Manage Ounce Equivalents on Menus

As of October 1, 2021, the USDA requires that all grains served be recorded using ounce equivalents instead of standard units of measurement. This requirement applies to both the Bread/Alt and Infant Cereal components. To accommodate this policy and ensure accurate quantities reporting, you must save an ounce equivalent calculation for all Bread/Alt and Infant Cereal foods to your food list. Learn how to do that here

However, there are several other tools to help you and your center manage the ounce equivalent requirement in Minute Menu CX, including:

  • Overriding the default food list calculation.
  • Switching Bread/Alt item quantities to ounce equivalents.

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Override the Default Food List Calculation

You can override the ounce equivalent calculation saved to your food list as long as you have not locked the equation for the selected Bread/Alt or Infant Cereal item. This helps you and your centers account for weight differences between brands of the same food when determining required quantities.

Let's look at an example.

Your food list has an entry for Brand A Bread. The serving information saved for this item  1 slice = 28g = 1 oz eq.

However, this week, Center X is serving Brand B bread. Brand B bread's nutrition label shows the following information: Serving Size: 1 slice (45g). This means that one slice of Brand B bread weighs 45 grams, so the the ounce equivalents present in Brand B bread will not match what is saved to your food list for Brand A.

  1. Click the Select Center drop-down menu at the top of the window and select the center for which to record menus.
  2. Click the Menus/Attendance menu and select Record Center Menus. The Record Menu window opens.
  3. Record menus as you normally would.
  4. Click Calculate Oz Eq for Bread/Alt or Calculate Oz Eq for Infant Cereal. The Ounce Equivalent Calculator dialog box opens.
  5. Click the Serving Size box and update the common serving size, if needed. Following our example above, we'll leave this set to 1 Slice.
  6. Click the Serving Weight box and update the serving weight as stated on the nutritional label for your food. In our example, we need to change this to 45. 
  7. Use the corresponding drop-down menu to select the weight unit. This will typically be grams (g), but some labels may give the serving weight in ounces. If this is the case, select ounce (oz). Once you set the new weight, the 1 Serving = box updates and displays the total ounce equivalents in one serving of your food item. Continuing our Brand B example, you'll see that Brand B contains 1.5 oz eq in one serving vs the 1 oz eq saved to the food list for Brand A.
  8. Click Save.

Switch Bread/Alt Items to Ounce Equivalents

Once you enable ounce equivalents and update Bread/Alt items on your food list with the appropriate calculations, you can convert items recorded prior to August 18, 2021 to ounce equivalents, if needed.

  1. In the Record Menu window, select a menu recorded before August 18, 2021. 
  2. Click Switch to Oz Eq for the Bread/Alt item.
    • If the recorded quantity matches the quantity saved to your food list and an ounce equivalents calculation exists, the quantities are converted to match what you have input on your food list.
    • If the recorded quantity does not match, CX cannot convert the item to ounce equivalents and you are prompted to either update your food list or use the override calculator to convert to ounce equivalents. This is to prevent impacts to claims processing.