Figuring out how to use the recipe maker

danaleejones7304

Hello fairy new here and trying to get the hang of how to use this app for recipes...so far it's tricky on figuring out the portions and calories in the recipe..

I copy and pasted a recipe from a site I use for chili in the recipes in my fitness.The recipe I am using and entered says serving of 4 and calories are 330 per serving but when I entered it along with the same serving number into my fitness app the calories per serving in my fitness app came up as 778 calories ...just wondering why it shows up higher then what recipe says ....sorry still learning this.
Trying to figure out a non complicated way to figure out calories per serving with recipes.
I'll get it one of these days 🤦‍♀️

And what a serving when it comes to chilie,stew,soups and casseroles a most other recipes be considered a cup ?

corinasue1143

It could be different brands, etc. The recipe may assume you’re using 93/7 ground beef, but MFP used 80/20. Check each individual food MFP listed to make sure you actually got what you intended, and that the calories are correct.
For what constitutes a serving. Do you weigh your foods? I weigh the empty pot I will be cooking in, then weigh the full pot after the food is cooked. I divide this by the number of servings I expect. Then I weigh my empty bowl and add enough food to equal one serving. Some people put the number of grams weight as the number of servings, then weigh their food, and list as many servings as grams they eat.
Good luck, and yes, it was hard for me at first, but I found the way that worked for me in a week or two. You will too.

BarbaraHelen2013

If you’re using the recipe builder to import recipes (as opposed to entering each ingredient yourself) there’s a stage in the process where it ‘matches ingredients’ - the results of the match are frequently insane! I quite enjoy seeing what it’s done for amusement value! 😂

Personally I ‘search for alternative’ on almost every line item, mainly so I can enter the brands I’m using and exact gram weight rather than the 1/2 can, large onion etc, for example. Doing this also weeds out the database entries that are just plain wrong, or the ingredients that have ‘matched’ incorrectly.

I’m one of those who will weigh the entire finished product and enter that exact gram weight as the number of servings. I then add ‘1g=1serving’ to the recipe title. When I want to log my portion I weigh it out in grams and enter it as that many servings.

AndreaTamira

BarbaraHelen2013 wrote: »

If you’re using the recipe builder to import recipes (as opposed to entering each ingredient yourself)

I’m one of those who will weigh the entire finished product and enter that exact gram weight as the number of servings. I then add ‘1g=1serving’ to the recipe title. When I want to log my portion I weigh it out in grams and enter it as that many servings.

That's a pretty cool way to do it. I, in contrast, am one of those people who says "recipe= x portions" and puts the food directly into x containers for easy reheating.

danaleejones7304

BarbaraHelen2013 wrote: »

If you’re using the recipe builder to import recipes (as opposed to entering each ingredient yourself) there’s a stage in the process where it ‘matches ingredients’ - the results of the match are frequently insane! I quite enjoy seeing what it’s done for amusement value! 😂

Personally I ‘search for alternative’ on almost every line item, mainly so I can enter the brands I’m using and exact gram weight rather than the 1/2 can, large onion etc, for example. Doing this also weeds out the database entries that are just plain wrong, or the ingredients that have ‘matched’ incorrectly.

I’m one of those who will weigh the entire finished product and enter that exact gram weight as the number of servings. I then add ‘1g=1serving’ to the recipe title. When I want to log my portion I weigh it out in grams and enter it as that many servings.

It sounds like maybe it makes life easier to add the ingredients your self rather than importing the recipes.

danaleejones7304

So far I'm finding figuring out portions and calories with recipes pretty confusing...I'm not so good with numbers.
I don't have a kitchen scale yet ...I should probably get one 😊.

AndreaTamira

danaleejones7304 wrote: »

So far I'm finding figuring out portions and calories with recipes pretty confusing...I'm not so good with numbers.
I don't have a kitchen scale yet ...I should probably get one 😊.

Yes, get a scale. I weigh a lot of stuff, but not lleverything(1 small mandarin gets logged as one small mandarin and not x grams of mandarin, for example), but if there ever is a plateau I know this will be the second thing to change after making sure my calorie goals actually are still up to date. Weighing stuff just is more accurate than any of the other ways of estimating how much food you are eating.

BarbaraHelen2013

danaleejones7304 wrote: »

BarbaraHelen2013 wrote: »

If you’re using the recipe builder to import recipes (as opposed to entering each ingredient yourself) there’s a stage in the process where it ‘matches ingredients’ - the results of the match are frequently insane! I quite enjoy seeing what it’s done for amusement value! 😂

Personally I ‘search for alternative’ on almost every line item, mainly so I can enter the brands I’m using and exact gram weight rather than the 1/2 can, large onion etc, for example. Doing this also weeds out the database entries that are just plain wrong, or the ingredients that have ‘matched’ incorrectly.

I’m one of those who will weigh the entire finished product and enter that exact gram weight as the number of servings. I then add ‘1g=1serving’ to the recipe title. When I want to log my portion I weigh it out in grams and enter it as that many servings.

It sounds like maybe it makes life easier to add the ingredients your self rather than importing the recipes.

Oh definitely - the only material advantage to importing over manually entering the ingredients is that you get the ability to access the method from the recipes webpage via the MFP recipe.

danaleejones7304

Thank you for the feedback everyone.
I don't why I find the figuring out servings and calories in recipes so mind boggling when in reality it's not that hard.
I did order a scale which even that seems tricky since I've never used one before and I just feel dyslexic When it comes to numbers and weighing but I'll get the hang of it eventually and I'm going to watch some YouTube videos on this which should help.