Nutrition Labels for Home Bakeries
Updated November 2026 · For US home & small-batch bakers
Cookies, cakes, brownies, breads — if you sell them packaged, the question is rarely whether you can make a panel, but when you need one and how to get the serving size right. Direct sellers often qualify for the small-business exemption; sell to a café, a shop, or online and a panel is expected. This page covers the bakery-specific parts: serving sizes, batch math, and the traps that make homemade labels wrong.
Serving sizes: start from the FDA reference amount
The FDA publishes a Reference Amount Customarily Consumed (RACC) for each food category in 21 CFR § 101.12. Your label serving should reflect what people actually eat in one sitting, anchored to these amounts:
| Baked good | FDA reference amount | Typical label serving |
|---|---|---|
| Cookies | 30 g | 1–2 cookies (weigh yours) |
| Brownies | 40 g | 1 piece (__ g) |
| Cupcakes / medium-weight cake | 80 g | 1 cupcake or 1 slice (__ g) |
| Heavyweight cake (cheesecake, etc.) | 125 g | 1 slice (__ g) |
| Lightweight cake (sponge, angel food, no icing) | 55 g | 1 slice (__ g) |
Weigh a typical piece and use that gram weight in the serving line, e.g. “1 cookie (28 g)”. Then servings per container = total batch weight ÷ serving weight. A 900 g batch of 30 g cookies is about 30 servings.
Weigh the batch, not the memory
A panel is calculated, not guessed: each ingredient is looked up in a reference database (USDA FoodData Central), scaled by its weight in the batch, summed, and divided by the number of servings. The software then applies the regulatory rounding and formatting. The one thing it cannot fix is a wrong recipe — the label is exactly as accurate as the weights you enter. Change the recipe and you need a new label.
Bakery-specific traps
- Per serving, not per 100 g. US panels declare nutrients per serving. A per-100 g column is an EU convention and does not belong on a US Nutrition Facts label.
- Icing and fillings count. Buttercream, ganache, cream filling and glaze are part of the recipe and must be in the calculation — they often dominate the fat and added-sugars lines.
- Added sugars is its own line. Sugar, honey, syrups and the sugar in icing all count toward “Includes X g Added Sugars.” See the rounding rules for how the gram steps work.
- Zero is still a line. Under 0.5 g total fat per serving with no fat claims lets you omit saturated fat, trans fat and cholesterol with a “Not a significant source of…” footnote — but total fat still shows as 0 g.
- Single treats need small formats. An individually wrapped cookie or cake pop has little label space. Packages under 12 sq in may use the tabular format; under 40 sq in where tabular will not fit, the linear format (§ 101.9(j)(13)). Both are part of NutrientLabel Pro.
- Claims are loaded words. “Low fat,” “sugar free,” “good source of fiber” each have a legal definition and force a full panel. Do not print them unless the numbers qualify.
Selling to cafés and shops
Even if you are federally exempt, a wholesale buyer’s spec sheet will usually ask for a nutrition panel, an ingredient statement and an allergen declaration. Building the panel from your weighed recipe now means you can say yes when the opportunity comes. For the production routes and their costs, see how to get a nutrition label.
Turn your recipe into a panel
Enter ingredient weights, get a print-ready FDA label with the right serving size and rounding — free, no account, nothing uploaded. Free exports are 2.5″ vertical with a small watermark; other sizes and tabular/linear are Pro.
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