Most independent kitchens know their overall food cost percentage and cannot tell you which dishes are carrying it. That is a pricing decision made blind.
A recipe attaches ingredients and quantities to a menu item, so a plate has a cost the moment it has a recipe. Prep items are recipes in their own right — make a sauce once and use it across four dishes, and the cost flows through to all four without being retyped.
Modifiers price correctly rather than approximately. An extra portion adds its own cost and its own price, and it moves its own stock, so a heavily-modified dish does not quietly become the least profitable thing you sell.
Menus can also respect the clock. A breakfast menu that turns itself off at eleven is a schedule, not a task somebody has to remember.