How do you make a nutrition label for a recipe?

Start with the numbers

A label is only as good as the recipe calculation under it. Add up the ingredients by weight first, using appropriate food composition data and accounting for any relevant cooking losses (how to calculate calories in a recipe shows how). Then weigh the finished batch, because changes in weight affect the nutrient values per 100 g. Where appropriate, use cooking yield and nutrient retention factors to improve the estimate.

Say a batch of 12 muffins adds up to 2760 kcal and weighs 900 g out of the oven, so each muffin is 75 g. This example assumes the batch total already accounts for any relevant cooking effects.

Per 100 g
  Energy = 2760 ÷ 900 × 100 = 306.7 kcal (about 307 kcal, 1283 kJ)

Per serving (one 75 g muffin)
  Energy = 2760 ÷ 900 × 75 = 230 kcal (about 962 kJ)

Do the same for every nutrient on the label. Calculate with unrounded values and round at the end, not ingredient by ingredient, or the errors stack up.

US Nutrition Facts and the AU/NZ panel

The US and Australia/New Zealand use different regulated nutrition label formats, so a label prepared for one market cannot automatically be used in another.

The UK and EU use a third format. For prepacked food, the mandatory nutrition declaration generally gives energy in both kJ and kcal, then fat, saturates, carbohydrate, sugars, protein and salt, normally per 100 g or 100 mL. It uses salt rather than sodium. Some products are exempt, and non-prepacked food has no requirement. UK and EU rules are closely related but not identical in every regulatory detail, and UK government guidance covers England, Scotland and Wales, so check the rules that apply to you. Canada has its own bilingual Nutrition Facts table. Carbohydrate is the line to watch when you move between them. A US figure includes fibre and an Australian one does not, which why nutrition databases differ explains.

Handout or legal label?

For a personal recipe handout or meal plan, a clear per-serving nutrition table is usually sufficient. A recipe intended for home cooking does not generally need the same regulated nutrition panel as a packaged food product. Different requirements may apply when food is prepared, supplied or sold by a food business.

Once you sell packaged food, the label is regulated. Its format, rounding, allergen declarations, ingredient list and any nutrition claims all have rules, and exemptions and product-specific requirements mean not every packaged food has the same obligations. The rules differ by country and they change, so I won't pretend a page like this can clear your label. Check the applicable food labelling regulations with the FDA, FSANZ or your local food authority, or pay a labelling consultant for an hour.

Nutrition information for packaged foods may be based on calculations using reliable ingredient data or appropriate laboratory analysis, subject to local requirements. Calculations should account for recipe quantities, cooking yields and relevant nutrient changes. Laboratory analysis may be useful where ingredient variability, processing effects or nutrition claims make calculated values less reliable.

Mistakes that show up on labels

• Per 100 g worked out from the raw weight instead of the finished weight.
• Sodium counted from added salt only. Include naturally occurring sodium and sodium from every ingredient, such as stock cubes, sauces and baking powder.
• Kilocalories typed where the panel asks for kilojoules. The number is 4.184 times too small.
• A US total carbohydrate figure, fibre included, copied onto an Australian or New Zealand panel.
• A serving size that doesn't follow the relevant market's requirements, such as FDA reference amounts in the US, or doesn't match what you sell, like "serves 4" on a tray you cut into 12.
• Rounding too early. Calculate recipe totals with unrounded values where possible, then apply the relevant market's labelling rounding rules.

When you've got the figures, the free nutrition label generator lays them out in the US Nutrition Facts format. The generated label is a starting point. Check that the values, serving size and formatting meet the applicable requirements before using it on a product for sale.