Before prep: what the kitchen needs

What does this tour show?

It follows a sample head chef through the first job of his day. Marco runs the kitchen at The Olive Table, a twelve-table restaurant. It is nine in the morning, lunch service starts at noon, and before anyone picks up a knife he wants to know whether anything on the menu is about to run out.

The tour stays on one screen, Kitchen stock, and moves across it in five steps: the summary line, what is almost out, what is running low, the link to suppliers, and everything else. It is the digital version of walking the fridges with a clipboard, without the clipboard.

Why check stock before prep rather than after service?

Because the morning is the last point at which a shortage is cheap to fix. Found at nine, a missing case of lemons is a phone call and a delivery. Found at half twelve, it is a dish taken off the board mid-service, or someone sent to a shop to buy at retail price.

An evening check still has its place for counting waste, but the order that saves lunch is placed in the morning.

Step by step

1. Open Kitchen stock. At 09:00 Marco opens the Stock page in the restaurant's dashboard. The heading reads Kitchen stock, and the summary line under it says 24 ingredients, 2 almost out and 3 running low. Small chips repeat the point: 19 of 24 in stock.

2. Read the summary before the detail. That one line tells him the size of the job. Five ingredients need attention, nineteen do not. If the line had said twelve running low, he would know the morning order was a big one before reading a single row.

3. Look at Almost out first. On the left, under Needs buying, the first group is labelled "Almost out · Order today". Feta is down to 0.8 kg against a keep-at-least of 3 kg. Lemons are at 6 against 30. Both carry a red Almost out label. These go on the order before anything else.

4. Then read Running low. The next group is "Running low · Below the level you keep". Lamb mince is at 4 kg against 6 kg, aubergines at 9 against 12, olive oil at 3 litres against 5. None will stop lunch, but all three will be short by the weekend if nobody orders.

5. Check the keep-at-least levels make sense. Each row shows the level under the ingredient's name. Those are the numbers Marco set, so the list is only as good as they are. If feta keeps hitting Almost out, the level of 3 kg may be too low for how popular the salad has become.

6. Tap Suppliers. At the top right of Needs buying is a Suppliers link. One tap takes Marco to the Suppliers page, so the dairy order goes to the dairy supplier and the oil to whoever sells oil.

7. Leave the In stock list alone. On the right, the In stock list holds everything above its level: chicken thigh at 14 kg against 8, tomatoes, pitta, halloumi, sea bass, rice and yoghurt. It is out of the way on purpose, so the morning check is about the five that matter.

8. Use a stock adjustment to fix a figure. If a tub of yoghurt was dropped last night, Marco does not type a new amount over the old one. The note at the foot of the list says it plainly: to change an amount, use a stock adjustment. That way the change is recorded with a reason.

The five ingredients that need buying today

A simple rule for the order quantity: order enough to get back above keep-at-least and cover use until the next delivery. If feta goes at 1.5 kg a day and the next drop is in two days, 0.8 kg on hand needs at least 2.2 kg more to reach the next delivery, and enough on top to get back to 3 kg.

Tips for a faster morning check

• Set keep-at-least from real use. Take a normal week's usage of each ingredient, divide by the number of deliveries, and add a margin for a busy service.
• Use the filter chips. All, Almost out, Running low and In stock sit above the lists, and the search box finds an ingredient by name, code or barcode.
• Review levels when the menu changes. A new special can turn a slow ingredient into a fast one overnight.
• Do the check at the same time every day, before deliveries are due to be confirmed, so the order goes in while the supplier can still add to the van.
• Keep perishables tight. A high keep-at-least on fresh herbs or fish means more waste, not more safety.

Common mistakes

Overwriting amounts. Typing 5 over 3 to "fix" the olive oil hides what happened. Was a bottle not booked in, or was it wasted? A stock adjustment answers that question later, when the food cost looks wrong.

Treating Running low as optional. Running low is tomorrow's Almost out. Adding it to today's order costs nothing extra in delivery and saves a second order midweek.

Never booking deliveries in. If goods arrive but are not received into stock, the list will keep saying feta is almost out. The kitchen then orders twice.

Levels set once and forgotten. Keep-at-least levels from the winter menu will be wrong in summer. Look at them when covers or dishes change.

What should you do next?

Place the order and book it in when it arrives, so the list clears itself. Then look at how the front of house is set up for the day: the bookings tour for the same restaurant shows Amira confirming tables at half ten.

If you want to set better levels, the reorder point guide shows how to work out when to order from daily use and delivery time. The food cost percentage guide explains why waste and over-ordering show up in your margins, and the restaurant guide covers the wider daily routine.

How EasyTaskr helps

Kitchen stock lists every ingredient against the level you keep, puts what is almost out and running low at the top, and links to your Suppliers. Amounts are changed through stock adjustments, so every change has a reason, and stock value reports show what the kitchen is holding at cost.