Weighted nutrient analysis estimates the nutrients that actually reach students when more than one recipe is offered on the same day. Instead of treating every offering equally, Gaia weights each offering's nutrient values by how many portions you expect it to serve. It is the method USDA requires for the weekly nutrient analysis districts use to demonstrate that menus meet the meal pattern's dietary specifications. This article explains how to set up a menu so the weighted reports are accurate, how to run them, and exactly how the daily and weekly numbers are calculated.
Two report types use this method, both found under Report Type on the Nutrition Analysis Report page:
Daily Weighted Analysis: one weighted nutrient summary per day.
Weekly Weighted Nutrient Analysis: the weekly average used for compliance, with a Pass/Fail result against USDA thresholds.
Setting Up a Menu for Weighted Analysis
Two pieces of data drive the calculation: the feeding figure and a portion count on each offering.
1. Set the feeding figure. The feeding figure represents the expected total number of meals and is the baseline (the divisor) for the weighted calculation. Set it per meal on the menu plan, so each meal can have its own baseline. The default is 100.
2. Enter a portion count on each offering. In the menu builder, open Display Options and choose the Weighted Analysis view. A data field appears next to each offering. Click the field next to an offering and type the portion count, which is the number of servings you expect that offering to contribute. Press Tab to move to the next offering's field and keep entering counts. The weighted reports compare these counts against the feeding figure to decide how much each offering counts toward the day's totals.
Not sure whether to use your forecast or your prepared numbers here? See Forecast vs. Weighted Analysis Numbers.
If an offering has no portion count, the weighted reports treat it as a full single serving (a weight factor of 1), so its per-serving values are counted in full rather than scaled down. For an accurate weighted picture, set a portion count on every offering you want weighted; otherwise an unset offering can count for more than an offering you deliberately scaled down.
How Portion Counts Are Applied to Offering Types
An offering can contain more than one recipe, and how the portion count is shared depends on the offering's rule type:
Combo: every recipe in the offering uses the offering's full portion count.
Assorted (students choose one, for example one of several fruits): the portion count is divided evenly across the recipes in the offering.
Running a Weighted Analysis
Open the menu plan and go to the Nutrition Analysis Report.
Choose a Date Range, and optionally narrow Days of Week, Meals, or School.
Set Report Type to Daily Weighted Analysis or Weekly Weighted Nutrient Analysis.
Use Export to download the result as Excel or CSV.
How the Calculation Works
The heart of the method is a per-offering weight factor:
Weight factor = portion count ÷ feeding figure
For example, an offering with a portion count of 150 on a menu whose feeding figure is 300 has a weight factor of 150 ÷ 300 = 0.5. A recipe in that offering with 100 calories per serving contributes 100 × 0.5 = 50 calories to the day's total. (An offering with no portion count uses a weight factor of 1, contributing its values in full.)
Daily weighted value. For each day, Gaia multiplies every recipe's nutrient values by its offering's weight factor and adds them up across all offerings on that day. The result is one weighted nutrient value per nutrient, per day, reflecting the relative size of each offering.
Weekly weighted average. The weekly value is the average of the daily weighted values across the days offered. The unrounded daily values are summed and divided by the number of days that actually have offerings (not by 5 or 7). Days with no offerings are excluded. This follows the weekly-averaging method USDA requires for approved nutrient analysis software, so the weekly figure equals the mean of the per-day values shown on the Daily Weighted report. See the USDA Nutrient Analysis Protocols Manual for the underlying methodology.
Example: daily weighted calories of 728.235, 772.308, 628.846, 876.714, and 481.902 sum to 3,488.005 across 5 days, giving a weekly average of 3,488.005 ÷ 5 = 697.601 calories.
Compliance with USDA Requirements
The Weekly Weighted Nutrient Analysis compares the weekly averages against the USDA dietary specifications, the weekly limits USDA sets for each age/grade group, for four nutrients: calories, sodium, saturated fat, and added sugars, and shows a Pass/Fail result for each. Saturated fat and added sugars are judged as a percentage of calories, calculated from the weekly averages (not by averaging daily percentages):
% calories from saturated fat = (weekly avg saturated fat grams × 9) ÷ weekly avg calories × 100
% calories from added sugars = (weekly avg added sugars grams × 4) ÷ weekly avg calories × 100
Both thresholds display as ≤ 10% of Calories. The USDA added sugars limit takes effect July 1, 2027; until then its footnote appears automatically on the report.
For lunch, you can exclude fluid milk saturated fat from the weighted saturated fat calculation, per SP 01-2026, Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act of 2025 – Implementation Requirements for the National School Lunch Program. Set a default preference for your district and override it per report. This exclusion applies to weighted totals only; per-item saturated fat values are unaffected.
A * on any offering, daily, or weekly value means one or more source nutrient values are missing from that calculation, so the total may be understated. Complete the recipe or ingredient nutrition to clear it.