A buyer walking into the store on a Wednesday afternoon sees two logs on the shelf and asks "is that enough?". A smoked roast order calculation exists to answer that question with a number; the answer should not be "two logs left" but "we need 3.4 logs by the weekend, so one more has to come in".
What makes the maths awkward with log products is indivisibility. Mortella Smoked Roast Beef 1800 g and Mortella Smoked Roast Turkey 1800 g arrive as whole roasts; you cannot order half of 1800 g. So a calculation that starts in grams ends in a log count rounded upwards, and the rounding difference becomes stock that has to be managed.
Which four numbers does a smoked roast order calculation start from?
Without four numbers the formula does not run: daily portion count, weight per portion, service days per week and current open stock. All four belong to the business; none can be read from a catalogue.
Daily portion count is the number of plates, sandwiches or buffet covers; at a breakfast buffet it is built as "guests taking breakfast × share of guests taking deli meat". Portion weight is slice count multiplied by slice weight, and slice weight is found by weighing; because beef and turkey logs differ in cross-section, the same slicer setting gives a different gram figure for each. Service days are close to five in a canteen and seven in a hotel. Open stock is the weighed quantity left on the shelf at the close of the week, including a wrapped half log.
How many portions an 1800 g log yields at a given slice standard is shown step by step in portion maths for an 1800 g smoked roast log by slice standard; here that result is put to work for the weekly order.
The formula: daily portions × weight × days ÷ 1800 + safety margin
Weekly need in grams is daily portion count multiplied by portion weight multiplied by service days. That figure is divided by 1800 and produces a decimal number of logs. Open stock is subtracted in grams, the safety margin is added, and the result is rounded up to the next whole number.
A worked example with every assumption stated: a café sends out 40 sandwiches a day, puts two slices in each and weighs one slice at 25 g. It is open six days a week. Weekly grams: 40 × 50 × 6 = 12,000 g. In logs, 12,000 ÷ 1800 = 6.67. With 900 g of opened log on the shelf, 11,100 g remain, or 6.17 logs. As a safety margin the difference between the busiest of the last four weeks and their average is added; say that difference is 1,200 g. Total 12,300 g ÷ 1800 = 6.83, rounded to 7 logs. The order: 7 × 1800 g.
The crux of the formula is the rounding. Rounding 6.83 up brings in 0.17 of a log, roughly 300 g extra; that surplus is deducted as open stock the following week and is not lost. Rounding down means running out of slices on the last day of the week.
How does the weekday-weekend split change the log count?
A weekly average works in a café and fails in a hotel. In a property where Friday and Saturday breakfast covers double the weekday figure, daily portions cannot be a single number; separate portion values are entered for weekdays and weekend, and the grams are summed in two parts.
The effect on the log count looks like this: five weekdays at 60 portions, two weekend days at 120 portions, portion weight 40 g. Weekdays 12,000 g, weekend 9,600 g; total 21,600 g, exactly 12 logs. Using an average (7 days × 77 portions × 40 g = 21,560 g) looks the same on paper, but it would not tell you on which day the logs get opened. The two-part calculation also says how many sealed logs must be on the shelf by Thursday evening: 9,600 ÷ 1800 = 5.33, so at least six.
By what rule is an opened smoked roast log carried into the weekend?
Once a log is opened its cut face meets the air; the remainder is wrapped in film, held between 0 °C and +4 °C and finished first the next day. This rule affects the order calculation in two ways. First, since an opened log is always used before a sealed one, consumption on the first day of the week comes out of open stock and the opening of new logs shifts by a day. Second, a log opened on the last day of the week carries into the next week and becomes that week's open stock.
In practice: at the week's close the opened log is weighed, the grams are written on the order form and entered on the "open stock" line of the formula. If the wrapped face shows slight darkening, a thin slice is removed and discarded; that slice is noted separately as trim, because in a kitchen carrying an opened log twice a week this trim adds up to half a log before long.
Worked table: three venues, three weekly orders
The table below applies the same formula to three types of venue. Slice weights are assumptions and every business should use its own weighing.
| Venue | Daily portions | Portion weight | Service days | Weekly grams | Open stock | Logs (rounded) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Café, sandwich line | 40 | 50 g | 6 | 12,000 g | 900 g | 7 |
| Hotel, breakfast buffet | 60 weekday / 120 weekend | 40 g | 7 | 21,600 g | 0 g | 12 |
| Canteen, cold plate | 150 | 30 g | 5 | 22,500 g | 1,500 g | 12 |
On the canteen row the safety margin is kept near zero; headcount is fixed, so consumption does not swing. On the hotel row no extra log was added as margin, because the weekend load already entered the calculation through the two-part portion value.
Why is the safety margin held in sliced packs rather than a whole log?
When the forecast misses, one log too many means a sealed 1800 g product waiting out its shelf life. Holding the margin as Mortella Sliced Smoked Roast Beef in the 450 g tray pack is a more flexible answer: while sealed it keeps waiting, if opened it is finished the same day, and on a busy Saturday morning it goes to the plate without mounting a log on the slicer.
The sliced pack costs more per kilo than the log, but that premium is paid only on the margin, a small share of the weekly need. In the formula it is written like this: the log count is rounded down, and the remaining decimal plus the safety margin are converted into 450 g packs. In the café example above, 6 logs plus 3 × 450 g packs are ordered instead of 6.83 logs.
How do FIFO and goods-in records correct the order calculation?
If the formula lives only on paper it repeats the same mistake every week. Correction comes from two records: date and temperature at goods-in, and first-in-first-out order in the store. The WHO food safety fact sheet (yeni sekmede açılır) frames temperature control and traceability as the backbone of safe handling, and the same records produce data for the order calculation. When the date of every log received and its position on the shelf are written down, the end of the week shows which log stayed unopened and for how many days.
How a FIFO sequence is set up and run in stock management is covered in its own article; the result that matters for ordering is this: a log that waits two weeks unopened proves that the portion or day value in the formula is too high, and that value is lowered in the next calculation.
In which weeks is the order recalculated?
The formula is not set once and pinned to the wall. It is recalculated in four situations: when a new roast line enters the menu, when weekend covers change markedly, when the slice thickness setting is changed, and when an opened log spills into the following week three weeks in a row. The first three change the inputs; the fourth says the formula is too optimistic.
Place your own week in the table and compare the resulting log count with end-of-day weighings for one week. For delivery patterns on the beef and turkey logs and for opening a trade account, write to EMKA FOOD; we will verify your weekly figure together.
