The Restaurant Prep List Template

By Rob Bruni, founder of OpsEdge Hospitality, twenty years running restaurants, bars, clubs and resorts. Updated November 2026.

A prep list tells every cook what to make, how much and by when, before the first ticket prints. Without one, prep runs on memory: too much of what the opener likes making, not enough of what sold out last night, and a walk in full of product that gets thrown away on Sunday. This guide gives you a kitchen prep list template you can print, shows a filled in example, and explains how to set the pars that make the list work.

What a prep list does

• Protects service. The line starts the shift stocked for the sales you expect.
• Controls food cost. You make what you will sell, so less goes in the bin.
• Controls labor. Prep hours match the work, and nobody stands around deciding what to do next.
• Keeps food fresh. Smaller batches made more often beat a huge batch that sits for five days.
• Makes the kitchen run without the chef. Any trained cook can open the kitchen from the list.

The columns every prep list needs

Print the blank prep sheet

The button prints a one page prep sheet with those seven columns, 26 rows and a header for station, date and day. Print one per station.

Print the blank prep sheet See a filled in example

Prints in black and white on letter or A4 paper. Write your items and pars in once, then photocopy the sheet so only on hand and prep change each day.

A filled in kitchen prep list

This is a Friday list for the grill and saute station in a 70 seat restaurant. The opener counted what was on hand at 9 a.m. and worked out the prep column in about five minutes.

Two things to notice. Prep is rounded up to a full batch or case, because nobody makes half a recipe of Caesar dressing. And the demi glace is over par, so it gets a zero, which is the list doing its job. The shelf life column shows our own standards in this example. Set yours from your recipes and your local food code, and date every container with the rotation labels you already use.

How to set pars

A par is the amount you need on hand at the start of the day to get to the next prep without running out. Set it from what you sell, not from what fits in the reach in.

• Pull the item sales from the POS for the last four weeks, by day of the week.
• Set at least two pars: one for slow days and one for busy days. Busy kitchens set one for each day.
• Respect shelf life. If an item holds for one day, the par is one day of sales. If it holds for five, you can batch for two or three days and save labor.
• Review pars monthly, and any time the menu, the season or the forecast changes. The par level calculator does the math for ordered goods, and the same logic applies to prep.
• Watch what is left at close. An item that is always over par at the end of the night has a par that is too high.

Free prep list calculator

Pars are set for a normal day, and real days are not normal. If a normal Friday is 150 covers and tonight's reservations point to 180, every par should be 20 percent higher. Add event and large party prep on top, item by item. Enter a normal day's covers and today's forecast, then type over the rows with your own items. The calculator scales each par to the day, subtracts what is on hand and rounds up to full batches.

The daily prep routine

1. Count first. The closer or the opener counts every item on the list and writes it in the on hand column. No count, no list.
2. Do the subtraction. Fill in the prep column and round up to full batches.
3. Order the work. Start what takes longest (stocks, braises, anything that has to cool), then what the first service needs, then the rest.
4. Assign names. Each line gets a cook, and each cook initials what they finish.
5. Label and date everything as it is made, and put new product behind old.
6. Chef or manager checks the list before service. Anything not done is a decision, not a surprise at 7 p.m.
7. Note what ran out or was left over at close. That note is how the pars get better.

Cooling takes planning. Anything cooked and chilled for later has to follow the two stage rule on a cooling log, so start those items early.

Shelf life and date marking

• Date mark everything. Under the FDA Food Code, ready to eat food that needs temperature control and is held for more than 24 hours must be marked with a date, and can be kept for up to seven days at 41 F or below, counting the day it was made as day one (FDA Food Code). Many kitchens set shorter limits for quality, and your local code may differ.
• Count only what is usable. Product that expires today does not count toward tomorrow's par.
• Never top off. A new batch goes in a clean container behind the old one, not on top of it.
• Flag allergens. Label prepped items that contain major allergens and prep allergen free items first on clean equipment. See the allergen management guide.

Tuning pars with waste and 86s

• The waste log. If the same item is thrown away every Wednesday, its par is too high or its batch is too big. Lower the par or halve the batch.
• The 86 list. If an item runs out before close more than once, raise its par or move it up the prep order.
• Prep time. Add up the minutes on the list. If the day's prep does not fit the hours scheduled, you want to know before service, not during it.

Over prepping shows up as the gap between what food should have cost and what it did. The actual vs theoretical food cost guide shows how to measure it.

Five ways prep lists fail

1. No count. The on hand column is guessed from the doorway of the walk in.
2. One par for every day. Tuesday and Saturday are different restaurants.
3. Pars nobody updates. The menu changed in the spring and the list did not.
4. Prep to fill the container. A full six quart container looks right. The par says four.
5. No one checks it. A list that is not reviewed before service turns back into memory within two weeks.

Prep is also where food cost is won or lost. The recipe yield guide shows how to measure trim and cook loss, and the food cost guide shows where waste appears in the numbers.

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