Weigh Meats Before or After Cooking?

knra_grl

Okay so I am making a spicy pasta sauce which is basically my meat sause with hot italian sausage added. So I remove the sausage meat from the casing and pre-cook it so I can get rid of as much of the fat as I can. So the package is 500 g and I was going to use about half so I started weighing it and the entire pkg after cooking was 271 g. I did the same thing with my "lean ground beef" and the package weight was 650 g and after browning and draining the fat it was 434 g.

So what weight measure would you use? The before or after? I drained the fat and put the meat(s) on a paper towel while I was chopping the other ingredients so there is very little fat left.

Makoce

I always weigh my meats after I cook and drain them, but I was never sure 100%...so lets see what others said.

Ctrum69

THe after.

THis is going to throw off your tracker, minimally, because unless it's specifically saying "lean beef, cooked and drained" it's figuring it for the fat content of the raw, packaged beef.

But any anomaly is going to be within margin of error.

(IE: every apple you eat is not whatever it says for "one apple" and every egg is not exactly 70 calories, etc etc and so forth).

So measure it after cooking, and don't sweat the small stuff.

Iron_Feline

It doesn't make much difference as long as you select the correct raw or cooked item in the database.

There is always going to be some margin for error esp as you drained the fat as neither will take that into account.

Personally I do it before and use the raw entry. That way odds are it's slightly over in calories which can only be to my benefit.

Guinivere

Deffo cooked weight in the same way you weigh meat you buy that is already cooked or eaten raw. Like ham, or chicken slices for salads or sandwiches.

knra_grl

Thx :flowerforyou:

AHack3

I don't weigh my food. I measure. I measure after I cook it for whatever a serving if it says 4 oz. I go with 1/2 cup, if it says 3oz I go with 1/3 of a cup. I don't know how accurate that is but I've been doing it that way for years and I lost weight entering the calories that way.

SezxyStef

I can't weight the meat prior to cooking as I cook for myself and my family.

but that being said I always weigh after cooking and choose the correct entry.

FindingMyPerfection

I weigh before and figure the amount of servings then weigh after and decide by number of servings. This is also how I do rice and pasta.