Intermediate preparations: sauces, stocks and doughs

What is an intermediate preparation?

An intermediate preparation is a sub-recipe you don’t sell on its own but that goes into plenty of dishes: a tomato sauce, a dark stock, a dough, a praline, a pickling liquor. In Miselup they live under Kitchen → Preparations and they are Level 2 of your recipe book: above them sit the ingredients (Level 1) and below them the dishes, the «Final preparations» (Level 3).

The point is to cost the sauce once and use it in as many dishes as you like: when tomatoes go up, the sauce goes up and every dish that carries it goes up on its own.

How do I create an intermediate preparation?

1. Go to Kitchen → Preparations and create a new one.
2. In «Preparation details» give it a name —the field itself sets the tone: «Tomato sauce, dark stock…»— and, if you want, a one-line summary that shows up as the subtitle.
3. In «Composition & cost» add its ingredients with quantity, unit and waste, exactly like in any recipe.
4. Fill in the «Yield» and its «Unit»: how much actually comes out of the batch.
5. Write the «Preparation» method and press «Save preparation».

What is yield and why does it change my cost?

The yield of an intermediate preparation is what’s left at the end of the batch, not what went in. Miselup shows it to you as three figures inside «Composition & cost»: the «Total input» (what the ingredients add up to), the yield you declare and the «Yield %», with a one-line read along the lines of «3,000 g of ingredients → 2,400 g yielded» and the shortfall flagged as «loss».

The cost your dishes inherit is the batch’s total cost divided by the yield: the cost per yield unit (€/g, €/ml, €/unit), shown as «Per yield unit». If a stock costs €24 and yields 2,000 ml, every milliliter is worth €0.012 and a dish using 50 ml carries €0.60. Reducing a stock by half doesn’t make it cheaper: it makes every milliliter dearer.

How do I put an intermediate preparation into a dish?

On the final recipe’s page, the «Composition» section has two separate blocks: «Direct ingredients» and «Intermediate preparations». In the second one you search for the preparation by name and give it a quantity in its yield unit. In the costing table the line comes tagged «preparation» so you can tell it apart from an ingredient.

If the preparation doesn’t have a calculated cost yet, the line warns you with «cost not calculated» and the message «the line is costed at 0.00 and the real cost is higher»: check that it has priced ingredients and a yield greater than zero.

Can I nest one preparation inside another?

Yes, and it’s the norm with mother sauces. An intermediate preparation can carry other intermediate preparations inside it: a demi-glace built on a dark stock that itself carries a mirepoix. The nested preparations block says so in its empty state: «Handy for sauces, stocks or bases you’ve already costed». The cost climbs up the chain and the allergens are inherited upwards too.

How do I produce a preparation and put it into stock?

You have two routes, depending on how you work:

• One-off, from Stock: the «Produce preparation» action asks you for the «Quantity to produce», lets you «View stock consumption» before confirming and, when you produce, deducts the components and books in what you made.
• Planned, from Production: a production order groups the whole day’s mise en place. Completing it deducts the components’ stock and books in what was produced. You have it in /en/help/production-orders/.

Known limits

• When you produce from Stock, only components held in inventory are deducted; anything you haven’t added to inventory isn’t subtracted.
• The quantity an intermediate preparation goes into a dish with has to be in a unit that’s convertible to its yield unit (kg↔g, l↔ml). If you mix weight with volume, the line is flagged «unit ≠» and isn’t costed.
• No yield, no unit cost: an intermediate preparation with an empty or 0 yield goes into dishes at 0.00.