Recipes - portions - water evaporating

anemoneprose
anemoneprose Posts: 1,805 Member
in Recipes
How do you estimate portions when you cook something like a sauce or stew for a while? Obv can't just use the weight of the raw ingredients. I know things will differ depending on a million things, but what's a rough % minimum you might expect (for say cooking 4 cups of a sauce for 1 hour at med-low heat)? Like 5% reduction, maybe, could be expected?

Replies

  • musenchild
    musenchild Posts: 182 Member
    Too much math!

    Weigh the finished product, then enter your recipe servings based on weight.

    For instance, I made bread yesterday; the recipe made 1440g of bread; I entered my recipe as 14.4 servings. Now each "serving" is 100g, so when I slice off some bread, I just weigh it to log.

    Same with any other recipe. Weigh or measure after it's cooked.
  • Sunitagt
    Sunitagt Posts: 486 Member
    I stick with weighing the raw ingredients since pretty much all your losing is water. I don't see the point of worrying that much about water. When I get the finished meal, I divide it up into '8 servings' then I would measure if I need to, but I can usually just eat '1 serving' however much that may be, as long as they're roughly equal and move on.
  • anemoneprose
    anemoneprose Posts: 1,805 Member
    Thanks ladies :)

    The problem doing it after is, it's impossible to tell how many servings there are when people just take any old amount (lol, like regular people). Then I have to estimate what's left & / out the calories. I should get in there quicker!

    For raw ingredients - sure, it's just water that goes, but what's left for a given weight is denser cal-wise. Ach, honestly they're all estimates anyway, can't make that much of a difference, *really*. Tore me up a bit yesterday, haha
  • musenchild
    musenchild Posts: 182 Member
    Thanks ladies :)

    The problem doing it after is, it's impossible to tell how many servings there are when people just take any old amount (lol, like regular people). Then I have to estimate what's left & / out the calories. I should get in there quicker!

    For raw ingredients - sure, it's just water that goes, but what's left for a given weight is denser cal-wise. Ach, honestly they're all estimates anyway, can't make that much of a difference, *really*. Tore me up a bit yesterday, haha

    I know what you mean! I will often weigh the pan I'm cooking in before starting. Then as soon as it's finished, I weigh the whole thing again and subtract the weight of the pan. Then SO can dish straight out of the pot with a spoon, and I'm the only one who needs to weigh my portion.
  • cavia
    cavia Posts: 457 Member
    I measure out the finished product one cup at a time into a secondary pot. 5 cups=5 servings etc.

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