Recipes, forecasts and production plans
Write each dish as a recipe with its yield, preparation loss and cost. Each meal gets a forecast of how many will eat and what to cook. The kitchen's day becomes a production plan with the raw materials it needs. Any shortfall goes to the store in one click.
PLANSScale only
The problem it solves
- The cook decides how much rice to make by looking at yesterday's pot, and a third of it is thrown away.
- Nobody knows what a plate of veg biryani costs since the price of onions went up.
- The kitchen finds out at 10 in the morning that the store has no paneer for lunch.
- The vegetarian and no-onion counts reach the kitchen by word of mouth.
How it works
- Under Food Service > Kitchen > Recipes, write each dish. Give the Batch Yield (portions or units one batch makes). Give each ingredient with its Quantity, Unit and Preparation Loss (%), and the Method. The Cost per Unit is worked out and kept up to date.
- Each meal of each outlet has a demand forecast. It holds the members expected to eat, the usual walk-ins for that weekday and your Adjustment for an exam or a festival. It lists the items to cook.
- Open Production Plans, click New, choose the Kitchen and the Date, save and click Refresh from Forecasts. The plan gathers the forecasts of every outlet the kitchen supplies.
- Items to Cook lists the quantity per session and item. Raw Materials shows what is Needed, what is In the Kitchen Store and the Shortfall.
- Click Indent the Shortfall and the kitchen store asks its main store for what is missing.
- Click Confirm and Make Orders. Each item with a recipe gets a production order. The chef starts and finishes on the tablet with the quantity made and the ingredients used.
Everything it does
Recipes
- For menu items and Prepared Items (sub-recipes such as a gravy base or dough)
- Batch Yield (1 to start with) in the item's unit; ingredients in any unit, converted to the store's unit
- Preparation Loss (%): peeling, trimming, cooking; that much more is taken from the store
- Alternatives per ingredient: recorded for the cook; the system does not swap them by itself
- Cost per Unit from the ingredients' costs, written to the item's cost, and recomputed up the chain when an ingredient's cost changes
- A recipe that contains itself, through its sub-recipes, is refused
- One recipe for every Entity or one per Entity; the first active one is used
- Dishes Made to Order, per outlet: a dish sold there takes its recipe's ingredients from the outlet's store
Demand forecast per meal
- One forecast per outlet, date and session
- Plan Members: members expected to eat by the outlet's confirmation rule, less those who said no or are on leave. Taken from the meal's headcount where there is one
- Walk-ins: the average of the same weekday over the last 4 weeks
- Adjustment: your correction in people, kept when the forecast is rebuilt
- Special Diets: members eating by diet, allergy and diet note, such as Vegetarian: 12
- Per item: For Plan Members (by the combo each picked), From Sales History (4-week average), Pre-booked, Catering Orders, your Adjustment and the Quantity
Production plan
- One plan per kitchen and day; States: Draft, Confirmed, Done
- Refresh from Forecasts rebuilds the forecasts of the kitchen's outlets and the plan
- Raw Materials: sub-recipes opened into raw materials; prepared items already in the kitchen store are used first
- Indent the Shortfall: one indent to the kitchen store's source store, requested at once
- Confirm and Make Orders: a production order for each item that has a recipe; items without one are marked
Production orders
- Kitchen, session, item, Planned and Made, Cook, Batch, start and finish times
- Ingredients: Standard for the quantity made against Used, with the difference
- Done takes the ingredients used out of the kitchen store; a stocked prepared item made goes into it
- Yield (%), Standard Cost and Actual Cost per order
- Cancel only before cooking starts
- Food Service > Reports > Kitchen and Meals > Production Analysis
Who uses it
Kitchen Manager / ChefWrites recipes, corrects the forecast, makes the plan, indents the shortfall and confirms the orders.
Cook at the chef's tabletStarts and finishes each production order with the quantity made and the ingredients used.
StorekeeperIssues the shortfall indent from the main store.
Food AdministratorSees recipe costs and production against plan.
Where you use it
- Web: Food Service > Kitchen > Recipes, Demand Forecast, Production Plans, Production Orders; Food Service > Reports > Kitchen and Meals > Production Analysis
- The SmartMy Feast Kitchen app in Chef mode: today's production orders, Start and Done with the quantity made and the ingredients used. Built and in testing, not in the app stores yet
- The SmartMy Feast Manager app: today's and tomorrow's meals and the forecast, with a correction by kitchen managers. Built and in testing, not in the app stores yet
- Not built: a plan made by itself every day; you click Refresh from Forecasts on the plan
What you control
Settings
- Batch Yield: 1 to start with
- Preparation Loss (%): 0 to start with, per ingredient
- Recipe per Entity: empty means every Entity
- Dishes Made to Order, per outlet: off
- Kitchen Store of each kitchen, and the store it indents from
Approvals
- Indent: the shortfall indent goes through the Indent chain (Storekeepers, Kitchen Managers, Food Administrators to start with)
Notifications
- No messages of their own; the shortfall indent raises Request Waits for Your Approval to its approvers, in the app and by email
Works with
SmartMy HostelResidents' mess plans, leave and answers feed the members expected at each meal, so the forecast follows the hostel's headcount.
Questions
Does the forecast know who is not eating?
Yes. Plan members are counted by the outlet's confirmation rule, so members who said no or are on leave are left out. Where the meal has a headcount, the forecast takes its people from there.Can a recipe use another recipe, like a gravy base?
Yes. Mark the base as a Prepared Item and give it its own recipe. Its cost flows into the dish, and gravy already made and kept in the kitchen store is used first.Will the dish cost change when the price of onions changes?
Yes. When an ingredient's cost changes, the cost of every recipe using it is worked out again, up to the dishes that use those recipes.Is the production plan made by itself every morning?
No. The kitchen manager opens the plan for the day and clicks Refresh from Forecasts. Forecasts can also be made from the Manager app.Does the cook have to type every ingredient?
No. The order fills in the standard quantities for what was made. The cook changes only what was used differently.Related features
MEAL PLANNING AND ENGAGEMENTAre you eating? Headcount before the cut-offPlan members say Eating or Not eating for each meal before its cut-off, on the portal or in the app. At the cut-off the members' count is frozen, walk-ins are added from the last four weeks, and the kitchen cooks for that number.STORES AND PURCHASEStock per store with batches and use-by datesKeep the stock of your main store, kitchen store and outlet stores apart, with each batch and its use-by date. Stock that expires first goes out first, and each store asks for more by itself when an item falls below its reorder level.KITCHEN PRODUCTIONCentral kitchen dispatch to outletsOne kitchen cooks for several outlets: each dispatch records what left, in which vehicle and at what temperature, and the outlet records what arrived. When the outlet belongs to another Entity of your group, the received food is billed between the two at cost plus your markup.KITCHEN PRODUCTIONFood cost, leftovers and plate wasteRecord what was left after each meal and what became of it, and weigh the plate waste. Every night SmartMy Feast works out the cost per plate and food cost % of each outlet and meal. It sets what was cooked against who came, with the reasons in plain words.PORTAL AND APPSChef and storekeeper appsA tablet in the kitchen lets the chef start and finish production, record leftovers and plate waste, log fridge temperatures and keep food samples. A tablet in the store lets the storekeeper issue indents, receive deliveries with batches, count stock and write off waste.SELLINGCatering orders with an advanceTake an order for an event with its menu, guests, venue and date, priced from the outlet for the customer type. Invoice an advance on confirmation and the rest after the event, less the advance.
See it with your own menu.
Tell us how many outlets you run and how people pay today. We will show you a day in your mess or canteen on SmartMy Feast.