Food Scale question

MGreensides
MGreensides Posts: 173 Member
in Food and Nutrition
I'm new to weighing my own food, should i weigh my food before or after it's cooked?

Replies

  • Laurelthequeen
    Laurelthequeen Posts: 78
    You can do either. Realistically, weighing before it's cooked is probably more accurate due to widely varying amounts of water in cooked food.
  • briabner
    briabner Posts: 427 Member
    I always weigh before and I weigh everything now. I noticed that I would always try to cram in extra food if I used measuring cups/measuring spoons.
  • Citrislazer
    Citrislazer Posts: 312 Member
    I always weigh before I cook. It's usually better to over estimate your calories a bit than to under estimate. Also for something like steak, I weigh twice. Once before I cook it, and then I weigh any left over gristle. I subtract the left overs from the original weight. Also a good digital food scale is worth the investment. I use my digital one all the time compared to my old one. The old one wasn't as accurate and discouraging to use.

    Ditto on what briabner mentioned. I used to always cram more food into measure cups too.
  • MGreensides
    MGreensides Posts: 173 Member
    Thanks! So funny about the measuring cups...I TOTALLY do this lol. And the scale I bought seems to be quite technical. It's digital and has 999 foods pre programmed so its able to calculate calories and macro's. Just trial and error for me to figure it out now lol.
  • Bekahmardis
    Bekahmardis Posts: 602 Member
    I have a basic digital kitchen scale that does grams, ounces, pounds, and kilograms. I put a small bowl on the scale, then turn it on, put the food in BEFORE it's cooked and weigh it all that way.

    If there appears to be a discrepency in calories for that particular food, I take an average of at least 3 different numbers and use that.
  • MGreensides
    MGreensides Posts: 173 Member
    Ok and another question about the scale. Say for example I weigh half a banana and it tells me its 59 calories but the database says 50cals for half a banana. Do I just quick add 9 calories? I guess I'm asking how to log food when using a scale. Sorry for being such a pesky newb lol
  • haroon_awan
    haroon_awan Posts: 1,208 Member
    Preferably before as things like chicken and rice tend to differ in post cooked weight depending on the amount of water used/absorbed.
  • Laurelthequeen
    Laurelthequeen Posts: 78
    Use one source for your food data. That would either be the scale or mfp. I just use a normal food scale that doesn't have food preprogrammed in. Take your grams and enter into MFP.

Categories