What is the normal food cost for a restaurant?!

well allot depends on the costing of the menu products
food cost could be higher yes
for example you can have a basic sandwich menu and then put on whats called a lost leader
like a nice steak and instead of you making 3 times what it cost you for the menu price you may put it on at 2 times the cost
if you have any questions email me and i will help..

Dune summed it up well. I've always heard it expressed the opposite way, as in aiming for at least a 60% profit. However you can always have a few items that are loss-leaders to get people in the door. Say like an appetizer or one or two dishes that only make a 40% profit. Other items might get you 80% profit so as long as you average in the 60% range, you should be good.

Most restaurants take the basic costs of ingredients, labour and overhead and double it for the cost to sell with their profit.

You can charge whatever you wish, but factor in what your competitors are charging, and if you want a larger margin make sure yours are a damn sight better.

Food cost should be controlled at around 30%, going higher than 33% usually does mean you're losing profit most probably due to lack of business, unit price of food has gone up without increasing your price, more wastage due to poor quality or bad kitchen control.

Thats about right 200% markup over costs