- What is a Personal Menu Item?
- Adding a Personal Menu Item
- Tutorial Video - Personal Menu Items (4:42)
- Removing a Personal Menu Item from a Personal Menu
- FAQs
What is a Personal Menu Item?
A personal menu item is an item that is added to a person's personal menu that is not currently served on the main menu. A personal menu item is specific to the day of the week, the meal period or snack time, and the menu category.
Personal menu items will appear in the Touch and POS apps, production reports, and the following people reports:
- Dietary Profile Report
- Meal Service Report
- Snack Service Report
- Tray Card Ticket Report (People) - Lists Dietary Needs
- Tray Menu Ticket Report (People) - for Non-Select & Advance Ordering Service Types
- Person-Specific Select Menus Report (People) - for Table Select & Advance Ordering Service Types
- Snack Delivery Worksheet
- Stickers (People) - for Personal Items, Snacks or Identification
- Personal Menu Item Report
Note: For a person with the advance ordering service type, if that person does not select an item, then a personal menu item will be served instead if a personal menu item exists for the same day, meal period/snack time, and menu category.
Adaptive Aides and Supplements as Personal Menu Items
For a resident/patient who requires an adaptive aide or supplement, you would add these as personal menu items. Prior to doing so, first ensure you have appropriate menu categories to assign the adaptive aides and supplements to. For more information, see the following articles:
Adding a Personal Menu Item
- Open the person’s personal menu.
- At the top right corner, click the settings tool. The customization slide-out panel appears.
- The Diet Order field by default displays the person’s currently-assigned diet order (diet type and texture type), which is indicated by the blue user icon. You can only add a personal customization to the person’s currently assigned diet order, so therefore ensure it is selected in the Diet Order field.
If the person’s currently-assigned diet order consists of different texture types for meal periods and snack times, then those texture types (combined with the primary diet type) are available in the Diet Order field with the blue user icon, as per screenshot below. Therefore personal customizations can be added to them. (For more on what diet orders are displayed in the Diet Order field, see Viewing Personal Menu Customization Grid > Diet Order Field).
- Click the Add New > Personal Item. The Add Personal Item window appears.
- Select the Food & Non-Food Items option and use its associated filters as needed:
- Food Type - filter by recipes, prepared foods, and non-food items.
- Recipe Box (available only if Recipe is selected from Food Type) - filter by a recipe box label, such as My Recipes.
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Categories - filter by food categories (if searching for prepared foods) and recipe categories (if searching for recipes). Note that if searching for both recipes and prepared foods, food categories are listed first in the drop-down (first screenshot), followed by recipe categories (second screenshot).
- Tags - filter by tags applied to recipes and prepared foods.
- Business Lines (exists if your MealSuite account is associated with more than one business line)
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My Corporation Items Only (for future use)
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As another search option, the Vendor Products option is a means to select a prepared food associated with a vendor product. From the vendor products that are returned from the search results, you then select one, which in turns adds the prepared food item the vendor product is linked with (i.e., vendor product is verified for the prepared food item). In other words, the prepared food item the vendor product is linked with is added, and not the vendor product itself.
- In the Search field, enter the description or ID of the item or product you are searching for and click Go.
- Note 1: If results are not being returned, click here for search tips.
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Note 2: The search results are limited to 100. If you do not find the search results suitable, then change the above settings as needed, and rerun the search.
- If searching for a vendor product, note the following:
- A blue + indicates the vendor product is linked to a food item.
- A red + indicates the vendor product is not linked to a food item, and therefore cannot be selected. To get a vendor product linked to a food item, see Suggesting a Vendor Product be Linked to a Food Item.
- By clicking the eye icon (
) of an item, a separate window appears with the following tabs:
- Details - displays the recipe details.
- Nutrition Facts - displays the Nutrition Facts label.
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Where used (screenshot below) - displays the following sections:
- Recipes - lists any recipes the item is assigned to as an ingredient (i.e., a recipe can be an ingredient itself in a recipe), and lists any recipes the item is assigned to as a therapeutic substitute (i.e., an extended recipe).
- Menus - lists the menus the item is assigned to.
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Personal Menus - lists the people profiles who have the recipe added as a personal menu item to their personal menu.
Note: The Recipes section is displayed first; therefore if you do not see the Menus and Personal Menus sections, then you can either collapse the Recipes section (by clicking the Recipes header bar) or scroll down the window to see the Menus and Personal Menus sections. Also, the Menus and Personal Menus sections will need to be expanded by clicking their respective header bars.
- For an item you want to add, click its + icon. You can repeat the above steps to add other items. Each time an item is added, the Personal Item to Add section refreshes with the added item.
- Enter or select the following:
- Day - select the days to serve the item.
- Meal - select the meal periods and snack times to serve the item.
- Menu Category - select the menu category to apply the item (e.g., if Cheerios is the item, then select the Cereal category). Note that the categories that are available depend on the meal and snack times that are selected.
- Serving Size - adjust the default serving size if needed.
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In Addition to Menu Items or Instead of Menu Items options (screenshot below) - If the In Addition to Menu Items option is selected, then the personal menu item is listed as an additional item alongside the standard menu item(s) on the personal menu. If the Instead of Menu Items option is selected, then the personal menu item replaces the standard menu item(s) on the personal menu.
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Always order (screenshot below) - this option is available if the person’s service type for any meal period (breakfast, lunch, dinner) is set to advanced ordering or table select. If the Always order option is selected, then the system will always order the personal menu item rather than have it as an option.
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Item Note - you have option of adding a note (e.g., “milk on the side”), which will be printed on the service report for production staff.
- Click Add to close the window and add the item(s). Note that if the added item conflicts with the person’s dislike group, a message appears stating such and gives you the ability cancel the personal menu item, or ignore the dislike restriction and apply the personal menu item.
- On the personal menu view, a personal menu item appears in blue text below choice 1 items.
- Hovering your cursor over the item displays “Personal Menu Item”.
Tutorial Video - Personal Menu Items (4:42)
Removing a Personal Menu Item from a Personal Menu
When a personal menu item is added, it is then considered a customization in the person's personal menu. Therefore to remove a personal menu item, the "personal item" personal menu customization will need to be removed. To remove a personal menu customization, see Removing a Personal Menu Customization.
FAQs
Can a personal menu item be added to a specific meal period on a specific week?
No. At this time, a personal menu item cannot be added to a specific meal period for a specific week.
I've added a personal menu item, but it is not appearing in the personal menu view or showing in reports?
It could be that the item that is being added as a personal menu item has already been added from other methods: Also Available menu, fallback substitute, specific substitute. If so, then the system calculations can be preventing the personal menu item from being added.
Remove the item as a fallback substitute and/or specific substitute from the personal menu to see if the personal menu item can then be added.