NSV: Figured out how to measure recipe portion sizes! I should not be this proud.
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vegaslounge
Posts: 122 Member
I'd say 80% of my diet is what I cook myself as A ) I love to cook and B ) I'm one step up from qualifying for food stamps so budgeting is a fine art that sadly doesn't include as many pizza rolls as I'd like.
Until tonight, although I create my recipes to the gram and knew how many servings the recipe yields, I was never sure just how much of a stated serving I was actually eating. After all, my trusty little food scale nearly maxes out holding an empty casserole dish, it could never cope with the food actually IN the dish after I've made it!
Well, tonight while making this week's dinners (I bulk-cook), it finally dawned on me: Add up the grams of the ingredients. Divide by number of servings. Boom, you've got how many grams an individual serving is.
I do wish the recipe builder had a "notes" section where you could put this info, but I've started adding the total weight to the recipe name so I know it and can divide thusly. I feel well chuffed. Like I said, I shouldn't be so proud that I finally figured this out after literally years, but, I went to art school. I don't...do...math.
~VL
Until tonight, although I create my recipes to the gram and knew how many servings the recipe yields, I was never sure just how much of a stated serving I was actually eating. After all, my trusty little food scale nearly maxes out holding an empty casserole dish, it could never cope with the food actually IN the dish after I've made it!
Well, tonight while making this week's dinners (I bulk-cook), it finally dawned on me: Add up the grams of the ingredients. Divide by number of servings. Boom, you've got how many grams an individual serving is.
I do wish the recipe builder had a "notes" section where you could put this info, but I've started adding the total weight to the recipe name so I know it and can divide thusly. I feel well chuffed. Like I said, I shouldn't be so proud that I finally figured this out after literally years, but, I went to art school. I don't...do...math.
~VL
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Replies
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Except that original uncooked weight isn't going to relate to cooked weight. Unless you're weighing individual components after cooking?4
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I'd be cautious about this. If your ingredients have a bunch of water that boils off during cooking then your "start" weight and your "final" weight are going to be very different. I'd say the longer the cook time or the higher the temperature the more likely this will be an issue.
You might want to track the total weight of cooked portions over the time you eat it and compare it with your calculated recipe weight.
I bulk cook too, and then I portion into 8 or 12 or whatever servings. Or maybe 6 "full" servings and 4 "half servings". I don't really worry if one is slightly more or less because I'm the only one eating them. If I'm under one day, I'll be over the next. If other people are eating it too, then the accuracy becomes more of an issue.4 -
Slightly off topic: I've contemplated buying a digital body weight scale for my big, big family gatherings. Has anyone else done this?0
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Heather4448 wrote: »Slightly off topic: I've contemplated buying a digital body weight scale for my big, big family gatherings. Has anyone else done this?
To weigh the family?
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Heather4448 wrote: »Slightly off topic: I've contemplated buying a digital body weight scale for my big, big family gatherings. Has anyone else done this?
Will people have to weigh in before and after the meal?!5 -
Haha! No. To weigh my huge crockpots that really only get used at big family gatherings. I always do one for collard greens, one for venison chili, and one for mac-n-cheese.3
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livingleanlivingclean wrote: »Except that original uncooked weight isn't going to relate to cooked weight. Unless you're weighing individual components after cooking?
But what would be the harm in this? I ask honestly. Say I'm cooking bell peppers (a notorious water-holder). I weigh the uncooked bell pepper to put in my recipe, and for simplicity let's say I'm just baking them with no oil etc, just the straight pepper. The weight might be different cooked vs. uncooked but, calories couldn't possibly be MORE cooked than uncooked. If anything, I'd like to err on the side of overestimating my grams than under. Does that make sense?
A recipe is never going to be exact (hell, prepared food rarely is). Unless my oven somehow adds mass to my food whilst cooking, I don't know of a more exact method that doesn't involve – as you said– picking apart and weighing each individual cooked component. As much as I love my food scale, that just is impracticable IMO. I'm willing to fudge 50 calories or so for the greater good of knowing the general grams per portion.
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Heather4448 wrote: »Slightly off topic: I've contemplated buying a digital body weight scale for my big, big family gatherings. Has anyone else done this?
Will people have to weigh in before and after the meal?!
Lol, I'm somehow picturing Thanksgiving like a carnival ride. "HUR-RAY HUR-RAY HUR-RAY step right up to the buffet! Laaaaadies and gentlemen! Please step up to the scale before you eat! HUR-RAY HUR-RAY HUR-RAY!"3 -
vegaslounge wrote: »livingleanlivingclean wrote: »Except that original uncooked weight isn't going to relate to cooked weight. Unless you're weighing individual components after cooking?
But what would be the harm in this? I ask honestly. Say I'm cooking bell peppers (a notorious water-holder). I weigh the uncooked bell pepper to put in my recipe, and for simplicity let's say I'm just baking them with no oil etc, just the straight pepper. The weight might be different cooked vs. uncooked but, calories couldn't possibly be MORE cooked than uncooked. If anything, I'd like to err on the side of overestimating my grams than under. Does that make sense?
A recipe is never going to be exact (hell, prepared food rarely is). Unless my oven somehow adds mass to my food whilst cooking, I don't know of a more exact method that doesn't involve – as you said– picking apart and weighing each individual cooked component. As much as I love my food scale, that just is impracticable IMO. I'm willing to fudge 50 calories or so for the greater good of knowing the general grams per portion.
If you are fine with the inaccuracy, then it doesn't matter. But I got the impression you thought this method was more accurate than estimating portions, and that you were specifically unhappy with prior method estimating portions because of inaccuracy... in which case, this method is just as bad.
Yes, the calories aren't really changing much from uncooked to cooked. But the calories per gram might be changing a ton. (And if it were just bell peppers, who cares? But meat also shrinks by 25%?)
I also think you will be underestimating, not overestimating calories in your method. Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you are doing. Here is an example of what I think you are saying:
Suppose you calculated that you put 1000 grams of stuff in a recipe. And it has 1000 calories total. So 1 calorie per gram. After cooking, the whole thing weighs 750 grams. You weight out 750 grams and based on your prior math, log 750 grams as 750 calories or log that you at 750 g out of 1000 g total (giving you 750 cal). But it is really 1000 calories--- because it is the whole the whole thing- just lighter now that you've cooked it! [Obviously, in this silly scenario, you'd notice, but I picked everything to make the math easy.]
I'd still recommend tracking out your cooked food as you eat it and comparing it with your calculated weight at the start. Then you can decide if the error is acceptable to you.1 -
Yes, the calories aren't really changing much from uncooked to cooked. But the calories per gram might be changing a ton. (And if it were just bell peppers, who cares? But meat also shrinks by 25%?)
I also think you will be underestimating, not overestimating calories in your method. Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you are doing. Here is an example of what I think you are saying:
Suppose you calculated that you put 1000 grams of stuff in a recipe. And it has 1000 calories total. So 1 calorie per gram. After cooking, the whole thing weighs 750 grams. You weight out 750 grams and based on your prior math, log 750 grams as 750 calories or log that you at 750 g out of 1000 g total (giving you 750 cal). But it is really 1000 calories--- because it is the whole the whole thing- just lighter now that you've cooked it! [Obviously, in this silly scenario, you'd notice, but I picked everything to make the math easy.]
Actually, I'm pretty sure I'm doing the opposite. I think there might be some miscommunication here. I write down the gram of each pre-cooked ingredient (100 grams of raw bell pepper, for example). THOSE (pre-cooked) ingredient numbers go into my total grams for the recipe. The total gram mass for the recipe I calculate comes from these raw pre-cooked ingredients. EVERY ingredient– veg, oil, seasoning etc– is the gram-total that I'm basing my final calculation on. Once cooked, I base my serving on that pre-cooked calculation and those pre-cooked grams. If the cooked weight is lower than the pre-cooked weight, I honestly just can't see how extra mass would be added to those figures simply by virtue of heating them. I can see how the finished product would be "lighter" than the raw ingredients based on water weight, but that's not the figure that I base my calculation on.
Maybe I'm wrong– like I said, I don't do math. If I'm missing something thermodynamically, please tell me! But, this is way more accurate than eyeballing and I think I'll stick with it at least awhile.
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vegaslounge wrote: »Yes, the calories aren't really changing much from uncooked to cooked. But the calories per gram might be changing a ton. (And if it were just bell peppers, who cares? But meat also shrinks by 25%?)
I also think you will be underestimating, not overestimating calories in your method. Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you are doing. Here is an example of what I think you are saying:
Suppose you calculated that you put 1000 grams of stuff in a recipe. And it has 1000 calories total. So 1 calorie per gram. After cooking, the whole thing weighs 750 grams. You weight out 750 grams and based on your prior math, log 750 grams as 750 calories or log that you at 750 g out of 1000 g total (giving you 750 cal). But it is really 1000 calories--- because it is the whole the whole thing- just lighter now that you've cooked it! [Obviously, in this silly scenario, you'd notice, but I picked everything to make the math easy.]
Actually, I'm pretty sure I'm doing the opposite. I think there might be some miscommunication here. I write down the gram of each pre-cooked ingredient (100 grams of raw bell pepper, for example). THOSE (pre-cooked) ingredient numbers go into my total grams for the recipe. The total gram mass for the recipe I calculate is pre-cooking. EVERY ingredient– veg, oil, seasoning etc– is the gram-total that I'm basing my calculation on. Once cooked, I base my serving on THAT pre-cooked calculation and those grams. If the cooked weight is lower than the pre-cooked weight, I just can't see how extra mass would be added to those figures simply by virtue of heating them.
Maybe I'm wrong, like I said, I don't do math. If I'm missing something thermodynamically, please tell me! But, this is way more accurate than eyeballing and I think I'll stick with it at least awhile.
It's no more accurate imo - I'd put more accuracy in dividing meals in to a certain number of portions. There's error in both.0 -
vegaslounge wrote: »Yes, the calories aren't really changing much from uncooked to cooked. But the calories per gram might be changing a ton. (And if it were just bell peppers, who cares? But meat also shrinks by 25%?)
I also think you will be underestimating, not overestimating calories in your method. Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you are doing. Here is an example of what I think you are saying:
Suppose you calculated that you put 1000 grams of stuff in a recipe. And it has 1000 calories total. So 1 calorie per gram. After cooking, the whole thing weighs 750 grams. You weight out 750 grams and based on your prior math, log 750 grams as 750 calories or log that you at 750 g out of 1000 g total (giving you 750 cal). But it is really 1000 calories--- because it is the whole the whole thing- just lighter now that you've cooked it! [Obviously, in this silly scenario, you'd notice, but I picked everything to make the math easy.]
Actually, I'm pretty sure I'm doing the opposite. I think there might be some miscommunication here. I write down the gram of each pre-cooked ingredient (100 grams of raw bell pepper, for example). THOSE (pre-cooked) ingredient numbers go into my total grams for the recipe. The total gram mass for the recipe I calculate comes from these raw pre-cooked ingredients. EVERY ingredient– veg, oil, seasoning etc– is the gram-total that I'm basing my final calculation on. Once cooked, I base my serving on that pre-cooked calculation and those pre-cooked grams. If the cooked weight is lower than the pre-cooked weight, I honestly just can't see how extra mass would be added to those figures simply by virtue of heating them. I can see how the finished product would be "lighter" than the raw ingredients based on water weight, but that's not the figure that I base my calculation on.
Maybe I'm wrong– like I said, I don't do math. If I'm missing something thermodynamically, please tell me! But, this is way more accurate than eyeballing and I think I'll stick with it at least awhile.
Okay, either I'm misunderstanding what you're saying or you've got it exactly backwards.
Let's take a single ingredient for our example: a pork tenderloin, portion size 4 oz uncooked, 200 calories per serving. You weigh it before cooking and it's exactly 16 oz, so there are 4 portions in the whole loin - four times 200 is 800 calories for the whole loin. You then cook it, but do not weigh the whole cooked loin, which has gotten lighter through water loss and now weighs 12 oz. However, the total number of calories in the loin has not shrunk. There are now 12 oz of meat equaling 800 calories.
You cut and weigh a four ounce portion of cooked meat, which is now one third of the total, not one fourth, due to the whole thing being lighter. However, one third still contains one third of 800 calories, which means you are eating 267 calories, not 200.1 -
rheddmobile wrote: »Okay, either I'm misunderstanding what you're saying or you've got it exactly backwards.
Let's take a single ingredient for our example: a pork tenderloin, portion size 4 oz uncooked, 200 calories per serving. You weigh it before cooking and it's exactly 16 oz, so there are 4 portions in the whole loin - four times 200 is 800 calories for the whole loin. You then cook it, but do not weigh the whole cooked loin, which has gotten lighter through water loss and now weighs 12 oz. However, the total number of calories in the loin has not shrunk. There are now 12 oz of meat equaling 800 calories.
You cut and weigh a four ounce portion of cooked meat, which is now one third of the total, not one fourth, due to the whole thing being lighter. However, one third still contains one third of 800 calories, which means you are eating 267 calories, not 200.
Basically what I'm coming away with is that food 'gains' more calories when it is cooked, because the water burns away and the food becomes more dense and thus 'packed'.
So, next question...how can one account for this? Weighing my food-loaded pots etc is not really an an option. So, any other suggestions?2 -
vegaslounge wrote: »rheddmobile wrote: »Okay, either I'm misunderstanding what you're saying or you've got it exactly backwards.
Let's take a single ingredient for our example: a pork tenderloin, portion size 4 oz uncooked, 200 calories per serving. You weigh it before cooking and it's exactly 16 oz, so there are 4 portions in the whole loin - four times 200 is 800 calories for the whole loin. You then cook it, but do not weigh the whole cooked loin, which has gotten lighter through water loss and now weighs 12 oz. However, the total number of calories in the loin has not shrunk. There are now 12 oz of meat equaling 800 calories.
You cut and weigh a four ounce portion of cooked meat, which is now one third of the total, not one fourth, due to the whole thing being lighter. However, one third still contains one third of 800 calories, which means you are eating 267 calories, not 200.
I think we're both not understanding each other. I'll use the pork analogy (I'm a vegetarian so I don't eat meat, but for the sake of the conversation):
I weigh 16oz of raw pork and put that into the recipe builder to create a serving of 4. This – 16oz– is the number I put into the recipe builder. If the post-cooked weight is 12oz, I'm still basing my 4-person serving size off the 16oz pre-cooked weight. I divide 16oz by 4, not 12oz by 4. I know calories do not shrink with the loss of water and so I base my measurements off that pre-cooked and pre-shrunk weight, not the end result.
Again, based on my admittedly limited knowledge of math and chemistry, I could be totally wrong doing this. But honestly, I don't quite understand how else I could do it. Any suggestions, I'd be happy to learn.
For this example, I'm using one of the entries to see how much of a difference it would make
16 oz raw pork: 1070 calories and 4 oz per serving
This means 67 calories per oz and roughly 270 calories per 4 oz raw.
If it cooks down to 12 oz (that's the same 1070 calories per 12 oz and about and roughly 90 calories per oz)
Now, if you weigh a portion of 4 oz for yourself based on the 16 oz weight divided by 4 you would be eating 360 calories while thinking you're eating 270.
Am I understanding that right?0 -
As this is getting to a (oven) heated discussion, just breaking up things before they get too serious.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=wu1UXCdyNo0
(I love all you MFPals, thank you for continually educating me!)2 -
It really wouldn't matter if you're the only one eating that meal. The calories would add up to the total of the calories in the recipe anyway. Your method has problems only if you're cooking for a family (not to mention that you would be robbing some of your family members of their full portion like in the pork example you would eat 4 oz and leave 3 family members with 8 oz to split).0
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I would just eyeball out however many equal portions you have and then maybe weigh each individual portion to make sure they are roughly equal?3
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vegaslounge wrote: »rheddmobile wrote: »Okay, either I'm misunderstanding what you're saying or you've got it exactly backwards.
Let's take a single ingredient for our example: a pork tenderloin, portion size 4 oz uncooked, 200 calories per serving. You weigh it before cooking and it's exactly 16 oz, so there are 4 portions in the whole loin - four times 200 is 800 calories for the whole loin. You then cook it, but do not weigh the whole cooked loin, which has gotten lighter through water loss and now weighs 12 oz. However, the total number of calories in the loin has not shrunk. There are now 12 oz of meat equaling 800 calories.
You cut and weigh a four ounce portion of cooked meat, which is now one third of the total, not one fourth, due to the whole thing being lighter. However, one third still contains one third of 800 calories, which means you are eating 267 calories, not 200.
Basically what I'm coming away with is that food 'gains' more calories when it is cooked, because the water burns away and the food becomes more dense and thus 'packed'.
So, next question...how can one account for this? Weighing my food-loaded pots etc is not really an an option. So, any other suggestions?
That's basically it, cooked food can be more calorie dense. If it's just you, it will average out if you divide it into portions. Or you could put your finished food into a container on the scale, weigh and divide. That is what I would do in the case of the roast in the example.
I have a scale which, while small itself, came in a box showing someone weighing a whole roasting pan with a turkey on it - it was twenty dollars or thereabouts on Amazon and I love it. If you care enough, that's an option. What I generally do is just eyeball a portion size when I make the food. Poke around with my ladle, and figure out there are about eight ladlefuls in this pot right now, or something like that. Unless you are at a very tight deficit, you can live through occasional inexactitude.0 -
You can't compare the weight of cooked food with raw food at all, unfortunately. Your servings will probably be 30% off.
I have no issue with my scale weighing a full casserole dish. Buy a new scale.0 -
I've been known to use my bathroom scale carried down to the kitchen for larger pots of food (wiped down and all that)1
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