menu-cost-engineer
Cost a menu item to a plate cost and food-cost percentage, then price it for a target margin. Use when asked to cost a dish, calculate food cost percentage, price a menu item, or engineer a menu for profitability. Produces a plate-cost breakdown (ingredient × yield × price), the food-cost %, a suggested price for the target margin, and menu-engineering flags (star / plow-horse / puzzle / dog) so the operator knows what to promote, reprice, or cut.
Profile →npx skills add mohitagw15856/pm-claude-skills --skill menu-cost-engineer --agent claude-code
Same command for any agent — swap --agent for codex, cursor, copilot.
Weekly change comes from our own snapshots, not the repository page — it measures attention, not adoption.
# Menu Cost Engineer Skill Restaurants don't fail on bad food — they fail on math they never did. A dish that "feels" priced right can quietly run a 45% food cost. This skill costs the plate honestly (accounting for yield loss and waste), sets a price to the margin the operator actually needs, and flags where the menu is leaking money. ## Working from a brief Given a recipe and ingredient prices, **produce the full costing** — estimate yields and waste where not given (label the assumption). If prices are missing, ask or use a stated regional estimate and flag it. ## Required Inputs Ask for (if not provided, else infer and label): - **The dish** — ingredients and portion sizes (recipe) - **Ingredient costs** — as purchased, with pack size/unit - **Target food-cost %** (default ~28–32%) or target margin, and current menu price if repricing ## Output Format ### Plate cost breakdown | Ingredient | As-purchased cost/unit | Yield % | Portion | Plate cost | |---|---|---|---|---| | | | | | | Include a line for waste/trim and any garnish/consumables. ### The numbers - **Total plate cost**, target food-cost %, and **suggested price** = plate cost ÷ target food-cost %. - Actual food-cost % a
- Working from a brief
- Required Inputs
- Output Format
- Plate cost breakdown
- The numbers
- Menu-engineering flag
- Levers
- Quality Checks
- Anti-Patterns
What does the menu-cost-engineer skill do?
Cost a menu item to a plate cost and food-cost percentage, then price it for a target margin. Use when asked to cost a dish, calculate food cost percentage, price a menu item, or engineer a menu for profitability. Produces a plate-cost breakdown (ingredient × yield × price), the food-cost %, a suggested price for the target margin, and menu-engineering flags (star / plow-horse / puzzle / dog) so the operator knows what to promote, reprice, or cut.
How do I install it?
Run `npx skills add mohitagw15856/pm-claude-skills --skill menu-cost-engineer --agent claude-code` — it drops the skill into your project so the agent can pick it up. Swap the --agent value for codex, cursor or copilot if you use one of those.
Where does this skill come from?
From mohitagw15856/pm-claude-skills, a repository with 1,255 stars. We read it straight from the repository tree rather than a submitted listing, so what you see here is what is actually published.
Is a popular skill a good skill?
Not necessarily. Stars measure attention, not adoption — a repository can trend for a week and be abandoned. That is why we show the weekly change from our own snapshots next to the total, instead of a single flattering number.