Fudge in bulk is a temperature recipe: the sugar, cream and chocolate go into the kettle by percentage, but the texture comes from cooking every batch to the same temperature and working it at the same point as it cools. Scale the weights and keep the thermometer honest, and 120 pounds come out like 7 did. Done this way, a fudge shop that cooked 7 pounds on the stove makes 120 pounds in a day, and the cost of a half-pound slab falls from $5.64 to $2.32. Below is the recipe at three sizes, the steps, the cook loss, what a slab costs at each size, and a free scaling calculator.
The short version
- Weigh every ingredient once and turn the recipe into percentages of the mix.
- Size each cook to the kettle.
- Cook every batch to the same temperature on a calibrated thermometer.
- Work it on the table at the same point as it cools.
- Cut half-pound slabs by weight.
- Weigh what comes out and use your real cook loss to cost a slab.
- TaroStack keeps the recipe by weight, takes each batch's ingredients off stock and checks its yield. More below.
The recipe, by percentage
Straits Fudge Kitchen, the made-up fudge shop in Mackinaw City, Michigan, I use in these examples, cooked chocolate fudge 7 pounds at a time until a gift shop order needed more. The recipe, weighed:
| Ingredient | % of the mix | Kitchen batch, 7 lb | One batch, 30 lb | The run, 120 lb | Cost a lb, bought in bulk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Granulated sugar | 45% | 3.15 lb | 13.5 lb | 54.0 lb | $0.60 |
| Heavy cream | 22% | 1.54 lb | 6.60 lb | 26.4 lb | $1.90 |
| Semisweet chocolate | 18% | 1.26 lb | 5.40 lb | 21.6 lb | $5.50 |
| Butter | 8% | 0.56 lb | 2.40 lb | 9.60 lb | $3.20 |
| Corn syrup | 6% | 0.42 lb | 1.80 lb | 7.20 lb | $1.20 |
| Vanilla extract | 0.5% | 0.04 lb | 0.15 lb | 0.60 lb | $25.00 |
| Salt | 0.5% | 0.04 lb | 0.15 lb | 0.60 lb | $0.40 |
| The whole mix | 100% | 7 lb | 30 lb | 120 lb |
The 120 pounds cost $255.96 in ingredients. Sugar is nearly half the weight; the chocolate is the biggest cost. How percentages work for other recipes is in scaling recipes for production.
The steps, at 120 pounds
- Cook by the kettle. Thirty pounds a cook, stirred, to the soft-ball range, 234 to 238°F, on a thermometer checked against boiling water that morning; the check is in thermometer calibration log.
- Pour onto the table. The batch cools undisturbed on a marble or steel cooling table to about 110°F.
- Work it. Paddled and folded until it loses its gloss and starts to set; worked too warm it turns grainy, too cool it won't shape.
- Shape and set. Shaped into loaves, set for an hour, then cut into half-pound slabs by weight.
- Weigh what comes out. Over three runs, the mix loses about 12% to the cook, mostly water from the cream.
- Wrap with a lot code. Each slab boxed or wrapped and labeled with the run's lot and date.
The run takes one person about 8 hours: four cooks, each poured and worked while the next one cooks.
What a half-pound slab costs at each size
| Per half-pound slab | Kitchen batch, 7 lb | Bulk run, 120 lb |
|---|---|---|
| Ingredients | $1.76 (grocery prices) | $1.21 (bought in bulk) |
| Packaging | $0.55 | $0.35 |
| Labor at $20 an hour | $3.33 (10 min a half-pound slab) | $0.76 (2.3 min a half-pound slab) |
| Cost of a half-pound slab | $5.64 | $2.32 |
Sugar by the 50-pound sack and chocolate by the box cut the ingredients by a quarter, and the labor falls by more than two-thirds: a kettle takes about the same attention for 30 pounds as a saucepan for 7. Pricing a slab is in how to price fudge, and its margins in fudge profit margin.
Humidity and the record
Fudge cooked on a humid August afternoon sets differently from the same recipe in October, so many shops cook a degree or two higher in damp weather. Write the cook temperature and the weather on each batch; after a season, the record says what works in your kitchen. The boxes are in how to package fudge for sale.
Get the calculator
Download the fudge scaling calculator. Two sheets: scale the recipe, where you type each ingredient's percentage and cost a pound and the raw mix you want, and each ingredient's weight for the run fills in, with the kettle cooks, table loads, what comes out after the cook loss, the half-pound slabs it fills and the cost of each half-pound slab; and weigh the loss, where what went in and came out over a few batches gives your average cook loss. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.
Where this stops working
Six flavors, cooks every day of the season, chocolate from two deliveries, and a gift shop that reorders by phone. A sheet can say how much sugar a run needs, but not which chocolate went into which slab, or whether the cook loss has crept up on the new kettle.
How TaroStack does it
TaroStack keeps the recipe by weight, takes each batch's ingredients off stock and checks its yield.
The recipe in the units you use. A recipe holds each ingredient by weight, with sugar bought by the 50-pound sack and used by the pound, and the cost of every slab comes from what you paid. "What could I make right now" says how many runs the sugar, cream and chocolate on the shelf allow.
Each run a batch. A run takes its ingredients off stock, records the lots of cream and chocolate it used, and gets a lot of its own for the slabs, with how much came out good, how much was rejected and the labor minutes.
Yield checked from history. From your own batch history, TaroStack says whether a recipe yields what it claims and which ingredient's quantity is off, so a cook loss that creeps up shows in the numbers. A batch that went grainy is an adjustment with its reason, spoiled, and shows in the waste report.
| The job | Spreadsheet | In TaroStack |
|---|---|---|
| Ingredients for Saturday's run | Multiply, then check the shelf | What could I make right now |
| Which chocolate went into a run | Not written down | Lots recorded on the batch |
| The real cook loss | Weighed now and then | Good and rejected on every batch |
| A grainy batch | Thrown out, forgotten | Adjustment with a reason |
Recipes, batches, lots and yield are on every plan, from $49 a month. The first 30 days are free, with no credit card. If you'd like a hand setting up, ask, and we'll do it with you.