EATEC vs. CBORD

EATEC is the computer software BYU uses for food inventory, retail, purchasing, ordering, nutrition, etc. ISU uses CBORD. At BYU, I currently work with EATEC doing nutrient calculations on BYU’s recipes, so I am fairly familiar with the program. My boss, Bob Smith, is the EATEC coordinator and everyone goes to him for EATEC problems. Bob loves EATEC and lets everyone know it is the best program out there. While here at ISU, I’ve had the opportunity to use CBORD which has the same functions as EATEC but is a different program. Although, I am not well versed in either program, I thought it would be interesting to compare and contrast the two from a nutrition stand point.

EATEC –

EATEC allows you to input all nutrition information by hand or link it to a USDA item. You then must go through the recipe and adjust for refuse change (weight of portion of food that is thrown away ex. Potato peels), moisture change (when items shrink after cooking ex. Meat), and fat change (fried items that don’t retain all of the fat).  There have been problems with refuse not pulling through when it is located in a sub recipe or with finished good inventory items that are linked to recipes.

CBORD –

CBORD allows you to input all nutrition information by hand or link it to a USDA item as well. One thing that is different is that ISU only has one primary vendor: US foods. BYU has several and sometimes it can be difficult to track down certain vendors to get nutrition information. After that information has been inputted, you can go and change production yield which is similar to refuse or nutrition yield which is similar to moisture change. There have been no problems with any of these features. A special feature which EATEC does not have is that items within recipes can be changed without changing that item's information for every recipe that item is linked to. An example of this would be oil, often times in fried goods, there is absorption of some of the oil but not all of it, thus that item needs to be adjusted for production yield. With EATEC you would have to change the refuse or fat change to the whole recipe which is not as accurate compared to applying it directly to the item it is affecting.

After reviewing this, it seems like CBORD is the winner. There have been no problems with refuse or moisture change adjustments. As well, it is more accurate in that you can apply those changes in yields to the specific item it is affecting. This results in a much more accurate nutrition label. Although, I have no say for the rest of their features, as far as nutrition goes CBORD pulls through as being the better choice of the two.