Recipes: How-To

The importance of Menu Item data and what it's used for

What is Menu Item Data?

It’s all the information in the below 3 categories:

- Build Recipe - The makeup of a thing we’re going to sell (portioned meal itself)

- Sub-Recipe - A recipe that holds a lot of details but we’re not going to sell on its own (a component part of the Build Recipe)

- Ingredients - The things we’re going to purchase, used in both types of recipes

- Method or Instructions - Clear, specific, and exhaustive instructions for each sub- and build recipe are CRITICAL, not only to ensure consistency during production and to simplify training for your employmees, but to also allow for our Photo and Content team to prepare and plate your meal properly when it gets to the photoshoot stage. 

What does CookUnity use this information for?

We use the menu item data set for the following important things:

- Costing of the items we’re going to sell aka our theoretical food cost.

- Purchasing the specific ingredients in the quantities you need for production. We multiply your recipe by the number of items sold for the current production week.

- Cooking during production (if we don’t cook from the recipes, then the usage, cost, and nutritional values will be inaccurate) This is a major step that everyone needs to fully implement and commit to.

- Nutritional Values and Item Labeling which is required by law and is much different standard compared to items produced for immediate consumption.

How do we create Menu Items and what are the requirements?

What is the process?

Concept Approval > Submit a Tested Recipe Draft > Culinary Engineering > Sourcing > Adjustments, Review, and Approval > Photography > Scheduling and Communications

Communications for each of the above sections are super important.

- All chef partners have a Chef Success Account manager set as your key contact. If you don’t know your CSM then email us we’ll let you know.

- For new menu items and edits we need to know who you designate as the main point of contact, sometimes it's the chef partner and sometimes there is another person. If you want to change that person at any time just let your CSM know.

- For approving concepts you or (your designated POC) will work with the portfolio team and your CSM will be in the loop.

- For creating and approving the actual items a recipe squad member will get you or (your designated POC) through the approval phase and then a CSM will take over to help schedule photos and go live.

- Your CSM is responsible for letting you know that new items have been scheduled to go live.

- For recipe edits a recipe squad person will communicate with you or (your designated POC) to confirm the next steps and an email will be sent to: the person who submitted the request, the chef owner and lead on file, the local ops manager and MD to let you know the change has been made.

- For the recipe review, a recipe squad member will reach out to you or (your designated POC) about the needed info. We need this to be handled as swiftly as possible.

- IMPORTANT - When changes are made or when new items go live, we need a good way to communicate with your operational team, other than email. This is out of our hands at the moment and we’re seeing the need to ensure this is completed.

Your team in the kitchen needs to know:

- Always reference the parsley recipes. We’re working on a way for you to use your own device to view them in a convenient way so stay tuned for that.

- When an ingredient or significant recipe edit has been made

- When a new item is going live and they need to be trained in advance

-Navigate to the form HERE and complete 

-You'll receive an email from recipes@cookunity.com on the status of your submission 

-Once approved, move on to the next step!

More about concept approval:

Led by the Portfolio team and followed up by your Chef Success Manager. They will provide insight into what customers are demanding and what would fit well into a market's active menu pool.

Items are approved by CookUnity through a [concept approval form](https://sites.google.com/cookunity.com/chefs/home), where the Chef team will give the following for each proposed item:

- title (main component)

- subtitle (other components)

- description (something interesting about this idea/item)

- list of components (i.e. list of items that will go into the final plate including the packaging)

Please be creative and have fun with this part, these don’t need to read like a glossary and can have some of your culinary personality and/or brand's style to them. If your concept is approved it will go to the next step. If not there will be some feedback to suggest a change, possibly because we think it won’t work well in this format or there are already several similar meals in the pool. Either-way we’ll work to get something approved!

CookUnity Recipe Software Tutorial and Recipe Submission Steps on Parsley (click here)

Once you have submitted a draft recipe through Parsley, contact your recipe squad team member to notify them!

The recipe squad will submit new items or market-sourcing requests to the supply chain team. Once the supply chain team has sourced and entered the new items into the database they will alert the recipe squad it's complete.

We say engineer instead of data entry because in most cases this info needs to be altered to work for the 4 major outputs. It’s a skillset and not data entry.

A member of our recipe squad will be assigned to your work and will review your items for the purpose of making sure the information provided works for the 4 main outputs: costing, usage, nutritional values, and your chef team in operations.

They may require a meeting with you or send questions over email. Please respond to the best of your ability.

Checkpoint for the menu item on whether it meets food cost criteria 

The goal of this step is to have a means-tested recipe that can be scaled to as many as 500 portions (our tools assist in scaling, once a recipe has been approved)

You may be using an existing recipe, finding a recipe from the internet, or developing a recipe from scratch. Best practice to have a recipe tested in at least a batch of 10 portions. Always use a scale! Accurate recipes require accurate measurements.

CookUnity requires these trials for any menu item that includes a new ingredient, but it is a good practice to test the recipe prior to the first production day. Your recipe squad point of contact will either reach out to schedule this if required, or can assist in the event it is not required but you would like to test. 

CookUnity has standards for the design of the menu items:

- We need all recipes that are submitted by you to be tested first so we know you’re giving us accurate information. Remember we’re using this info for several important controls, this is not just a list of ingredients.

- Final weight between 12-14.5 oz for main meals. SKU expansion items targets will be set as we expand the categories. Meal weight/portioning consistency during production must be +/-10% of published weights.

- Cost targets are regional but the idea is to have a balanced portfolio, some less expensive, and some (with certain proteins) will be more expensive. Just like any menu!

- Standard protein portion sizes and trim/ cook yields are provided and are used for the majority of item. The exception is a dish like “chicken wings”, where inherently the protein portion will be larger than a meal. This way we know: standards are set for cooking, meaning we make usage more predictable for both Chefs and CU. It means it a fair playing field for chef teams, and consistent for eaters across meals. We will publish current protein yields going forward.

- Food must fit neatly into the pulp fiber tray or other containers and can not protrude over the top edge.

- The recipe must be able to be executed at scale within existing CookUnity facilities and must be able to be evenly portioned. Meaning if you make gumbo for example, you should aim to portion the soup and protein separately or cut the protein small so you don’t need to, that way you know each meal gets the same amount.

Ask important questions:

-Can this meal be easily scaled? What are the different types of equipment I would need to produce the recipe in large batches?

-How will production of this recipe affect my team's daily production workflow?

-What cooking methods will I use?

-Does the meal have balanced flavors?

-Are the meal components good for re-heating?

-Will all the components hold up for a 6 day shelf-life?

-Will the recipe seal properly?

What to Expect: Day of Trial 

CookUnity will provide the necessary ingredients for you to cook 5 portions of each plate with the goal of ensuring the recipes as currently written can be replicated accurately in a production environment. This means accurate trims, yields, ingredient quantities, heating instructions, and descriptions.

Please make sure to  take pictures of the plated recipe and upload every feedback to this form (one per recipe) so we can review it and adjust everything there is to adjust before proceeding:

CookUnity Menu Item Trial Form

We will review these results and your recipes in another call with a member of the CU recipe team.

This recipe trial is a critical step to ensuring your recipes are great from day one - keep in mind that the more exact and accurate your recipes are, the less issues we will have down the line (e.g. ingredient distribution quantities) and will help us avoid needing to make last minute edits to ACTIVE menu items in the first couple of weeks (which can be both a risk for labeling accuracy and distracts from the focus on getting your team prepared and trained for preparing great food. 

IMPORTANT NOTES:

• Please see the "Ingredient - General Information" page for a list of current CookUnity Inventory - it is always best to use ingredients we already carry (this will speed up the recipe onboarding process too!)

• The net weight of a single meal portion should be 12 oz. to 14.5 oz., depending on meal type

• We have a standard size for most proteins - please do not include a larger quantity of protein then stated here

• Depending on the protein(s) used, the meal may fall into our Premium Pricing

When testing the recipe, document all of the ingredients you are using and the beginning raw amounts.

1. Weigh raw, unprocessed cauliflower (write it down)

2. Process and cook cauliflower, weight again (write it down)

3. Portion your cauliflower into your 4 trays (record weight of cauliflower in 1 tray)

4. If you have extra cauliflower left over after portioning write that down also

Example.  If you thought you would use 3 lbs of cauliflower, raw, and after trimming & cooking you had 1.5 lb and after portioning into 4 trays, you have 4 oz leftover, then the starting amount would need to change in your recipe.  By how much?  Use this equation to calculate.

3lbs raw→ 1.5lb finished is 50% yield→ after portioning has .25 lbs extra

SO, only needed 1.25 lbs finished cauliflower for 4 dishes,  need to start with 2.5 lbs raw

New starting amount x .5= 1.25 lbs

1.25/.5= 2.5 lbs

CHANGE RECIPE

2.5lbs raw--->1.25 lb finished with 50% yield

Additional Resources:

Culinary Math

Ingredients - General Information

Ingredient Yields and Conversions

The recipe squad will add the new ingredients to your recipes and make any adjustments they think are required due to sourcing.

They will make a final review with the Chef team (chef owner/corporate lead and now your local lead and CU local operations lead are required) to confirm you’re happy with all the details, sourcing, and any substitutes should they be needed.

The recipe squad will then review them with the Finance team and work to get your items approved. You’ll be alerted if any adjustments are needed.

All meal photography is conducted in CU's NYC content kitchen. This includes new meals, existing meals, reshoots, SKU expansion, bundles, banners, campaigns. We will replicate your menu items according to the recipe (reminder it is CRITICAL to include instructions for our team) in New York. 

This will be done in 2 ways depending on business need:

• 1. Food stylist makes from scratch using marketplace ingredients

  2. Producer will order dish from market lead via UPS

CookUnity does not cover the cost to be onsite for meal photography, however if you choose to do so, you are able to be present for photography and content shoots. 

What to Expect:

Once an item reaches this stage, a member of CU's Content team will reach out to you via email to notify of the upcoming photo shoot. We schedule these 10 days in advance of the shoot. You or a member of your team with knowledge of the recipe will need to be available remotely by email and cell phone for questions.

After the images are captured, they will be edited and move on to further steps!

Chef Success will ask you for a launch date earlier in this process and confirm with you around the time of the photoshoot. Once a date is confirmed by the chef team, meaning you agree your local team can prepare the new item they will alert the menu planning team to add this new item to the menu. Local chef teams must receive training before the launch date.

Viola, there is now a new item in your active menu pool!