The Anatomy of a Fresh Recipe

Recipe Management Solution

What makes for a great fresh recipe? Does more detail equal a more delicious result? Is Grandma’s handwritten apple pie recipe easier to follow than the one from Google with over 500 five-star reviews?   

What happens if we try to modify Grandma’s fresh recipe? How do we share it? How much is left to the “eye” and how much skill and experience is necessary to get it right?    

Invafresh’s Freshologists delved into these questions and concluded with proper recipe management and automation, whether from a single location or a commissary kitchen, there is in fact the perfect recipe to Recipe Management.   

The perfect recipe includes the following elements: 

  • Yield 
  • A detailed ingredients list 
  • Easy to follow instructions 
  • …and the three T’s

Yield

Pricing

In the same way that a regular recipe provides the number of servings it will make, the Invafresh Fresh Retail Platform (FRP) system eliminates the guesswork by telling you an accurate amount to produce based on current demand.  

Integrated with Production Planning, the system offers a cost and margin management overview that is visible to all stakeholders across the organization, which gives the exact breakdown of all ingredients, labor, packaging, and recipe yield.

Ingredients List

With nutritional facts and allergen disclaimers being a top food safety concern for both consumers and operators, it’s crucial to have a system that keeps all this information traceable and easily accessible. Invafresh’s Recipe Management allows you to: 

  • Centralize recipe information through Esha Genesis, such as raw materials, chemicals/additives, and industry ingredients. To ensure regulatory compliance, the system lets you attach relevant documents associated with the recipe with full label content control. This includes nutritional analysis, allergen statements, and vendor details.
  • Improve operational efficiency with centralized preparation worksheets and pick slips, eliminating guesswork with accurate ingredient replenishment recommendations.  
  • Convert non-standard units of measure (i.e., “a pinch” or “a slice”) to standard weights for calculating nutrition allowing for consistency and accuracy every time. 

Instructions

Invafresh’s Recipe Management provides everything needed to prepare recipes in a single view. This includes step-by-step instructions, pictures, and videos making it easy for new employees to follow and adopt, making recipes easy to share across multiple locations and departments.

The Three T’s 

The tools, time, and temperature required in a recipe are a bit different when cooking at home versus cooking at the store or a central commissary.  

As tools develop and grocers move away from the dreaded store binder and excel spreadsheets, grocers must adopt long-term solutions to provide a single source for when recipes need to be added, deactivated, and modified.   

From a time perspective, labor forecasting is critical – especially in the current market. With Recipe Management, labor time is tracked so grocers can use the forecasted labor hours as an input to improve labor scheduling. 

Though temperature is straight forward, if we think back to Grandma’s apple pie, how many times have we wished we jotted down her revisions and tips over the years?  

The idea is the same when training and sharing the same recipe across multiple locations. What is needed is an organized system that allows input and change that can be approved, accessed, and tracked across all cooks in the kitchen. In this way, we are avoiding risk of error, inconsistencies, and unnecessary waste. 

So, as it turns out, all you need for your recipes to succeed is to follow a recipe yourself! The key is to have a centralized, well-maintained database to help you enhance operational efficiency, forecast demand, and keep your operations compliant and safe. All of this to reduce your fresh item costs, save you time, and maximize your profits.  

About Invafresh

With a combined 500+ years of Freshology experience, the heritage of Invafresh has enabled fresh food retailers to create extraordinary store operations performance and differentiated customer experiences. As the leader of Freshology, Invafresh is deployed in over 350 grocery retailers spanning a global reach of 35 countries with more than $100 million of Fresh revenue being transacted daily, to provide AI/ML demand forecasting, merchandising, replenishment, and sustainability and compliance solutions.  

Learn more at About Us | Invafresh.

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