Appeal: Please use serving size as grams

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  • whierd
    whierd Posts: 14,026 Member
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    Weight (Grams or ounces) should be used for solid foods, and volume (fl ounces, ml, cups) for liquids

    I prefer grams for liquid when possible as well.
  • AllonsYtotheTardis
    AllonsYtotheTardis Posts: 16,947 Member
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    Edit: Okay I have to revoke my assumption that MFP users rely on food scales- my apologies.

    you'll notice that biggest complainers about how "This isn't working for me" are usually the ones who don't have food scales.

    Coincidence?
  • cdjs77
    cdjs77 Posts: 176 Member
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    First, in the US, many things do not give a gram serving size. Second, it's pointless to try to calculate calorie count by weight on prepackaged foods. What they give for the serving size and calorie count is an average of a sample of the prepackaged meals. Some may be lighter, some may be heavier and even two prepackaged meals of the same weight may have different calorie counts because one had more veggies and the other had more meat or cheese. Your pizza might have actually been 100 calories more because all that extra weight was in cheese and oil, or it may have been only 20 calories more because all that extra weight was in vegetables. It's even possible that your heavier pizza had the same calories as that of the suggested serving size. Heterogeneous prepackaged foods vary significantly in calorie counts.
  • challenger9509
    challenger9509 Posts: 286 Member
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    to be honest Im just glad I have some sort of measurement compared to where I was before when I just ate whatever..if I had to stress my life out so much that I had to be down to an exact detailed account of my calories I would go crazy.
  • AlsDonkBoxSquat
    AlsDonkBoxSquat Posts: 6,128 Member
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    The calories on food packages are all estimates anyway, your pizza wasn't identical to the pizza they measured calories for.

    Also, you can't just upscale the calories of your pizza by weight to assume your pizza is the same. What if the difference in weight wasn't equal between the ingredients and was just down to your pizza receiving too much cheese :smile: :wink:

    Just deal with it :drinker:

    No such thing as too much cheese :angry:
  • LAW_714
    LAW_714 Posts: 258
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    Personally I like having volumetric sizes available and not just grams. Grams are great when I'm someplace where I can weigh my food (i.e. at home) but it's pretty useless when I'm out and about, whereas I have a pretty good eye for volume and can pretty closely figure if I'm at 1/2cup, 1Tbs, etc. It's NOT as exact as weighing (which is why I have a scale at home and do weigh foods there) but it's far better than nothing and helps me when I'm outside of home and a scale is not available (who carries scales around? And no, restaurants don't list your order's amounts in weight measurements).

    And, yes, as others have stated, 1 cup, 1 tablespoon, 1 teaspoon are actual (specific) volumetric/fluid measurements, not just some random amount.
  • odusgolp
    odusgolp Posts: 10,477 Member
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    The calories on food packages are all estimates anyway, your pizza wasn't identical to the pizza they measured calories for.

    Also, you can't just upscale the calories of your pizza by weight to assume your pizza is the same. What if the difference in weight wasn't equal between the ingredients and was just down to your pizza receiving too much cheese :smile: :wink:

    Just deal with it :drinker:

    No such thing as too much cheese :angry:


    Right? Something went wrong here....
  • rowanwood
    rowanwood Posts: 510 Member
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    I'll be sure to change my life for your benefit immediately.









    I just sprained something.
  • whierd
    whierd Posts: 14,026 Member
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    First, in the US, many things do not give a gram serving size. Second, it's pointless to try to calculate calorie count by weight on prepackaged foods. What they give for the serving size and calorie count is an average of a sample of the prepackaged meals. Some may be lighter, some may be heavier and even two prepackaged meals of the same weight may have different calorie counts because one had more veggies and the other had more meat or cheese. Your pizza might have actually been 100 calories more because all that extra weight was in cheese and oil, or it may have been only 20 calories more because all that extra weight was in vegetables. It's even possible that your heavier pizza had the same calories as that of the suggested serving size. Heterogeneous prepackaged foods vary significantly in calorie counts.

    First, yes they do.

    Second, are you suggesting to not do it then? Or that it is better to not err on the side of caution?
  • whierd
    whierd Posts: 14,026 Member
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    I'll be sure to change my life for your benefit immediately.









    I just sprained something.

    Change your life?
  • DrunkenFaeGirl
    DrunkenFaeGirl Posts: 107
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    Or just stop being lazy and use the various online tools to do the conversions to the unit of measurement in your country yourself.
  • rosepad72
    rosepad72 Posts: 5 Member
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    i giggled at this true though,i feel the same
    :laugh:
  • AlsDonkBoxSquat
    AlsDonkBoxSquat Posts: 6,128 Member
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    ummmm. I think a cup is 8 oz and a 1/2 cup is 4 oz.

    Well I just did a little experiment - I weighed a cup of flour (level) - it was 160g or 5 5/8 oz, and a cup of penne pasta (as level as poss) and that was 95g or 3 1/4 oz.

    I'll stick with my scales.

    really? that's like saying that gram of flour equals 1 litre of flour. This is just not a fact. 8 fluid ounces of flour does not equal 8 weighed ounces of flour.
  • JustAnotherGirlSuzanne
    JustAnotherGirlSuzanne Posts: 932 Member
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    I am on the opposite spectrum as you. I don't weigh out my food on a gram scale (sanity reasons for this). So if all the foods in the database were listed only by grams I wouldn't be able to calculate. I have to accept that different people prefer things different ways.
    I think restricting folks who are trying to do a good thing for themselves because it doesn't fit how you want to do that good thing for yourself is not the right answer.

    Pip

    ^^this. I don't use a food scale either...
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
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    I'm not sure where you live but here in the U.S. a lot of food items are not given a gram serving size. Instead it could be in ounces, cups, etc. And I think you're being awfully anal weighing prepackaged foods.

    I'm in the US and I have yet to see any packaged food that doesn't have a gram serving size (unless it's a liquid, although I wish that came in grams too!). As a matter of fact, I contacted a brand a couple weeks ago because their label was inaccurate (it said 2oz (50g)), and they said they have to put the serving in grams, and just rounded it up for the ounces, but that the gram serving was the accurate one.

    I typically have to go back and forth between the computer and the kitchen to look at the package to see what the serving size is in grams, but yeah, I might have to edit the entries so it's less annoying.
  • Amitysk
    Amitysk Posts: 705 Member
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    Weight (Grams or ounces) should be used for solid foods, and volume (fl ounces, ml, cups) for liquids


    ^^^This
  • LAW_714
    LAW_714 Posts: 258
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    ummmm. I think a cup is 8 oz and a 1/2 cup is 4 oz.

    Well I just did a little experiment - I weighed a cup of flour (level) - it was 160g or 5 5/8 oz, and a cup of penne pasta (as level as poss) and that was 95g or 3 1/4 oz.

    I'll stick with my scales.

    1 cup = 8 FLUID ounces.

    1 cup of something solid such as flour or pasta is a volume measurement (it occupies approximately that amount of space) and is not a weight measurement. No, it is not as exact as weighing something in grams, but then I don't carry a scale with me everywhere I go, either.)
  • julien999
    julien999 Posts: 41 Member
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    a cup is a standard measurement. Grams aren't popular in most countries so I think you might have trouble converting people.
    You can always add your own foods to just your page.
  • LJGettinSexy
    LJGettinSexy Posts: 223 Member
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    I'm pretty sure you can edit it and just edit that amount. Yes more work for you, but it'd be accurate in your diary.

    I am aware of that function, because I have to use it constantly. The database is there so calorie counting is easy, not a nuisance of sitting at my PC with packaging in my hand, typing everything in. No-one benefits from the "1 pizza" measure, that's my point. It is inaccurate, and to my knowledge there exists no inaccurate-calorie-count-diet for people to use.

    Edit: Okay I have to revoke my assumption that MFP users rely on food scales- my apologies.

    Eating healthy and trying to lose weight while tracking your calories is very hard work. That might mean inputting the food items in the database the way YOU prefer. I do it all the time. If I want the best out of my free weight-loss website, I do what I must do to keep my logging as accurate as possible.
  • BeccaBollons
    BeccaBollons Posts: 652 Member
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    The calories on food packages are all estimates anyway, your pizza wasn't identical to the pizza they measured calories for.

    Also, you can't just upscale the calories of your pizza by weight to assume your pizza is the same. What if the difference in weight wasn't equal between the ingredients and was just down to your pizza receiving too much cheese :smile: :wink:

    Just deal with it :drinker:

    No such thing as too much cheese :angry:

    Yeh that's what I thought! I'm grumpy if my pizza looks like it doesn't have enough cheese- I feel like I'm being cheated out of a few calories that I'm possibly logging but not eating :laugh:

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