Tutorials / How to fill the materials file
How to fill the materials file
When you are all set with Complete Inventory Management, follow these steps to set up your system.
This lesson is about the three buttons on Inventory and on Recipe: Sample file, Items file, and Upload file. The same file works on both pages. You do not type this into the screen one row at a time. You fill a spreadsheet, then upload it.
1. Two files you can download
Sample file is a filled example. Open it and read it before you write your own. It has rice, batter, gravy, dough, and a few dishes, including a pizza with sizes and crusts. You can change the names and the numbers, or use it only as a guide.
Items file is your own menu. Every dish is already listed, with its sizes, crusts, add-ons, and a packaging row. The material and the quantity are blank where you have not saved a recipe yet. You type those two cells. You do not retype the dish name.
2. How the colours work
On the Recipes sheet, every row of one dish is one colour. The next dish is the other colour. They keep taking turns, so a long pizza stays in one block and the next dish starts a new block.
On the Prepared sheet of the sample file, each kitchen preparation is grouped the same way. Dosa batter is one colour. The next preparation is the other colour. The top row of each sheet stays gold, so you can still see the column names.
3. Bought materials
The Materials sheet is what you buy: rice, oil, a box. Write the name, the unit, how much you already have, the rate for one unit, and when to buy again. If the opening quantity is above zero, the rate is required. A box or a packet is a whole number. A kilogram or a litre can use decimals.
Tick packing only for a takeaway pack, such as a box. A dish does not use a box as an ingredient. Packaging uses it.
4. Prepared in the kitchen
Dough, batter, gravy, and sauce are prepared. On the Materials sheet, set Prepared to Yes, leave the rate blank, and fill Makes. Makes is how much one batch produces, in the same unit as the material. Two kilograms of batter means Makes is 2.
Then use the Prepared sheet. One row is one ingredient. Dosa batter might use rice and urad dal. The quantity on that row is how much of the ingredient goes into the Makes amount, in the ingredient unit. The rate of the batter is the cost of those ingredients divided by Makes. You do not type that rate. QuickKOT works it out.
If the opening quantity cannot be made from what is on hand, that preparation is left out. The message says what is short and the one change to make before you upload that row again. The rest of the file can still be saved.
5. Recipes
Each row is one material for one dish, one size, one crust, one add-on, or the packaging. Use is Dish, Add-on, or Packaging.
A blank size means every size that does not have its own row. A blank crust means every other crust of that size. A crust row is the whole dish for that crust. It does not add on top of the blank crust.
An add-on with a size is only for that size. Extra cheese on a pizza is written again for Regular, Medium, and Large, each with its own quantity. An add-on with the size left blank applies on every size, such as a garlic dip.
Packaging is one list for the dish. Use a material marked as packing. Leave the size blank.
The item name, the size, the crust, and the add-on must already be on the menu. A material must already be in the kitchen, or on the Materials sheet of the same file. A row that does not match is ignored. If one row in a recipe does not match, that whole recipe is left as it is.
6. Upload
Upload file reads the spreadsheet and opens a review. It does not save yet. The review says, for materials, for prepared items, and for recipes, how many will be added, how many will be updated, and how many will be ignored. Ignored rows are listed with a one-line note of what to fix.
Proceed saves. Cancel saves nothing. If the file itself cannot be used, there is no Proceed.
A name that is already in the kitchen is not written again. Its quantity, rate, and unit stay as they are. A recipe that is already saved is updated only when every row in that recipe matches.
Related lessons
These lessons are one set. Each page links to the others.