Saturday’s 180-guest wedding is finished. Monday morning, the menu says food should have cost $2,466 and the supplier invoices add up to $2,612. Looks like you missed by $146. But the storeroom still holds food you bought for more than just this event.

What you bought and what the event used are different numbers.

Start with the expected cost

Expected, or theoretical, food cost comes from the confirmed menu, recipe quantities, usable yields, and the ingredient prices used for the plan.

For this illustrative wedding:

Expected food cost = $2,466.00
Guests = 180

$2,466.00 ÷ 180 = $13.70 expected food cost per guest

That’s the number you signed off on before you cooked. It doesn’t tell you what the kitchen actually used. It tells you what the plan should have used, if its assumptions held.

Do not call every purchase event usage

The supplier invoices for the event week total $2,612. Some of those purchases replaced pantry stock that remains after service. The event also used ingredients already on the shelf before those invoices arrived.

The unopened oil on Monday is not Saturday’s food cost.

Draw the line the same way every time:

Attributed food cost = beginning stock documented as used by the event
                     + purchases assigned to the event
                     − closing stock retained from those assigned goods

“Assigned” is the word doing the work. If one invoice fed three events, split it or count what’s left, instead of charging the whole thing to the wedding. And only call the result actual usage when real counts and recorded movements account for all the food inside that line.

Reconcile the 180-guest wedding

For the worked example:

Beginning stock documented as used =    $72.00
Purchases assigned to the event =     $2,612.00
Closing stock retained =               −$184.00
                                        ---------
Attributed food cost =                $2,500.00

Now compare the attributed cost with the plan:

$2,500.00 attributed − $2,466.00 expected = $34.00 unfavorable variance

$2,500.00 ÷ 180 ≈ $13.89 attributed food cost per guest

The invoices came in $146 over plan. Count the stock properly and the attributed variance is $34. If counts or movements are missing, that still isn’t proof of what actually got used.

Put both numbers against the sale

At an illustrative selling price of $68 per guest:

Revenue = 180 × $68.00 = $12,240.00

Expected food-cost percentage:
$2,466.00 ÷ $12,240.00 × 100 ≈ 20.1%

Attributed food-cost percentage:
$2,500.00 ÷ $12,240.00 × 100 ≈ 20.4%

Both are food only. They tell you nothing about profit until every other cost is in too.

Find out where the $34 went

The $34 is a reason to go through the records. It isn’t a license to pick whichever cause you like. In this example, the records show:

Recorded production waste =          +$38.00
Lower-cost accepted substitution =    −$4.00
                                      -------
Explained variance =                  +$34.00

Other events may point to changed supplier prices, overproduction, portion drift, an incorrect yield, a receiving error, unrecorded transfers, or a stock-count mistake. If you can’t explain an amount yet, call it unexplained until you can.

Carry the answer into the next event

Close the job with both sides intact:

  • What the confirmed menu should have cost.
  • What purchases and documented stock use were attributed to the event.
  • What remained on the shelf.
  • Which recorded causes explain the variance.
  • Which recipe, yield, buying, or production assumption needs review.

The wedding closes on a $34 variance you can name, instead of a $146 loss you guessed at. The $184 left on the shelf belongs to the next job only when the next job uses it.