A current recipe yields 200 servings and you want 50 servings. What is the conversion factor?

A current recipe yields 200 servings and you want 50 servings. What is the conversion factor?

• A. 0.5
• B. 0.25
• C. 0.75
• D. 0.1

Answer: (B)

To adjust a recipe to a smaller yield, use the ratio of the desired yield to the original yield as the conversion factor. Multiply every ingredient by this factor to get the new amounts. Here, desired servings = 50 and original yield = 200. Conversion factor = 50 ÷ 200 = 0.25. Multiplying each ingredient by 0.25 scales the recipe down to 50 servings. For context, using 0.5 would yield 100 servings, 0.75 would yield 150, and 0.1 would yield 20, so 0.25 is the factor that matches the target exactly.

To adjust a recipe to a smaller yield, use the ratio of the desired yield to the original yield as the conversion factor. Multiply every ingredient by this factor to get the new amounts.

Here, desired servings = 50 and original yield = 200. Conversion factor = 50 ÷ 200 = 0.25. Multiplying each ingredient by 0.25 scales the recipe down to 50 servings.

For context, using 0.5 would yield 100 servings, 0.75 would yield 150, and 0.1 would yield 20, so 0.25 is the factor that matches the target exactly.