Create an item

An item is one dish, drink or wine. This guide covers creating one properly the first time, so it does not need revisiting when the menu is reviewed.

Before you start

Have ready: the name as it should appear, the description, every price that applies, the category it belongs to, its allergens, and a photo if the menu uses them.

Create it

  1. Open All items under the menu type.
  2. Select Add New. On an empty menu the button reads Create your first item.
  3. Enter the title — the name guests read, with the capitalization you want published.
  4. Complete the item fields (see below).
  5. In the side column, tick the category.
  6. Tick the allergens that apply.
  7. Select Publish.

The fields, and what to put in them

Field What belongs there
Galería The dish photos. Wine list and beverages use a single Imagen instead.
Vídeo A YouTube or Vimeo URL. Nothing is uploaded.
Subtítulo A short qualifier — a region, a technique, a base spirit. Not a second name.
Descripción The always-visible line. Ingredients and preparation, kept to one or two lines.
Descripción larga Expanded on demand. Origin, story, technique.
Price fields Only the formats you actually serve.

Wine records replace these with the wine panel — sale prices, market references, vintage, ageing classification and technical sheet. See Wine fields.

Writing that holds up across a whole menu

Consistency matters more than eloquence. Decide once, then apply to every item:

  • whether descriptions are sentences or ingredient lists;
  • whether you name origins (Cantabrian anchovies) or not;
  • whether the subtitle carries the format, the origin, or nothing;
  • how long a description may be.

A menu where one dish has three lines and the next has three words reads as unfinished, whatever the layout.

Prices

Fill the formats the kitchen serves and leave the rest empty:

  • an empty field means the format is not offered and nothing is shown;
  • a zero is a real price of zero and will be displayed as one.

Where it helps, include the count in the price field as the field description suggests — for example 10,80€ (6 unidades).

Two things that happen when you save

  • If the item has photos in Galería but no featured image, the first gallery photo becomes the featured image.
  • If you publish without a category, one is assigned automatically: the first available category of the menu type, or a new category named after the menu type when there are none. Wine list items are excluded from this.

Assign the category yourself so the item lands where you intended.

Verify

  1. On All items, confirm the item appears under the right heading.
  2. Drag it to its position within the section.
  3. Open the public menu in a private window and read the item as a guest.
  4. Check it on a phone.
  5. On a multilingual site, add the translation before considering the item finished — see Translate items and categories.

Faster ways to create many

  • Duplicate an existing item when the next one shares most fields.
  • Bulk create/update when you have the names and prices in a spreadsheet already. It creates published items with titles and prices; descriptions, photos and allergens are completed afterwards.

Both are covered in Duplicate an item and Paste items in bulk.