Scale any recipe up or down for meal prep and large-batch cooking. Enter your recipe name, original serving size, and target serving size, then add up to 10 ingredients with their quantities. The Batch Cooking Calculator instantly computes the scaled quantity for each ingredient, plus the scaling factor so you always cook the perfect amount.
Scaling Factor
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Original Servings
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Target Servings
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Ingredients Scaled
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The calculator divides your target serving size by your original serving size to produce a scaling factor. It then multiplies each ingredient quantity by that factor to give you the exact amounts needed for your batch. For example, if you're scaling a 4-serving recipe to 20 servings, the factor is 5× — so 2 cups flour becomes 10 cups.
Yes. Simply enter a target serving size smaller than your original. If your recipe makes 12 servings and you only need 3, the scaling factor will be 0.25 — all quantities are reduced proportionally. This is just as useful for small-batch cooking as for large-scale meal prep.
The calculator shows decimal values (e.g. 1.5 cups or 0.333 tsp). For practical cooking, round to the nearest practical measurement — most recipes tolerate small rounding adjustments, especially for seasonings and liquids. For baking, try to be as precise as possible.
For most recipes, simple scaling works well. However, some elements don't scale linearly — cooking times, pan sizes, leavening agents (baking powder/soda), salt, and strong spices often need manual adjustment when scaling significantly. Always taste and test when dramatically increasing or decreasing a recipe.
This calculator supports up to 10 ingredients at a time. For longer recipes, you can run the calculator in multiple passes — the scaling factor stays the same, so just multiply any additional ingredient quantities by the displayed factor.
Start by choosing 3–5 base recipes that can be portioned and stored easily (soups, grains, proteins, roasted vegetables). Use the batch calculator to scale each recipe to your target number of servings, cook in bulk, then portion into meal-prep containers. Most batch-cooked meals keep 4–5 days in the refrigerator or up to 3 months in the freezer.
Enter fractions as decimals: 1/3 = 0.333, 3/4 = 0.75, 1/2 = 0.5. The calculator works with any decimal quantity. The scaled result is also shown as a decimal, which you can convert back to a common fraction for easier measuring.
Baking is chemistry. When scaling up, leavening agents (baking powder, baking soda, yeast) often need to be reduced slightly — using the full multiplied amount can over-leaven the bake. Similarly, salt and strong extracts (vanilla, almond) should be added conservatively at first. Cooking time and temperature may also need adjustment based on your pan size.