# Baker's Percentage Calculator

> Converts a bread or dough formula between baker's percentages and grams: flour is 100 %, every other ingredient is expressed relative to flour weight; works in both directions and reports total dough weight and hydration.

- Calculator id: `bakers-percentage` · Category: Food & Cooking (`food`) · Tool name: `calculate_bakers_percentage`
- Canonical page: https://tttkmbb.com/food/bakers-percentage · This document: https://tttkmbb.com/food/bakers-percentage.md · JSON definition: https://tttkmbb.com/food/bakers-percentage.json

## Purpose

Converts a bread or dough formula between baker's percentages and grams: flour is 100 %, every other ingredient is expressed relative to flour weight; works in both directions and reports total dough weight and hydration.

**Use when:** You know the flour weight and the formula percentages (or the ingredient grams) and want the other representation, e.g. to scale or compare bread recipes.

**Do not use when:** You want a ready-made pizza formula from ball count and weight (use pizza-dough) or plain servings-based scaling (use recipe-scaler).

## Input

| Parameter | Type | Unit | Required | Description |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| `flour_g` | number | g | required | Total flour weight (= 100 %). (> 0, max 1000000) |
| `ingredient_names` | string_list |  | required | Names of the non-flour ingredients, in order (comma-separated; use underscores instead of spaces, e.g. olive_oil). |
| `ingredient_percents` | number_list |  | optional | Baker's percentage of each ingredient (same order as the names). Give this to get grams. |
| `ingredient_grams` | number_list |  | optional | Weight of each ingredient in grams (same order). Used when ingredient_percents is not given, to get percentages. |

## Output

| Field | Type | Unit | Description |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| `ingredients` | list |  | Per ingredient: ingredient, percent (of flour) and grams. |
| `total_dough_g` | number | g | Flour plus all ingredients. |
| `total_percent` | number | % | 100 + sum of ingredient percentages; total_dough = flour × total_percent / 100. |
| `hydration_percent` | number | % | Percentage of the ingredient named 'water' (only when present). |

## Formula

`grams_i = flour_g × percent_i / 100; percent_i = grams_i / flour_g × 100; total_dough = flour_g + Σ grams_i; total_percent = 100 + Σ percent_i`

Baker's percentages let a formula be scaled to any flour weight and compared across recipes; hydration is the water percentage. For a preferment, count its flour in flour_g if you want true overall percentages.

## Data Sources

- King Arthur Baking – Baker's percentage — https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/pro/reference/bakers-percentage (reference, retrieved 2026-09-23)
- Wikipedia – Baker percentage — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baker_percentage (reference, retrieved 2026-09-23)
- BC Campus – Basic Kitchen and Food Service Management: Converting and Adjusting Recipes and Formulas — https://opentextbc.ca/basickitchenandfoodservicemanagement/chapter/convert-and-adjust-recipes-and-formulas/ (textbook, retrieved 2026-09-23)

Data freshness: `static`. Deterministic formula with fixed constants; results never go stale. Inputs supplied by the caller determine the output.

## API

- `GET https://tttkmbb.com/api/v1/calculate/bakers-percentage?flour_g=…&ingredient_names=…`
- `POST https://tttkmbb.com/api/v1/calculate/bakers-percentage` with JSON body `{"inputs": {…}}`
- Response: unified envelope (`success`, `request`, `result.values`, `result.units`, `sources`, `freshness`, `timestamp`, `next_actions`, `links`); see https://tttkmbb.com/docs/response-format.md
- Schema: https://tttkmbb.com/api/v1/calculators/bakers-percentage · OpenAPI operationId `calculate_bakers_percentage` in https://tttkmbb.com/openapi.json
- Authentication: none. Rate limit: fair use, see https://tttkmbb.com/docs/rate-limits.md.

## MCP

- Server: `https://tttkmbb.com/mcp` (Streamable HTTP, JSON-RPC 2.0, no auth)
- Tool:  `run_calculator` with `{"calculator_id": "bakers-percentage", "inputs": {…}}`

## Example

- 500 g flour, 65 % water, 2 % salt, 1 % yeast: inputs `{"flour_g":500,"ingredient_names":["water","salt","yeast"],"ingredient_percents":[65,2,1]}` → `{"ingredients":[{"ingredient":"water","percent":65,"grams":325},{"ingredient":"salt","percent":2,"grams":10},{"ingredient":"yeast","percent":1,"grams":5}],"total_dough_g":840,"total_percent":168,"hydration_percent":65}`
- 1000 g flour, 700 g water, 20 g salt → percentages: inputs `{"flour_g":1000,"ingredient_names":["water","salt"],"ingredient_grams":[700,20]}` → `{"ingredients":[{"ingredient":"water","percent":70,"grams":700},{"ingredient":"salt","percent":2,"grams":20}],"total_dough_g":1720,"total_percent":172,"hydration_percent":70}`

```
GET https://tttkmbb.com/api/v1/calculate/bakers-percentage?flour_g=500&ingredient_names=water%2Csalt%2Cyeast&ingredient_percents=65%2C2%2C1
```

## Limitations

You want a ready-made pizza formula from ball count and weight (use pizza-dough) or plain servings-based scaling (use recipe-scaler). Baker's percentages let a formula be scaled to any flour weight and compared across recipes; hydration is the water percentage. For a preferment, count its flour in flour_g if you want true overall percentages. All values are computed from the formula above; no measurement or live data is involved.

## FAQ

**Why can percentages add up to more than 100?**

Because each ingredient is relative to the flour, not to the whole dough. A 65 % hydration bread with 2 % salt and 1 % yeast totals 168 %, meaning 1.68 g of dough per gram of flour.

**How do I scale to a target dough weight?**

flour = target_dough / (total_percent / 100). For 1 kg of dough at 168 % use 595 g flour, then multiply each percentage by it.

## Related

- [Pizza Dough Calculator](https://tttkmbb.com/food/pizza-dough.md) — Preset pizza formula from ball count and weight.
- [Recipe Scaler](https://tttkmbb.com/food/recipe-scaler.md) — Simple servings-based scaling.