EZChefSOFTWARE® is a powerful and easy to use Excel based program designed to manage your food and beverage inventory tasks, and create fully costed and documented menu items and sub recipes.

• Easily manages all food and beverage INVENTORY tasks and processes including physical inventory counts and printed weekly order guides for each of your vendors
• Creates accurately priced and updated MENU COSTING for all your restaurant's Menu Items and associated Sub-Recipes
• Performs a full MENU ANALYSIS based your "sales mix" to evaluate and graphically display how each menu item impacts profitability

Now available with "one click" import of all your inventory items and prices from the following distributor Order Guides:

Sysco * U.S. Foodservice * Gordon Food Service * Ben E. Keith

(see bottom of page for details, and feel free to call us at 781-862-7520 if you are interested in having your distributor added to the list)

View an online demo:

Standard Version Demo (no order guide import)

Sysco Version Demo
 

EZChefSOFTWARE® was developed as a Microsoft Excel (Windows based, not applicable for Mac OS**) application which makes it easy to use from day one! A visual and intuitive Main Menu screen (below) guides the user effortlessly from one task to the next.

Here is a list of just some of the tasks that EZChefSOFTWARE® can do for you:

Inventory Management 

• Simple data entry screens allow your inventory to be manually entered or copied from another Excel sheet (Note:  customers of the foodservice companies noted above can "import" their inventory items automatically, with a single mouse click. See the "Sysco Version Demo" video clip above to see how this task is performed)
• Provides twelve inventory categories (e.g. Produce, Meat & Poultry, Dairy) to suit your specific needs and menu
• Includes a simple "Recipe Unit Conversion Tool" to convert each Vendors “As Purchased” unit and price to the way you will use each item in your menu and sub recipe templates (the “Recipe Unit”)
• Permits easy inventory counting and valuation by providing printed inventory sheets, a simple data entry procedure, automatic price extensions and category totals, and a summary page printout
• Creates and prints a Weekly Order Guide for each vendor that accommodates up to six orders, and includes columns for user defined “par” levels and current “on hand” amounts to assist in ordering only what you need!

Sample screen views of common Inventory Management tasks are displayed below....

1) Use the Main Menu "drop down" windows to perform basic inventory tasks

2) Partial view of an inventory worksheet showing navigation & task buttons

3) Use the Recipe Unit Conversion Tool to convert vendor's "As Purchased Unit" to the "Recipe Unit" that you will be using in your menu costing

        

4) Print your current Inventory Sheets to take your month end or period end inventory counts (includes five user-defined locations)



5) Enter the Inventory counts as obtained in #4 above

6) View and Print the Inventory Summary after all items are entered as shown above. Use this information to make "Inventory Adjustments" in your accounting system to create accurate Cost of Goods Sold numbers and percentages in your Profit & Loss Statement
 

7) Make ordering easy by printing a weekly Vendor Order Guide, with current products and prices, for each food and beverage supplier

Menu Item (and Sub Recipe) Costing

• Provides 100 menu item templates in each of eight user defined categories (e.g. Appetizers, Salads, and Entrees)
• Includes an additional 200 sub-recipe templates to be used as direct inputs for your menu items. The use of sub-recipes greatly reduces the time it takes to cost your menu!
• Links your Food and Beverage inventory items, and their current recipe unit costs, into each menu item and sub-recipe template
• Permits the manual entry of inventory items and unit costs to save time or for those items that do not have a significant impact on cost
• Auto calculates each menu item’s portion cost, cost of goods sold, and gross margin based on the item’s selling price
• Provides ample space to document the preparation of each menu item and sub-recipe
• Prints each menu item and sub-recipe with all documentation on a single formatted page

Sample screen views of common Menu Item Costing and Sub Recipe Costing tasks are displayed below.... 

1) To add a new Menu Item simply click on the "Add Menu Item & Sub Recipes" window, and select the item's Menu category

2) Use the "Recipe Search Form" to locate and/or edit existing Menu Items or Sub Recipes

3) Sample screen view of a completed Menu Item template that includes both "linked" Inventory items and manual or "unlinked" items. The price of linked items, like "Beef, Flap Meat" will automatically update any time the vendor price is changed from the Inventory section of the program. The price of manually entered items, like Bread and Butter, will not change unless done so in the template.
 

2) To auto-link ingredients from the Inventory section use the "drop down" window under the Inventory Category column (e.g. select Seafood in the image below), and then move to the corresponding row under the Inventory Item column. When you select the drop down window in that cell you will view a list of all inventory items in the category (e.g. select Oysters from the list below). Once the Inventory Item is selected the program will automatically input your designated Recipe Unit, and it's current Recipe Unit Cost as shown above. All you need to do is input the Number of Units called for in the Recipe and the program will do the rest...

Sales Analysis

• Summarizes all price and cost information for each menu item in tabular format (one table for each of the eight menu item categories)
• Based on the simple input of “item sales mix” information from your POS system (e.g. how many of each item you sold in a specified time period), the software graphs each menu item based on the total gross profit dollars it produces, and its corresponding cost of goods sold percentage. This allows you to visually compare the overall profitability of every item in each menu category against all other items in the same category
• Auto calculates the “Ideal or Theoretical” Cost of Goods Sold percentage of each menu section independently (same as the Item Cost % of 29.6% below), and provides a summary for your entire menu
• Performs “what if” analysis by permitting you to change the item selling price, the item cost or the number of each item sold. Use this information to optimize your menu’s overall profitability!

Sample screen views of common Sales Analysis tasks are displayed below....

1) From the Main Menu select the "Menu Item Analysis" window and select the Menu category you want to view (e.g. Entrees was selected below). Remember that each of the eight Menu Categories are user defined to best meet your restaurant's needs. Use your POS or Cash Register Item Sales report for a specified time period, and enter the number sold of each item as shown below. Once this data is input, the Table will reveal detailed information and rankings comparing each menu items popularity, gross margin, and food cost percentage. The Theoretical Food Cost of each Menu Category is also calculated and displayed.

2) A graphical view of the above Table is a more visual way to see each item's performance relative to all other items in the Category. Each item is placed on a graph with the X axis (horizontal) representing the Total Gross Margin of each Menu Item for the period (e.g. the number sold times the item's gross profit). The Y axis (vertical) plots the Food Cost % of each item. The "best" items in are the PRIMES, those that produce high gross profit dollars and with low food cost %, and conversely the PROBLEMS generate relatively low gross profit dollars, and do so at a corresponding high food cost %. STANDARDS  identify menu items that generate high gross profit dollars but do so at a relatively higher food cost %. SLEEPERS are menu items with low food cost % but because they are not popular, are not high gross profit generators. Cross reference each item's number to the Table above, and click on the item's name to navigate back to its Recipe Cost template. Use this information to proactively manage the menu mix (popularity), selling price and item costs within each Menu Section. This is the most powerful and direct way to increase your restaurants overall profitability. Promote those items that make you money, deemphasize those that do not. Re-price or re-cost other menu items to optimize your overall profitability.

NOTE: The technique used to generate this graphical analysis is called "Cost Margin Analysis" (D. Pavesic), and detailed information regarding this methodology, and how to effectively utilize it, can be found in "Fundamental Principles of Restaurant Cost Control" (click on link)

3) From the Menu Analysis section of the Main Menu screen select the "Theoretical Menu Cost Summary" button with results shown below.

Contact us for additional information on EZChefSOFTWARE®
781-862-7520
info@rrgconsulting.com
 

* Your distributors Order Guide, with all current inventory items and prices, can be easily and quickly imported into the EZChefSoftware program once obtained from the distributor. Instructions for obtaining and importing these files into EZChefSoftware are included in the program's online documentation. You can repeat this process on a regular basis to add new products, and to maintain updated inventory prices and automatically updated recipe & menu item costs. Note: None of the foodservice distributors mentioned at the top of the page sponsor, or are affiliated with either EZChefSoftware or Restaurant Resource Group, Inc.

** This Excel based program is not compatible with the Mac Operating System because it includes "macros" (programming features) written in the Windows version of Microsoft Excel . It can however be run on the "virtual" hard drive of a Mac computer with appropriate software installed (e.g. Boot Camp, Windows (all versions) and the Windows version of Excel (2003 or later ).