Add each ingredient's pack price, pack size and the amount your recipe uses to get the cost per batch and cost per serving — everything runs in your browser and nothing is stored on a server.
Cost your recipe
Enter every ingredient the recipe uses. Pack size and amount used must be in the same unit, for example grams.
Total recipe cost
$0.00
sum of all ingredient rows
Cost per serving
$0.00
total cost ÷ servings
Ingredients counted
0
rows with a pack size entered
Estimate for planning only. These figures are a planning estimate, not an exact cost. Real costs vary with the pack sizes and prices you actually pay, ingredient waste, and price changes over time. Confirm your own pack prices and quantities before relying on this for pricing decisions.
A one-page guide to costing ingredients and turning that cost into a price. No spam.
Ingredient cost is step one — it's not your price.
Once you know what a batch costs to make, CakePrice turns that cost into a defensible price by adding your labor, overhead and profit margin on top. Free tier available, with a $29 one-time PRO upgrade for saved recipes and more.
Every ingredient row uses the same simple formula: ingredient cost = pack price ÷ pack size × amount used. Dividing the pack price by the pack size gives you a cost per unit — per gram, per milliliter, per egg, whatever unit the pack is measured in. Multiplying that unit cost by the amount your recipe actually uses gives the cost that ingredient contributes to the batch. Add up every row and you get the total recipe cost; divide that by the number of servings and you get the cost per serving.
Using the calculator's default example: flour at $4.50 for a 1000g bag, with 250g used, costs $1.125. Butter at $6.00 for 500g, with 200g used, costs $2.40. Sugar at $3.20 for 1000g, with 180g used, costs $0.576. Eggs at $4.80 for a dozen, with 3 used, costs $1.20. Added together that's $5.301, which rounds to a total recipe cost of $5.30. Split across 12 servings, that's about $0.44 per serving.
The hidden costs people forget
Raw ingredient totals almost always undercount the real cost of a batch. Small things add up: a pinch of salt or spice, parchment paper or liners, a splash of oil for the pan, and the ingredients lost to a batch that didn't turn out. None of these are usually worth their own line item, but they are real money. A simple fix is to add a small wastage allowance — many bakers pad ingredient totals by 5–10% to cover exactly this — rather than trying to itemize every trace ingredient.
Cost per serving is the foundation, not the finish line
The cost per serving this calculator produces tells you what the ingredients alone cost to put one item on a plate or in a box. It does not include your time in the kitchen, packaging, utilities, equipment wear, or the profit that makes the business worth running. Those all need to be added on top of ingredient cost before you land on a selling price — which is a different calculation from the one this page performs.
This page is a general planning tool. It does not know your actual supplier prices, local costs, or how much of an ingredient you waste in practice — enter your own figures for the most accurate result.
Frequently asked questions
How do I cost a recipe?
List every ingredient in the recipe along with the price you paid for the pack, the size of that pack, and how much of it the recipe actually uses. For each ingredient, divide the pack price by the pack size to get a cost per unit, then multiply by the amount used. Add up every ingredient's cost to get the total batch cost, then divide by the number of servings to get the cost per serving.
What unit should I use for pack size and amount used?
Any unit works as long as the pack size and the amount used are entered in the exact same unit for that row, for example grams and grams, or milliliters and milliliters. If a bag of flour is priced by the kilogram but your recipe is measured in grams, convert one of the two figures first so both fields line up, otherwise the cost per row will be wrong.
How do I account for eggs and other things sold by count?
Treat count-based ingredients the same way as weight or volume ones: let the pack size be the number of items in the pack (for example 12 eggs) and the amount used be the number your recipe calls for (for example 3 eggs). The calculator divides pack price by pack size and multiplies by amount used, so the unit just needs to match between the two fields, whatever it is.
Does this include labor and overhead?
No. This tool only totals raw ingredient cost, which is the starting point for pricing, not the finished price. It does not add your time, packaging, utilities, equipment wear, or profit margin. Those all need to be added on top of the ingredient cost before you arrive at a selling price.
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