAFETY
[ ] Hot holding: [    ] °F  (target 135°F+)
[ ] Cold line reach-in: [    ] °F  (target 41°F or below)
[ ] Walk-in: [    ] °F
[ ] Sanitizer buckets: correct concentration

EQUIPMENT
[ ] All burners lit, holding temp
[ ] Flat top clean and seasoned
[ ] POS and printers online

Notes:

That entire checklist takes 10 minutes if the prep sheet was followed. It takes 45 minutes if it was not. That time difference is the ROI of good prep.

How Prep Sheets and Line Checks Protect Your Food Cost

This is where operations meets the numbers. Food cost percentage is not just a pricing problem, it is a consistency problem. Here is how these two tools move the needle.

Waste reduction. Over-prep creates waste. Waste is food you paid for and never sold. When your prep sheet is sized to real demand and your line check catches quality issues early (before a full pan goes bad), your waste drops. Track it on your waste sheet and you will see the trend.

Accurate portioning. A line check confirms portions are right. If the team is over-portioning protein because nobody checked the scoop size, your food cost creeps up even though your menu prices stayed the same. Line checks catch this.

Better purchasing. When your prep quantities are consistent and tracked, your ordering gets tighter. You stop over-ordering "just in case," which means less cash tied up in inventory and less spoilage. This is the bridge between kitchen operations and your prime cost.

Faster service, more covers. A ready line turns tables faster. More covers with the same labor and rent means your labor cost percentage drops and your profit per shift rises. The line check is not just a food safety move, it is a throughput move.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Using the same pars year-round. Covers fluctuate with season, holidays, and local events. Review pars monthly, at minimum. If you are still using January pars in July, you are either running out or over-prepping.

Making the line check optional. The moment a line check becomes "when we have time," it stops happening. Make it non-negotiable, assign it to a specific lead, and build it into the shift timeline.

Not connecting the prep sheet to the waste sheet. If you are throwing out the same item every week, your par is wrong. The waste sheet tells you which par to fix. Ignoring that feedback loop means the same money leaks out every week.

Overcomplicating it. A prep sheet with 80 items is a form, not a tool. Start with your top 20 prep items, the ones that matter most for your menu and your food cost, and expand from there. Complexity kills adoption.

No assigned owner. "Everyone" is responsible means no one is. Every prep item gets a name. Every line check gets a lead.

How to Get Started This Week

You do not need new software to start. Here is the fastest path:

List your top 20 prep items. The proteins, sauces, and garnishes that show up on the most plates.
Set a par for each based on your last four weeks of covers. Start conservative, adjust up if you run out.
Build a one-page prep sheet using the template above. Print it, put it on a clipboard, and make the opening lead fill in "Have On Hand" every shift.
Build a one-page line check. Use the template above. Assign it to the closing lead or chef de cuisine, 20 minutes before service.
Review weekly for four weeks. What ran out? What got wasted? Adjust pars. After a month, your pars will be tight and your line will run smoother.

How Percy Plate Fits In

Prep sheets and line checks are where the discipline lives, but the numbers behind them, your pars, your food cost percentage, your waste, your prime cost, need a home. That is what Percy Plate is built for. By tying your recipe costs and ingredient prices to your actual prep quantities, you can see in real time whether your pars are profitable, not just available.

When your line check logs a wasted pan of chicken, that cost flows into your variance. When your vendor raises the price of oil, your prep sheet pars get flagged for review. Operations and finance stop living in two different spreadsheets.

The Bottom Line

Prep sheets and line checks are unglamorous. They will never be the thing that wins you a local press feature. But they are the difference between a kitchen that runs and a kitchen that bleeds money one shift at a time.

Start with a clipboard, a printed template, and 20 minutes a shift. Tighten your pars, run the line check every time, and watch your waste and your food cost percentage move in the right direction. The tools are free. The discipline is the hard part, and it pays for itself within the month.

Related Guides

Allergen-Safe Cleaning and Cross-Contamination Prevention: A Practical Guide — Allergen-safe cleaning framework
How to Reduce Food Waste in a Restaurant Without Alienating Customers — Cut waste through kitchen discipline
Restaurant Inventory Management: PAR Levels, Counting, and the System That Stops Waste — Inventory and prep planning
The Par Level Formula: How to Stop Running Out (and Stop Overordering) — Ordering and prep level formulas

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