Question about entering recipes.

venus_blue

Hello all! I'm new to the group and have a question about entering recipes into the database. I've been on MFP for a while and have mostly just used the nutritional data for the cooked versions of the ingredients in my recipes. Usually it's not a problem, but it does get frustrating searching for good matches for what I'm making because I rarely find the single ingredients cooked in the fats (or not!) that I commonly use. It is extra work now because I am no longer going by database recipes because I am trying to be more exact and am working on recipes for clients (I'm a private chef) who also are trying to track their intake. I want to make sure they get the most accurate counts I can offer! Today I'm working on converting/entering my favorite pot roast recipe and it would be so much easier if I could just enter the raw ingredients, the fats and other miscellanea. Will this give me an accurate count? Thoughts? Advice? What do you folks do in this situation?

CMoeDee

Unless it's something really common like a fried egg, I usually just use the raw ingredient totals. If I go over my daily numbers by a small margin I don't sweat it. Try it for a couple weeks, assess your metrics, and adjust if need be. Oh, and I like the phone app for adding ingredients - it's a little easier to navigate. Good luck!

venus_blue

Thanks. And yes, the app is much easier for doing recipes!

catylina71

I enter EVERY ingredient that goes into the pan or dish you are making. this will give you the MOST accurate count. like if the recipe calls for it to be cooked in olive oil. i measure out how much olive oil i am using. of course i have the app and recipe calculator up and running while i am cooking in the kitchen and just go over and type it in. so that is easier, but if you are not near computer while cooking, i would say write it down on a piece of paper so you can enter it later when you get to the computer. hope that helps. man, i wish i had someone doing the cooking and tracking for me...lol... lucky clients you have.

venus_blue

I enter EVERY ingredient that goes into the pan or dish you are making. this will give you the MOST accurate count. like if the recipe calls for it to be cooked in olive oil. i measure out how much olive oil i am using. of course i have the app and recipe calculator up and running while i am cooking in the kitchen and just go over and type it in. so that is easier, but if you are not near computer while cooking, i would say write it down on a piece of paper so you can enter it later when you get to the computer. hope that helps. man, i wish i had someone doing the cooking and tracking for me...lol... lucky clients you have.

Agreed! I am a little OCD about measuring and entering everything - every herb, spice and fleck of salt is weighed to the gram and entered. I love the app! So much easier to tweak there, since you can adjust quantities in the recipe without deleting and re-entering the ingredient) Most of my recipes are already written down (since I have to reproduce the same dish the same way every time) so entering them is pretty easy, thankfully.

I felt like I should have KNOWN if the counts would be different for the cooked vs uncooked ingredients, but the OCD kicked in and then it just kind of stuck.

I just make sure they know the basic nutrient info (calories and macros along with sodium). It's right on their weekly meal plan. Luckily I don't have to plan the meals for them, they pick from a list and I spend one day at each home cooking and portioning. Some days I wish I had someone to do that for me, too! Right now the clients I have who are trying to lose weight are using MFP so they can just search for the food I added to the database and log it themselves. So easy!