African food

bouha2306

I need help. I cook at least 5 times a week from scratch using a lot of African ingredients. When I search for a meal name, the app either doesn't have my food in its library or doesn't know it. I'm getting so discouraged using this app because it's forcing me to type every single ingredient and even at that, my African food can't be found. Any suggestions please? I'm at the point of deleting this app.

Grey_1

Have you tried scanning the labels? Barcodes I mean?

janejellyroll

Have you tried using the "My Foods" to create database entries for them? Yes, it will be a pain at first, but after you enter them once, they will be available for you *forever*.

btogogirl

I live in West Africa and I just find something similar on the app. You might be surprised at what you can find .

seska422

janejellyroll wrote: »

Have you tried using the "My Foods" to create database entries for them? Yes, it will be a pain at first, but after you enter them once, they will be available for you *forever*.

This is what I do. Everything that I eat and use more than once is entered into My Foods without sharing with the database. That way, I know it's there, entered accurately, and no one else can edit it. It's a lot of work on the front end but super-easy after that.

It would be nice if MFP let us use My Foods to build recipes, but they don't. You can make Meals from your My Foods entries so that's what I do for most recipes.

777Gemma888

Good afternoon Bouha. Would you care to give a list of foods you were hoping to find in the database?

Some African ingredients may not be listed as what you're used to. When I'd started MFP, Taro was not in the database, but malanga was. I logged malanga, as it was in the same family as taro by weight. The same applied for Pacific plantain - not in the database, but South American plantain was ... Logged it by consumed weight. This is why a food scale is essential.

Am in agreement that you would need to input your own recipe of your dishes here on MFP.

bouha2306

Thank you all for your tips. The creating my own recipe is a great idea. I think my problem was that I was looking for the exact name when I can use the same family food group in some cases like 777Gemma888 said. To tell you the truth, I don't even know the name of some of the English names but that's easy as google is there. For example, this weekend I made millet but the millet is home grown...it was brought to me from Africa so I couldn't estimate the calorie as there's no barcode. Also I made cassava, palm oil, smoked cat fish, different spices, cat fish eggs, shrimps ( it was a 1 pot dish, i.e. Everything cooked in 1 pot); we call it "ebbeh". I didn't know how to record that. When I put the ingredients one by one, it doesn't save my dish.

deannalfisher

i'd create the recipe and then you can use it again in the future because the recipe will be saved

Queenmunchy

For anything homemade you should be creating your own recipe. You can never tell how many grams of one ingredient someone used in a generic entry or what variations they have in their recipe compared to yours.

Queenmunchy

bouha2306 wrote: »

Also I made cassava, palm oil, smoked cat fish, different spices, cat fish eggs, shrimps ( it was a 1 pot dish, i.e. Everything cooked in 1 pot); we call it "ebbeh". I didn't know how to record that. When I put the ingredients one by one, it doesn't save my dish.

When you create a recipe, weigh each raw ingredient and enter that. Weigh your cooked product at the end, and subtract the weight of the pan. If you set the servings in 1g or 100g portions, you'll be able to weigh and log the amount you put onto your plate.

Every time you make that recipe, you just need to tweak the weights again, but you won't have to find each ingredient again.

JoRocka

If you're using something home grown (i.e. millet) just use a generic entry for any unprocessed "raw" version of said thing.

It does not have to be exact.

Secondly- I'd start batch cooking. Cook a single meal for 3-4 days so you aren't doing the same thing every single day. that's to much work.

Streamline- and make your cooking more efficient.

bkbirge

bouha2306 wrote: »

Also I made cassava, palm oil, smoked cat fish, different spices, cat fish eggs, shrimps ( it was a 1 pot dish, i.e. Everything cooked in 1 pot);

I'll be over in half an hour.

extra_medium

If you're cooking the meals yourself it's best to enter the ingredients individually anyways. How else could you get accurate results? You can enter and save your recipes using the "meals, recipes and foods," menu and just select them the next time you make them.