How the numbers are computed

Every recipe here carries two numbers that are easy to state and hard to state honestly: what a serving costs, and what a serving contains. Both are estimates. This page explains how each one is arrived at, what it leaves out, and where the underlying data comes from, so you can decide how much weight to put on it. The same figures are published in machine-readable form at the bottom of this page.

Cost per serving

The figure printed on a recipe is the ingredient cost of one serving, at US national-average retail prices, buying the cheapest common form of each ingredient. Across the library it runs from about fifteen cents to a little over two dollars, with most recipes near sixty cents.

Cheapest common form is doing real work in that sentence. It means dried beans rather than canned, bulk oats rather than instant packets, whole spices or plain ground spices rather than blends, and store-brand canned tomatoes rather than a named brand. It is the form the pantry is built around. Buy the same recipe in convenience forms and it will cost more, sometimes twice as much.

Where the prices come from

• Beans, dried, any type, all sizes, US city average: $1.547 per pound (Aug 2025). Covers black beans and chickpeas as bulk staples. (BLS / FRED APU0000714233)
• Fresh produce (onions, garlic, ginger, limes, cilantro, chiles): national retail averages. (USDA ERS Fruit and Vegetable Prices)
• Store-brand canned tomatoes, tomato paste, and ground spices: typical US retail, no single national series.

The basis, in one line: US national-average retail prices, cheapest common form: dried and bulk staples, store-brand canned goods. Last reviewed 2026-07.

Where a national series exists, it is used. Dried beans have one, and it anchors the legume-heavy recipes that make up much of the library. Fresh produce has USDA's retail price series. Ground spices, canned goods, and specialty items like tamarind or gochugaru have no national series at all, so those are typical retail estimates and are the softest numbers on the page.

What the figure does not include

• Energy to cook, water, or equipment.
• Sales tax, which varies by state and often does not apply to groceries anyway.
• Your time. This is the largest omitted cost and the site does not pretend otherwise. Total and active time are printed on every recipe so you can weigh it yourself.
• Waste. The cost assumes you use what you buy. Half a bunch of cilantro that liquefies in the drawer is a real cost this figure ignores.
• Regional and seasonal variation. A national average is not your store.

Treat the number as a guide, not a receipt.

Worked examples

7 recipes carry the arithmetic line by line, so the method above can be checked rather than taken on trust.

Aiko's Healthy Bomb Cookies

10 servings, $2.94 total, $0.29 per serving.

• 1/2 cup almond flour (~2 oz) at ~$7/lb = $0.88
• 1 1/4 cups rolled oats (~0.25 lb) at ~$1.30/lb bulk = $0.32
• 3 medjool dates (~2.5 oz) at ~$6/lb = $0.94
• 1/2 cup raisins (~2.6 oz) at ~$2.80/lb = $0.46
• 1/2 banana = $0.13, 1 tbsp ground flaxseed = $0.04
• 1 tsp baking powder = $0.03, 1 tsp vanilla extract = $0.14
• total ~$2.94 / 10 cookies = $0.29

Black Beans with a Toasted Chile Sofrito

4 servings, $3.85 total, $0.95 per serving.

• 1.5 cups dried black beans (~0.64 lb) at $1.55/lb = $0.99
• 1 cup store-brand canned crushed tomatoes = $0.63
• 3 dried chiles, ancho + guajillo + chipotle (~1 oz) = $0.75
• 1 onion = $0.30, 5 garlic cloves = $0.30, 1 lime = $0.40
• cumin, oregano, no-salt bouillon = $0.20, cilantro + epazote + bay = $0.28
• total ~$3.85 / 4 servings = $0.96, rounded to $0.95

Cashew Dressing

8 servings, $2.72 total, $0.34 per serving.

• 3/4 cup raw cashews (~3.7 oz) at ~$7.50/lb = $1.73
• 1 lemon, juiced (3 tbsp) = $0.60
• 2 tbsp nutritional yeast (~0.3 oz) at ~$12/lb = $0.22
• 1 tbsp cider vinegar = $0.05, 1 tsp dijon = $0.05
• 1 clove garlic = $0.05, black pepper = $0.02
• total ~$2.72 / 8 servings (2 tbsp each) = $0.34

Chana Masala

4 servings, $2.96 total, $0.75 per serving.

• 1 cup dried chickpeas (~0.44 lb) at $1.55/lb = $0.68
• 1.5 cups store-brand canned crushed tomatoes (~0.85 of a 14.5 oz can) = $0.94
• 1 tbsp tomato paste = $0.08
• 1 onion = $0.30, 4 garlic cloves = $0.24, 1 tbsp ginger = $0.04
• cumin, coriander, turmeric, Kashmiri chile, pepper, garam masala, amchur = ~$0.40
• no-salt bouillon = $0.05, 1 green chile = $0.10, cilantro = $0.13
• total ~$2.96 / 4 servings = $0.74, rounded to $0.75

Crunchy Cabbage and Chickpea Bowl with Cashew Dressing

4 servings, $5.33 total, $1.33 per serving.

• 1 cup hulled barley (~0.44 lb) at ~$1.60/lb = $0.70
• 1 1/2 cups cooked chickpeas (~3/4 cup dried, 0.33 lb) at $1.55/lb = $0.51
• 1 lb green cabbage at ~$0.70/lb = $0.70
• 2 carrots (~0.4 lb) at ~$1.00/lb = $0.40
• 3 scallions = $0.30, 1/4 cup cilantro = $0.25
• half a batch of cashew dressing (4 servings at $0.34) = $1.36
• 3 tbsp lemon juice = $0.60, 2 tbsp sunflower seeds = $0.11
• total ~$5.33 / 4 = $1.33

Miso Ginger Tempeh and Buckwheat Bowl

4 servings, $6.63 total, $1.66 per serving.

• 8 oz tempeh at ~$6.00/lb = $3.00
• 1 cup buckwheat groats (~0.37 lb) at ~$3.50/lb = $1.30
• 1 1/2 tbsp white miso (~0.9 oz) at ~$6.00/lb = $0.34
• 12 oz napa cabbage at ~$1.10/lb = $0.83
• 1 carrot = $0.20, 3 scallions = $0.30
• 1 tbsp grated ginger = $0.15, 2 cloves garlic = $0.10
• 3 tbsp rice vinegar = $0.15, 2 deglet noor dates = $0.12
• 1 tbsp sesame seeds = $0.08, plus rounding
• total ~$6.63 / 4 = $1.66

Za'atar Cauliflower and Freekeh Bowl

4 servings, $6.04 total, $1.51 per serving.

• 1 cup freekeh (~0.4 lb) at ~$4.00/lb = $1.60
• 1 1/2 lb cauliflower florets at ~$1.30/lb = $1.95
• 1 1/2 cups cooked chickpeas (~3/4 cup dried, 0.33 lb) at $1.55/lb = $0.51
• 1 1/2 tbsp za'atar = $0.30, 1 tsp sumac = $0.10
• 1 lemon = $0.60, 1/2 red onion = $0.25
• 2 tbsp tahini (~1 oz) at ~$6.00/lb = $0.38
• 1/2 cup flat-leaf parsley = $0.35
• total ~$6.04 / 4 = $1.51

Priced from the model, without the arithmetic written out

Another 15 recipes have their per-serving figure recorded against the same price model, but not the line-by-line working. Every one of them was computed the same way: dried beans and lentils at the BLS rate, produce at USDA averages, priced by cheapest common form.

The remaining recipes in the library carry a cost figure derived the same way without a separate record in the price file.

Nutrition per serving

Calories, protein, fiber, and sodium are computed from USDA FoodData Central reference values for the main ingredients, divided by the stated number of servings. This is an approximation, not a laboratory measurement, and it inherits the usual limits: reference values describe a typical specimen, not the one in your kitchen, and cooking losses are not modeled.

Four figures are required on every recipe and the build fails without them, so there is no recipe on the site with a blank where a number should be.

Sodium is the figure to read most carefully. A recipe marked no added salt reports only the sodium naturally present in its ingredients. A recipe marked a little salt reports the sodium with the salt included, and where the recipe offers a salt-free version, the lower figure is shown alongside it. The FDA's daily reference is 2,300 mg. Both readings are on the page because the honest comparison is against what you would otherwise eat, and most dietary sodium comes from packaged and restaurant food rather than the salt cellar.

What the cost figures do and do not show

They show that the ingredients in these recipes are cheap. They do not show that eating well is cheaper than eating badly in general, and it would be convenient but wrong to claim they did.

The best available evidence points the other way on that broader question. A meta-analysis of 27 studies across 10 countries found that the healthiest diet patterns cost about $1.50 per day more than the least healthy, with the largest gap in meat and protein (Rao et al., BMJ Open 2013).

The narrower claim this site does make is compatible with that finding, and the same paper explains why: whole plant foods are the cheapest calories in the store, and what costs money is protein, packaging, and someone else doing the cooking. Every recipe here skips all three. The gap Rao et al. measured is largely a meat gap, and there is no meat in this library.

The data, in machine-readable form

The full corpus is published as JSON so the figures can be checked, analyzed, or cited without scraping the site.

• /data/recipes.json: one row per recipe, with slug, URL, title, cuisine, course, tags, servings, total and active time, salt level, published and updated dates, ingredients as pantry ids with quantity and unit, cost per serving in USD, and the four per-serving nutrition figures.
• /data/pantry.json: the ingredient reference every recipe is built from, with categories, roles, cuisines, cost tier, storage, and accepted substitutes. Join it to the recipe rows on the ingredient id.

Both files are regenerated on every build from the same source as the pages, so they cannot drift from what the site displays.

Reuse terms for the dataset are not settled yet. The figures themselves are statements of fact and facts are not copyrightable, so measurements can be reported freely. If you want to republish the corpus wholesale, or you would like an explicit license so you can, say so on the feedback page and one will be set.

Corrections

If a price looks wrong for your region, or a nutrition figure does not match what you calculate, the feedback page is the place to say so. Prices are reviewed periodically and the review date is printed above, so you can see how stale the basis is rather than having to guess.