£PrepSheet

Roast beef dinner: how much it costs to make, per portion

A pub Sunday roast: a beef joint roasted and rested, potatoes par-boiled and roughed before going in the fat, carrots, parsnips and cabbage, a Yorkshire pudding each and gravy off the roasting tray. Ten portions costed from wholesale and retail prices dated 7 September 2026. The beef goes into the oven raw and comes off the board smaller, and that roasting loss decides most of what the plate actually costs.

Ingredients per portion£3.37
Batch of 10£33.72
Sell at 30% food cost£13.49 inc VAT (£11.24 ex)

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Ingredients and cost, 10 portions

IngredientPack pricePack sizeUsedCost
Beef roasting joint (topside)£10.991000 g2200 g£24.18
Potatoes (chipping)£15.4925000 g2500 g£1.55
Carrots£6.9910000 g1000 g£0.70
Parsnips£0.74500 g1000 g£1.48
Savoy cabbage£0.771 each2 each£1.54
Plain flour£12.4916000 g250 g£0.20
Eggs (medium)£3.4930 each4 each£0.47
Whole milk£1.692000 ml400 ml£0.34
Beef dripping£28.9912500 g200 g£0.46
Gravy granules£25.795000 g100 g£0.52
Horseradish sauce£1.90136 g150 g£2.10
Table salt£10.996000 g20 g£0.04
Ground black pepper£15.991000 g10 g£0.16
Batch total£33.72
Per portion (÷ 10)£3.37

Cost per line is pack price × (amount used ÷ pack size), the same sum the tool runs. Change one pack price and every line that uses it moves.

Method

  1. Season the beef and roast on a trivet of the trim at 160 °C (320 °F) to a core of 55-60 °C (130-140 °F) for medium; rest at least 20 minutes before carving.
  2. Peel and cut the potatoes into even chunks, par-boil until the edges soften, drain and rough the surface in the empty pan.
  3. Toss the roughed potatoes in the hot dripping and roast at 200 °C (390 °F), turning once, until deep gold and crisp.
  4. Peel the carrots and parsnips, cut to matching batons, and roast or boil to order; shred the cabbage and steam or boil, drain hard.
  5. Whisk the flour, eggs and milk with a pinch of the salt to a batter the thickness of double cream; rest at least 30 minutes.
  6. Heat a little dripping hard in each Yorkshire pudding tin until smoking, pour in the batter and bake at 220 °C (430 °F) without opening the door until well risen, about 20 minutes.
  7. Deglaze the roasting tray with the gravy granules and 1.5 litres of water, scraping up the sediment; simmer to a coating consistency and season with the pepper.
  8. Carve the beef against the grain, plate with the potatoes, vegetables and a Yorkshire pudding, and serve the gravy and horseradish sauce on the side.

Costing notes

The beef is priced raw at 2.2 kg for ten portions; a 30% roasting loss is assumed, which works out at roughly 150 g of cooked beef a portion, and that yield is what decides most of the cost. Parsnips, savoy cabbage and horseradish sauce are priced at retail (Tesco) — no JJ Foodservice line was found for any of the three on the day; the potato line is the generic chipping-potato case, since JJ has no named Maris Piper line either. Beef is around seventy-two per cent of the plate: at £10.99 a kilo the joint alone is roughly £24.18 of the £33.72 total for ten portions, so the joint price moves this dish far more than the vegetables around it. Gravy is costed from a gravy-granules line rather than a dedicated beef stock — JJ had no beef bouillon that day either, the same gap as the cottage pie. Prices are ex-VAT, collection, and move week to week: open the recipe and put your own supplier's price in.

Where the prices came from

JJ Foodservice collection prices as shown on its public search pages on 7 September 2026 (delivery prices run about £1-2 a case higher). The site does not label VAT on most lines: raw food is zero-rated in the UK, while oil, vanilla and alcohol carry standard-rate VAT. Where JJ had no line that day, a Tesco retail price is used and marked. Your supplier's price is the one that matters: open the recipe and type it in.

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