Learn To Scale A Recipe For Production - (2024)

Learn To Scale A Recipe For Production - (1)

Do you have a favorite recipe, but it only yields enough for 12? Did you have a catering recipe, but a customer has asked if they can purchase only a dozen? Learn to quickly scale a recipe for production.

There are going to be numerous occasions in your business that is going to require you to increase or decrease the yield for one of your recipes. It is important that you as a baker know the proper steps to take to calculate the correct measurements for desired yield.


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Calculating Yield Changes By Hand To Scale A Recipe For Production

Now the math around increasing and decreasing yields to scale a recipe for production is fairly simple. You start with your desired yield amount, and you divide it by your recipe yield amount to get your conversion rate. This conversion rate will either be a decimal number if you need to reduce your recipe, or the decimal may include a whole number if you need to increase your yield for your recipe.


Once you determine the conversion factor, you will then take the conversion rate and times it by each line item in the ingredients for your recipe. This will give you the new measurements to produce your desired yield.


take desired yield/ recipe yield = conversion factor

conversion factor X each line of ingredients

Now this seems fairly easy to do the math quickly to scale a recipe for production, and it can be easy for small, simple recipes. However, it can be time consuming when you have to convert a large recipe with lots of ingredients. Here at Perfectly Pastry, we actually have a simple solutions for you that will make converting your recipes quick and easy. Save yourself the time and hassle of converting your recipes by snatching one of our calculators here.

Get Our Recipe Conversion Calculator Here

Time is money when you own your own business so save both time and money with our recipe conversion calculator. This calculator will quickly allow you to convert any recipe. Use it to quickly scale up your recipe for that big catering order that you just got, or you can use it to scale down that great scone recipe that you just found. Either way, you will be glad to have more time to spend focusing on your business.


Do you want to join the cool club so that you never mess out on all the great tools that we offer to fellow bakers like yourself? Then sign up below for our email list. We send out updates on all the items we offer. We share recipes, tips, and much more to our email list. You know know you want to be a cool kid. Join below.

Join the Cool Club

Using The Calculator

Now that you decided to save time with our calculator lets talk about using the calculator. Start by entering your recipe yield B1. Then you put your desired yield into D1. These are going to give you a conversion factor in the red box. DO NOT MESS with the red box, or you will mess up your conversions.


Next, put in ingredients for your recipe. If you are not using weight for your recipe, then you need to stop and go here. You should never use cups and teaspoons when baking. Instead, you need to convert all your recipes to weight so that you can consistently produce the best product every time. Seriously, go here to learn why this is important for your baking business.

Listen to “Episode 2: Reducing or Increasing Yield On A Recipe” on Spreaker.

Now back to using the calculator. Once you enter in all your ingredient weights, the calculator will quickly give you the new weight amount for each ingredient to use in a recipe to get your desired yield. That’s it. That is all you have to do. I mean, how many times have you sat down and figured that out by hand? Yeah, I know. Stop wasting time.


That time is better spent doing something else like marketing, spending time with family, or creating your next masterpiece. If you decided to hold off on getting your own calculator, then go here to grab one for your business today.

More about Chef Chris Phillips and Perfectly Pastry

Chef Chris Phillips spent 25+ years in the corporate world. She hated everything about it and wanted more in life. After coming to a crossroads in her life, Chef Chris Phillips discovered her passion for baking. She loves the creativity in developing flavor profiles. She enjoys the smiles and praises that come from a perfectly executed dessert, and she loves to share her knowledge and passion with others.

Learn To Scale A Recipe For Production - (4)
Learn To Scale A Recipe For Production - (5)
Learn To Scale A Recipe For Production - (2024)

FAQs

How do you scale up a recipe for production? ›

How To Scale Up A Recipe: 4 Easy Steps
  1. Step 1: Determine the Conversion Factor for the Recipe. ...
  2. Step 2: Convert all Weights in the Recipe to Ounces and all Volumes to Fluid Ounces. ...
  3. Step 3: Multiply Each Ingredient in the Recipe by the Conversion Factor. ...
  4. Step 4: Simplify and Round the Numbers for Easier Recipe Use.

What is the formula for scaling a recipe? ›

Calculate the scaling factor by dividing the number of servings (or grams) you want to make by the recipe yield. Example: This recipe yields five servings. If you are making nine servings, the scaling factor is 9 ÷ 5 = 1.8.

How do you resize a recipe? ›

The way to scale a recipe by number of servings is to multiply the original amount by the desired serving size and then divide by the original serving size. We are essentially doing the same thing as scaling a recipe by a multiplier.

What is scaling in food production? ›

What does scaling up mean? Scaling up food production means that you're increasing the size of your food production. Scaling up can be relatively small: making 50 instead of 10 muffins, or big: making 10.000 instead of 10 muffins.

Which types of recipes might not scale well? ›

Recipes such as baked goods with leavening ingredients such as baking soda, baking powder, and yeast don't lend themselves to scaling as easily. You can't simply add double the amount of baking soda in your bread dough and expect it to come out well.

How are most recipes scaled measured? ›

Recipe scaling is not just a matter of multiplying the ingredients. The container size and its shape (surface area to volume) cooking methods, and the accuracy of your measurements all greatly influence recipe scaling. Measuring all ingredients by weight will give you the most accurate results.

What are the four methods of scaling *? ›

Statisticians often refer to the "levels of measurement" of a variable, a measure, or a scale to distinguish between measured variables that have different properties. There are four basic levels: nominal, ordinal, interval, and ratio.

Can all recipes be scaled up or down? ›

Scaling down usually works fine to a certain extent, but not always. This is especially evident if your recipe/formula is done with volumetric measurements (e.g. cups, tsp, tablespoons), but even if your recipe is by weight, linear scaling up usually will lead to over seasoning.

How do you convert recipes to yield smaller and larger quantities? ›

Divide the desired yield by the recipe's original yield. The result is called the conversion factor. 2. Multiply all recipe ingredients by the conversion factor.

What does it mean to scale a recipe? ›

Scaling means to measure out the ingredients of a recipe for the quantity you need. You can scale a recipe by doubling or halving the ingredients to adjust for the number of servings you will need.

When scaling a recipe What is the new yield? ›

When scaling a recipe, the amount of each ingredient is adjusted accordingly. The calculation that is used to adjust the amount of an ingredient is as follows: New yield / original yield x ingredient original amount = new ingredient amount.

What is the method of scaling? ›

Scaling methods are divided into two main categories, open questions and closed question. Scaling is the process of generating the continuum, a continuous sequence of values, upon which the measured objects are placed. An open question is one in which the respondent does not have to indicate a specific response.

What are the three Ps of scaling? ›

83: Scaling Your Business with the Three P's - People, Process & Planning. Navigating business growth is similar to maneuvering a traffic circle.

What is an example of scaling? ›

For example, a scale of 1:10 means that the size of 1 unit in the drawing would represent 10 units in the real world. For example, if a lion is of height 50 inches in the real world and is represented as 5 inches on the drawing, it shows that a scale of 1:10 has been used.

What is production scaling? ›

Production scale-up is the process of increasing the output of a product from a small-scale production run to a large-scale production run. This can be a challenging process, as it requires careful planning and execution to avoid delays, cost overruns, and quality issues.

What does scale up production mean? ›

scale up (something)

to increase something in size, amount, or production: This research on seaweed could be scaled up at low cost.

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