Learn how to estimate the nutrition data or cost per serving of a recipe.
View our full nutritional disclaimer here.
What You Need
To calculate the nutrition and cost information for a recipe, you will need:
- The recipe
- Nutritional labels of ingredients
- Receipt or other means to identify item prices
- Calculator
How to Estimate Nutrition Data
Method to estimate:
- Determine the serving size of the ingredient
- Determine how many servings of each ingredient are in the recipe
- Calculate total number of calories per ingredient
- Sum total calories per recipe
- Divide total calories by recipe servings
We’ll use our Balsamic Chicken and Crackers recipe as an example. By looking at the nutrition label on the canned chicken that was used, it listed that each 3 oz of chicken contains 70 kcal. The recipe utilizes the full 12.5 oz can which means there are 4.17 servings per can. This is equal to 292 kcal from the chicken. This calculation can be repeated for the balsamic glaze and the Ritz crackers. The total kcal are equal to the sum of the kcal of each ingredient: 292 + 53 + 480 = 825 kcal. Since there are five servings in the recipe, the total kcal per servings is 165.
The same strategy can be applied to other nutritional data such as total protein or total sugar.
Sources of Variation & Error
There are many sources of variation that could cause your calculation to differ from that of Rintz Recipes for any given recipe. These factors could also cause the estimation to be different from the actual information of the prepared dish. The factors include but are not limited to:
- Specific product used — Did you use identical ingredients as Rintz Recipes? (One brand might have 30 kcal per 4 oz serving and another brand might have 60 kcal per 4 oz serving.)
- Packaging measurement — Package says 10 oz, but did the supplier actually package it to 10.5 oz?
- Labeling Estimation — Nutrition labels often list total servings per package, but sometimes they estimate. I’ve seen “about two servings” listed on a can when really there are closer to 1.6 servings if we divide package size by serving size.
- Measuring Equipment — Not every measuring cup is identical
- Measuring Technique — Do you use a different technique to measure ingredients compared to Rintz Recipes that could result in a different amount of ingredient used? (Ex: Spoon flour into a measuring up vs. scooping the flour with the cup.)
- Totality of Ingredient Usage — Do you consume 100% of the ingredients used? Or are some ingredients not fully consumed? (For example, when covering a meatloaf with tomato sauce, some of the sauce runs to the bottom of the pan.)
- Serving technique — Was each serving identical?
How to Estimate Cost Data
The process of estimating recipe cost is very similar to estimating nutritional information.
Method to estimate:
- Determine the cost per unit of each ingredient
- Determine how many units of each ingredient are in the recipe
- Calculate total cost per ingredient
- Sum total costs per recipe
- Divide total cost by recipe servings
Again, we’ll use our Balsamic Chicken and Crackers recipe as an example. The prices below are from my local grocery store. A 12.5 oz can of cooked chicken costs $2.44, which means that each ounce costs $0.20. We use the entire can in the recipe, so $2.44 is added to the recipe cost.
The math gets more involved with the balsamic vinegar glaze. Each 8.5 fl. oz bottle costs $4.98. The recipe calls for a tablespoon measurement, so we must convert fluid ounces to tablespoons. Perhaps you know that 1 fluid ounce is equal to 2 tablespoons. Otherwise, there are plenty of conversion calculators on the internet that will calculate 8.5 fluid ounces is equal to 17 tbsp, which also means that each tablespoon costs $0.298.
Since we use 1.5 tbsp in the recipe, the cost of balsamic vinegar glaze is $0.44. The same exercise can be completed for the crackers. The total cost of the recipe is $3.65. Since there are five servings in the recipe, the total cost per serving is $0.73.
Cost Calculation Assumption
The largest note about cost calculations on Rintz Recipes is that it assumes that any portion of the ingredient package that is not used in the recipe will be used at a later time so that only the cost associated with the recipe is counted. For example, if the recipe above only called for 6.25 oz of chicken rather than 12.5 oz, the ingredient cost in the recipe would be $1.22 rather than $2.44. The remaining half of the chicken, and the remaining $1.22, would not be included in the cost calculations for this recipe.
Sources of Variation & Error
The sources of error are similar to those in the nutrition calculation. The process by which costs are calculated should yield identical results, but there are sources of variation that could cause your calculation to differ from that of Rintz Recipes. These factors could also cause the estimation to be different from the actual information of the prepared dish. Refer to the Sources of Variation & Error list under the Nutrition section.