Recipe: Converting Recipes

Hi Patty,

I just learned how to do this at school this week.

Think of the acronym "NO"...the "N" in no, stands for New and the "O" stands for old. The New always goes on top.

Say the recipe yields 50 servings of a dessert and you want to bring it down to 12. You take the new amount, which is 12 and divide by the old amount, which is 50. That would be 12/50 or .24. Anytime you are trying to reduce you will get a Recipe Conversion Factor (RCF) less than 1. You then take the RCF of .24 and multiply by all the ingredients in your recipe individually. When arriving at a RCF, NEVER round the factor. And the RCF does not carry any units with it.

If you are trying to increase a recipe it works the same way, only your RCF factor will be greater than 1.

If you are calculating something with different units, i.e., quarts and gallons you would need to know a little bit algebra to convert both numbers to be in the same unit of measure.

For instance, 1 qt. = 32 oz. 1 Gal. = 128 oz.

If you have a recipe that yields 2 gallons and you want to make 2 quarts of soup, you would need to convert gallons to quarts. This is done through the following information...2 qts = 64 fl.oz. 32 oz = 1 qt. Multiply 32 by 2 and you get 64. One gal = 128 fl.oz. 128 divided by 32 = 4 quarts, but you have 2 gals, so that would be 8 quarts.

New: 2 quarts
Old: 8 quarts 2/8 = .25

Your Recipe Conversion Factor is .25...all other ingredients in the recipe must be multiplied by .25 and you will get your reduced recipe.

Keep in mind, when you change the yield of a recipe, you may have to adjust for a different pan size, mixing time, cooking temperature and time. I don't know about those things.

According to my book, many recipes or formulas that call for baking powder or baking soda cannot be converted using the RCF method. In addition, regarding spices, it's always better to cook with a light hand in this area, because you can usually add more, but not the other way around.

I am not a professional baker yet, but I am studying to be one and anytime you convert a big recipe to a smaller one, you risk the integrity of the original recipe. You might find that the product is not what you remember it to be, or some other such nuance.

At least it's some food for thought. Good Luck with your recipes!