Weighing my food?

slepygrl

Hey Y'all!
Can someone tell me why I would weigh my food? I just don't get it.

Thanks!

CynthiaT60

To lose weight?

sfbaumgarten

To know how much you're eating.

psmd

Accuracy. Until I started weighing it I was really just guessing on serving sizes. Now I have a scale at home AND at work, and it bothers me to eat out and not be able to weigh.

Sometimes by weighing you'll realize you were eating more, sometimes less, than what you could/should have been.

Serah87

All the above.

OMGSugarOHNOS

in before weighing food is associated with eating disorders

SezxyStef

because when I log 100grams of chicken it means I ate 100g of chicken....not 78...not 143...100grams cause I weighed it.

diannethegeek

If you're seeing the results that you want then you can weigh or not weigh as you please.

If you're not seeing the results that you want then weighing your food can be a cheap and easy way to assess what might be going wrong.

Also, things like this: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1270280-food-weighing-scale-miracles

Elsie_Brownraisin

Same above. An eyeballed tablespoon was much, much more generous than 15g on the electronic scale.

ew_david

Because you'll be shocked to know how much 2 tbsp of peanut butter really is.

diannethegeek

Because you'll be shocked to know how much 2 tbsp of peanut butter really is.

Shocked and saddened.

PumpJockeyy

So many feels. Life changing day.

pinkshiningstar

Because you'll be shocked to know how much 2 tbsp of peanut butter really is.

Shocked and saddened.

True statements. :sad:

SteampunkSongbird

So true about the peanut butter! :-( But yeah, I weigh most things for accuracy, you'd be amazed how wrong packaging can be (I recently bought tinned new potatoes that were supposedly 325g when drained, I weighed them and they were just over the 400g mark!)

caseythirteen

Because a slice of bread is hardly ever what the serving suggests it will be. And because "1/2 cup" of ice cream is sad looking like peanut butter.

yayamom3

And because the amount listed on the product is often an estimate that is completely wrong. Anytime it lists something such as a certain number of pieces (29 pieces, for example), it is frequently inaccurate. If you weigh it you will often discover you are eating too many for the calories listed. I've contacted several companies about this inaccuracy. I usually get a response along the lines of, "Yes, we realize that. We're working on it." The plus side, they usually send me free samples and/or coupons:)

jlahorn

I see you posted this before and got a lot of responses like the ones already added here that must not have clicked for you. Let me try a different approach.


All numbers here are imaginary and rounded for the sake of simplicity, but you should get the picture.

========================

Say you have 1 measuring cup full of bite-size shredded wheat.
If you put it on a scale, the weight of the cereal (minus the weight of the cup) is 6 oz.
The calorie count of this imaginary cereal is 300 kcal.

---

Take the cup off the scale. Put the shredded wheat in a blender and chop finely. Pour the shredded wheat back into the cup. How full is the cup? Maybe 1/3 full, because the volume of cereal decreased when you chopped it.
The weight of the measuring cup plus the chopped cereal is still 6 oz.
The calorie count is still 300 kcal.

---

However, you now have 2/3 more room in the cup. So you fill it the rest of the way with whole pieces of shredded wheat.
The weight of the cereal in the measuring cup is now 10 oz.
The calorie count is now 500 kcal.
But you still have 1 cup of cereal.

========================

2 cups of cereal.
One weighs 6 oz. One weighs 10 oz.
One has 300kcal of food. One has 500 kcal of food. They both fit into the same 1-cup volume measurement.

That is why you weight instead of measure. There can be significant weight difference between the same volumes of food.

SteampunkSongbird

I see you posted this before and got a lot of responses like the ones already added here that must not have clicked for you. Let me try a different approach.


All numbers here are imaginary and rounded for the sake of simplicity, but you should get the picture.

========================

Say you have 1 measuring cup full of bite-size shredded wheat.
If you put it on a scale, the weight of the cereal (minus the weight of the cup) is 6 oz.
The calorie count of this imaginary cereal is 300 kcal.

---

Take the cup off the scale. Put the shredded wheat in a blender and chop finely. Pour the shredded wheat back into the cup. How full is the cup? Maybe 1/3 full, because the volume of cereal decreased when you chopped it.
The weight of the measuring cup plus the chopped cereal is still 6 oz.
The calorie count is still 300 kcal.

---

However, you now have 2/3 more room in the cup. So you fill it the rest of the way with whole pieces of shredded wheat.
The weight of the cereal in the measuring cup is now 10 oz.
The calorie count is now 500 kcal.
But you still have 1 cup of cereal.

========================

2 cups of cereal.
One weighs 6 oz. One weighs 10 oz.
One has 300kcal of food. One has 500 kcal of food. They both fit into the same 1-cup volume measurement.

That is why you weight instead of measure. There can be significant weight difference between the same volumes of food.

Great analogy!

kbmnurse

Can someone tell me why I would weigh my food? I just don't get it.

Really, you need an explanation?