How do I measure out my homemade chili by weight and not serving size?
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Look_Its_Kriss wrote: »When i want to know my calories... I put all my ingredients into an empty food log day, because i honestly dont like the recipe builder... it never picks the right things i eat anyway...
Did you know you can manually add ingredients in the recipe builder? So you can pick the exact brand/variety you used from the database and use that in your recipe. I never use the bulk import function as it would be way out for my cooking, but I use the recipe builder all the time.
Edit to actually be on topic: I don't weigh my recipes, I just divide them into portions for freezing/using. I have a lot of tupperware that are the same size so they're all be similar portions, and in the long run any inaccuracies would work themselves out. Saves a lot of hassle for me.
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It is how ever many servings you make it... What I do in this situation is to weight the entire pot of chili in grams. (Need to know how many the pot weighs!) Say the chili is 1200g. I'll log it as 1200g, and make a note so I know the serving size is in gs. Then I weigh my portion. If I spoon 197g of chili into my bowl, I log 197 'servings'.So I made some homemade chili I entered all the ingredients in the recipe section but I don't know how many servings is actually in there how can I figured this out by weight and not serving size?
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I usually do the weight of all the ingredients added together as the serving size, and then when it's done, the weight of what goes in the bowl is my serving size. So if my chili weighs 1400 grams, that's what I put in as the serving for the recipe.
The problem with this, when you've got something you're cooking, is that the weight of your ingredients included the weight of the water in those ingredients. When you cook, an unpredictable amount of water boils off, but all the calories still stay behind. So, if you've got 1000 grams of chili ingredients with 1000 calories, you calculate 1 calorie per gram. But when you boil those ingredients down to 800 grams, they still have 1000 calories or 1.25 calories per gram. If you measure out 250 grams of chili, you would be calculating 250 calories, when it really has 312. Weighing your batch pre-cooking, and your serving post-cooking, is always going to result in undercounting calories, so it should be avoided.
You're going to have the same problem, to a lesser extent, if you save your chili as a recipe with 1.25 calories per gram-sized serving and try to re-use it. If you boil off more or less water than normal, your calculation is going to be off. How much of a difference this can make will depend on how long you cook it, the temp you cook it at, and how tight your lid is, if any. I wouldn't sweat it too much, however. In most cases, this probably makes less difference than the ratio of beans/meat/tomatoes in your bowl. And, if you are a little over on this batch, and a little under on the next batch, it works out in the end.2 -
Elle_phant wrote: »I weigh how much the entire pot of chili weighs (making sure I 0 out the bowl). And I put it in the recipe builder as 1 gram = 1 serving. So if you had 250 grams, you'd put it in as 250 servings.
I do the same thing, but I record each serving as 100 grams. Tends to avoid the "OMG!!! ARE YOU SURE YOU'RE MAKING 357 SERVINGS???!!!" message in the recipe builder (and means that I can usually find the right choice for number of servings in the drop-down menu at the end - 250 grams is 2.5 servings, for example).
My way isn't any better, of course. Just an alternative for those of us who like to work with smaller numbers (and I like getting a more accurate prediction of calories/serving as I recipe build).2 -
I never bother to weight the pot. It is too hot and too big to put in the scale and the scale will not hold it. I always get two laden full and what ever that is in grams = one serving. I then get my tupperware and fill up the containers with the same amount and label them appropriate ( 1 serving, XXX grams, and date).
I find this method easier for me.1 -
SusanMFindlay wrote: »Elle_phant wrote: »I weigh how much the entire pot of chili weighs (making sure I 0 out the bowl). And I put it in the recipe builder as 1 gram = 1 serving. So if you had 250 grams, you'd put it in as 250 servings.
I do the same thing, but I record each serving as 100 grams. Tends to avoid the "OMG!!! ARE YOU SURE YOU'RE MAKING 357 SERVINGS???!!!" message in the recipe builder (and means that I can usually find the right choice for number of servings in the drop-down menu at the end - 250 grams is 2.5 servings, for example).
My way isn't any better, of course. Just an alternative for those of us who like to work with smaller numbers (and I like getting a more accurate prediction of calories/serving as I recipe build).
We had to work with the developers to help us with an on again off again bug that limited number of servings. Whenever things worked well, we were allowed up to 9999 servings. Not sure about how. I've done 100g per serving, too. For some reason I'd lose track of the 100g setup and confuse myself. But one reason it's quite cool is that the nutritional info (like grams of protein etc) are left in a readable size and not 1g or 0g across the board in cases where serving size gets too small. There's options either way
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I usually do the weight of all the ingredients added together as the serving size, and then when it's done, the weight of what goes in the bowl is my serving size. So if my chili weighs 1400 grams, that's what I put in as the serving for the recipe.
The problem with this, when you've got something you're cooking, is that the weight of your ingredients included the weight of the water in those ingredients. When you cook, an unpredictable amount of water boils off, but all the calories still stay behind. So, if you've got 1000 grams of chili ingredients with 1000 calories, you calculate 1 calorie per gram. But when you boil those ingredients down to 800 grams, they still have 1000 calories or 1.25 calories per gram. If you measure out 250 grams of chili, you would be calculating 250 calories, when it really has 312. Weighing your batch pre-cooking, and your serving post-cooking, is always going to result in undercounting calories, so it should be avoided.
You're going to have the same problem, to a lesser extent, if you save your chili as a recipe with 1.25 calories per gram-sized serving and try to re-use it. If you boil off more or less water than normal, your calculation is going to be off. How much of a difference this can make will depend on how long you cook it, the temp you cook it at, and how tight your lid is, if any. I wouldn't sweat it too much, however. In most cases, this probably makes less difference than the ratio of beans/meat/tomatoes in your bowl. And, if you are a little over on this batch, and a little under on the next batch, it works out in the end.
We record the total weight of the food after cooking, not before. There's some evaporation after initial cooking when the food sits, but in my experience A) it's not significant, and B ), I actually re-weighed and recorded updated values in some cases. Hence why I know A)
The use of total weight of cooked food really offers a lot of simplication and works. It's not error prone 1 -
Sounds like some of you will be in the market for a higher capacity scale :bigsmile:
Here's the issue: MOST (affordable) 0.5g sensitive scales TOP at 1kg; MOST (affordable) 1g sensitive scales TOP at 2-4kg. To go above 4kg, most of the (affordable) scales I've seen become 5g sensitive.
When I cook a big pot it is often more than 4kg. When I add cinnamon to my yogurt it is usually less than 1g
I want an affordable 0.5g sensitive 5kg (or even 10kg, why not) scale.... can you find me one ;-) ????
Well that's easy - you're not gonna throw out your more sensitive scale just because you got a 10kg capacity one. And if you're really weighing a 9kg batch of food, I'd hope 5g of error for the total weight would be acceptable! Finally, if you drop the requirement to 1g sensitivity rather than 0.5g, there might be more cost effective options on the market.
PS: you weigh your cinnamon?
Edit: aw man they got scales looking like iPads. I shouldn't have done this search - for less than $10, a really sleek looking 5kg scale can be had. Not that I need another one.
The 5kg range is where the most options are at. These are the only two I found at 10kg so far. I may not have clicked on some >$30 ones to see what their range was... These two are at 1g sensitivity like all my other food scales.
Inspiring research. Of course in Canada not the same options
Mind you, I ran into an interesting one: https://www.amazon.ca/Smart-Weigh-Culinary-Platforms-Ingredients/dp/B01LXXBQWD/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1485773795&sr=8-2&keywords=scale+10kg
Having said that, it fails because I would prefer a more off-set or detachable screen so you can read it when a big plate is on there!
They covered some options for this on one topic. I believe one of the coolest ones was a poster that said she tares a little bowl and sets her plate of food on top of it! I always just nudged the plate to one side. Long as the plate doesn't fall off, I get a good weight and can view the #'s. But if you're gonna get yet another scale it needs to solve all scale related problems, amirite???0 -
I usually do the weight thing and divide but I do have the problem when I make soup that the pot itself is too heavy for my scale (enameled cast iron - I put it on my regular scale and it was 11 pounds) and so there is no way to do that so I picked a number for servings (my first attempt I went with 4, learned I should have tried 6) and then divided it into that number of portions and weighed them to make sure they were close in weight. Although I did look into getting a scale that can hold more and found a cool blue one on amazon for a decent price.
https://amazon.com/Weighmax-GL25-Tempered-Digital-Mailing/dp/B01167YPDS/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF80 -
So let me get this straight, because I think I've been doing this wrong the whole time. I weigh the bowl first that I'm cooking it in so I can subtract that out. Then after I put all of my ingredients, I take the total weight and make that the serving size? Then what am I measuring in my individual bowl when I'm ready to eat an actual serving. How do I then break that down? Sorry, I'm completely confused right now.1
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sarahstarr0416 wrote: »So let me get this straight, because I think I've been doing this wrong the whole time. I weigh the bowl first that I'm cooking it in so I can subtract that out. Then after I put all of my ingredients, I take the total weight and make that the serving size? Then what am I measuring in my individual bowl when I'm ready to eat an actual serving. How do I then break that down? Sorry, I'm completely confused right now.
Weigh and enter your raw ingredients in the recipe builder. Cook and weigh the total weight of your cooked dish, subtracting the weight of the pan.
Set your servings as the gram weight of the cooked food minus the pan.
When you plate yours, weigh that amount and log that number of 1g servings.3 -
sarahstarr0416 wrote: »So let me get this straight, because I think I've been doing this wrong the whole time. I weigh the bowl first that I'm cooking it in so I can subtract that out. Then after I put all of my ingredients, I take the total weight and make that the serving size? Then what am I measuring in my individual bowl when I'm ready to eat an actual serving. How do I then break that down? Sorry, I'm completely confused right now.
What @Queenmunchy said.
Example: You're done cooking. Total weight of the entire batch is 2539g. You record that as the number of servings in your recipe
It's time for dinner. You serve yourself 423g. Log 423 servings of your recipe. Tada! MFP does all the math for you in calculating calories and nutrients.1 -
Sounds like some of you will be in the market for a higher capacity scale :bigsmile:
Here's the issue: MOST (affordable) 0.5g sensitive scales TOP at 1kg; MOST (affordable) 1g sensitive scales TOP at 2-4kg. To go above 4kg, most of the (affordable) scales I've seen become 5g sensitive.
When I cook a big pot it is often more than 4kg. When I add cinnamon to my yogurt it is usually less than 1g
I want an affordable 0.5g sensitive 5kg (or even 10kg, why not) scale.... can you find me one ;-) ????
Well that's easy - you're not gonna throw out your more sensitive scale just because you got a 10kg capacity one. And if you're really weighing a 9kg batch of food, I'd hope 5g of error for the total weight would be acceptable! Finally, if you drop the requirement to 1g sensitivity rather than 0.5g, there might be more cost effective options on the market.
PS: you weigh your cinnamon?
Edit: aw man they got scales looking like iPads. I shouldn't have done this search - for less than $10, a really sleek looking 5kg scale can be had. Not that I need another one. The 5kg range is where the most options are at. These are the only two I found at 10kg so far. I may not have clicked on some >$30 ones to see what their range was... These two are at 1g sensitivity like all my other food scales.
Inspiring research. Of course in Canada not the same options
Mind you, I ran into an interesting one: https://www.amazon.ca/Smart-Weigh-Culinary-Platforms-Ingredients/dp/B01LXXBQWD/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1485773795&sr=8-2&keywords=scale+10kg
Having said that, it fails because I would prefer a more off-set or detachable screen so you can read it when a big plate is on there!
They covered some options for this on one topic. I believe one of the coolest ones was a poster that said she tares a little bowl and sets her plate of food on top of it! I always just nudged the plate to one side. Long as the plate doesn't fall off, I get a good weight and can view the #'s. But if you're gonna get yet another scale it needs to solve all scale related problems, amirite???
U'z right. Else gimpy current scale workz gutnuff
I use my fry's cocoa "tube" as my tall stand as it is sitting on my counter together with cinnamon to be sprinkled on **kitten** as the mood strikes ;-)0 -
sarahstarr0416 wrote: »So let me get this straight, because I think I've been doing this wrong the whole time. I weigh the bowl first that I'm cooking it in so I can subtract that out. Then after I put all of my ingredients, I take the total weight and make that the serving size? Then what am I measuring in my individual bowl when I'm ready to eat an actual serving. How do I then break that down? Sorry, I'm completely confused right now.
What @Queenmunchy said.
Example: You're done cooking. Total weight of the entire batch is 2539g. You record that as the number of servings in your recipe
It's time for dinner. You serve yourself 423g. Log 423 servings of your recipe. Tada! MFP does all the math for you in calculating calories and nutrients.
Ooohhhh! I am so doing this from now on. I always estimated how many servings and hoped I did it right, yikes! Now I can be legit on my recipes, yay! Thanks!
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Edited to delete my last question. Figured it out! Thanks!0
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So I made some homemade chili I entered all the ingredients in the recipe section but I don't know how many servings is actually in there how can I figured this out by weight and not serving size?
When I've done a big pot recipe I entered all the ingredients in the recipe tool and when done cooking, I transferred it to another pot (or storage containers) using a large multi cup measurer. You can quickly transfer the whole thing and then know it's volume. I ended up with like 12 cups, which was then the number of servings entered in the MFP recipe, easy for me to track as I ate it over the week.0 -
Why can't MFP give the serving amount in oz's too instead of one serving? I might eat less than a serving, it might be a quarter, or half. It just doesn't help me to measure the amount of food that I eat when it says 1 serving.0
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because that is how the person who inputed the record made it...which is why we are recommending building a recipe and putting the number of servings to correlate to the weight in g's0
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If you dont eat a full serving, then you can change the serving size to .5, .25 or any fraction of the serving.0
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