Free Calculator · Updated 18 May 2026
Cost a menu item end-to-end: ingredient cost, labour minutes, overhead allocation, target gross profit, GST, and dine-in vs takeaway prices. Built for Australian cafes, restaurants, and bars.
Selecting an item type loads industry-typical defaults — adjust any field below to match your venue.
Total cost of all ingredients per single portion.
Cafes 18–25%, restaurants 28–35%, cocktails 18–22%.
Total kitchen time per portion — prep, cook, plate.
Base + super + workers comp + leave loading (typically 1.3–1.45× base).
Rent, utilities, insurance, admin as % of revenue (12–25% typical).
GP after food and labour but before overhead — 65–80% typical.
Three pricing methods (excl. GST)
Food cost % method
Price = ingredient cost ÷ (30% / 100)
$28.33
Multiplier method
Price = ingredient cost × 3.33×
$28.33
GP target methodRecommended
Covers food + labour + overhead + 70% gross profit
$158.33
How to use this calculator
Entree, main, dessert, coffee, or cocktail. Each preset comes with industry-typical defaults for food cost target (cafes 18–25%, restaurant mains 28–32%, cocktails 18–22%) and labour minutes per portion. You can override every input — the presets are a starting point, not a constraint.
The per-portion cost of every ingredient in the recipe — proteins, produce, dairy, dry goods, garnish. Use your actual supplier invoice prices. Don't forget plate garnish, oil, butter, salt and pepper — they're small individually but add 8–12% to most savoury recipes.
Labour minutes per portion (prep + cook + plate) at your loaded hourly wage (base + super + workers comp + leave loading — typically 1.3–1.45× the base rate). Overhead allocation is rent, utilities, insurance, software, and admin — usually 12–20% of revenue at a small cafe, 18–25% at a full restaurant.
The calculator outputs three suggested menu prices using different methods — food-cost-percentage, multiplier, and gross-profit-target. Pick the one that suits your category. Then see GST applied, dine-in price (often the menu price), takeaway price (typically same as dine-in in AU since GST applies either way unless surcharge is added).
Supplier prices move continuously — eggs, butter, oil, avocados, prawns are the recurring movers in AU. A 12% supplier increase on a hero menu item with 30% food cost target moves the actual food cost to 33.6% without any change at the venue. Re-cost every menu line quarterly and adjust selectively.
Menu engineering classifies items as stars (popular, high margin), plowhorses (popular, low margin), puzzles (high margin, low popularity), and dogs. Promote stars on specials boards. Re-cost or rework plowhorses. Reposition puzzles. Cut dogs.
A well-priced cocktail program runs 18–22% food cost; a food menu runs 28–32%. The blended margin is what makes a restaurant viable. If you only price food correctly and neglect drinks, you leave 5–10 points of gross profit on the table.
Customers don't expect cheap — they expect fair value clearly communicated. A $28 main with a confident menu description outsells a $24 main with apology language. Price for the quality you deliver, present it cleanly, and trust the customer.
Industry benchmarks: cafes 18–25%, casual restaurants 28–32%, fine dining 30–35%, cocktails 18–22%, wine 35–40%, beer 25–30%. Lower food cost % = higher gross profit, but also higher pricing — which can hurt volume. Most successful menus have a mix: 'star' items at favourable food cost (the items you push), 'plowhorse' items at higher food cost that drive volume.
Base rate × (1 + super % + workers comp % + leave loading + super on leave). For a Level 4 cook on ~$30/hour base, the loaded rate is typically $39–$45/hour after 11.5% super + ~4% workers comp + 25% leave & loading equivalents. Always use loaded wage in pricing — using base wage under-costs labour by 30–45%.
Usually not in Australia — GST applies to both dine-in and takeaway at the same 10% rate. The only legitimate reason to price differently is service-related — e.g., a public-holiday surcharge applies only to dine-in service, not takeaway. Some venues offer a small takeaway discount to incentivise pickup over delivery (which carries 30%+ aggregator fees).
It's a planning tool, not a P&L. The food cost and labour inputs are the most accurate parts — those come from your actual recipe and roster. Overhead allocation is harder — it depends on your actual rent, utilities, and admin costs. Use the calculator to set the menu, then track actual food cost % and labour % weekly against the model. Variances above ±3% are worth investigating.
Both arrive at the same answer mathematically — but operators think differently about them. Food-cost % method: 'I want food cost to be 30% of price, so price = cost ÷ 0.30'. Multiplier method: 'My multiplier is 3.33×, so price = cost × 3.33'. For a $3 ingredient cost, both give $10 menu price. Choose whichever framing your kitchen team finds intuitive.
Price each item separately. Averaging is the classic margin leak in hospitality — high-margin items subsidising low-margin items invisibly. Cost each recipe individually, set its price for its food cost %, then look at the menu as a whole to ensure your blended food cost stays on target (typically achieved through menu engineering — promoting the stars, deprioritising the dogs).
OneBookPlus is the all-in-one platform for Australian cafes, restaurants, and bars — reservations, deposits, rostering, GST-ready invoicing, supplier and recipe tracking. Free to start, no card required.
Last reviewed and updated: by Bishal Shrestha
About the author
Founder & CEO, OneBookPlus
Bishal has over a decade of experience in digital marketing, web development, and small business consulting across Australia. He has helped Australian cafe and restaurant operators move from gut-feel menu pricing to costed recipe cards, GP targets, and dine-in vs takeaway price discipline.
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