Question about food scale

TeamLeela
TeamLeela Posts: 3,302
edited September 22 in Food and Nutrition
So I have a digital food scale that I love, love, love. I just have a question about how to measure protein. For example, if you eat 3 ounces of chicken or 4 ounces of fish, do you measure it before or after its cooked? Does mfp numbers reflect the portion size raw? I just want to make sure that I have the most accurate numbers and that I can counting my calories correctly.

Thanks in advance.
Leela.

Replies

  • strongerthanb4
    strongerthanb4 Posts: 61
    i measure mine raw. i love my scale too! hope this helps:)
  • KimSchnizleinWECHANGED
    KimSchnizleinWECHANGED Posts: 189
    Well .. The inbred problem is that the answer might depend on how many you cook for. I cook only for myself ... So I measure about 4-5 ozs raw, and most of the time you'll lose an ounce or so in the cooking, but I also measure out what it is after cooking. That's the amount I'm actually consuming. My point is that if you're cooking an entire large meal for a family ... I would just take your portion from the platter and weigh out what you're eating after cooking. In the case of cooking just for one ... I just don't want leftovers so I weight it both before and after.
  • utes09
    utes09 Posts: 561 Member
    I've noticed that some inputs in MFP are for raw meat. So if you want search chicken breast, raw if you're eating chicken and you measure it raw.
  • jquintinjr
    jquintinjr Posts: 191
    after.

    say u have a burger raw. the sat fat is solid so it will remain in the burger

    once cooked the fat drips out onto the pan,grill, whathaveyou. thus decreasing the fat content and reducing overall caloric value.

    AFTER
  • deborahkidd
    deborahkidd Posts: 35 Member
    You measure after its cooked. We just had pork and I measured before and it was 8.30 but after it was 7.30 so definetely after.
  • ron2282
    ron2282 Posts: 2,760 Member
    I always measure before I cook.
  • azlady7
    azlady7 Posts: 471 Member
    after.

    say u have a burger raw. the sat fat is solid so it will remain in the burger

    once cooked the fat drips out onto the pan,grill, whathaveyou. thus decreasing the fat content and reducing overall caloric value.

    AFTER

    Thats how I have always thought of it
  • dognana
    dognana Posts: 10
    Great question which I need answered too. Where did you find a food scale you love so much? I need to get one of those so I'm not guessing. Keep up the good work!
  • jacksonalan
    jacksonalan Posts: 17
    I bought a good digital one at WalMart for $20. It will weigh in various formats and will also allow for the weight of the item you are laying the food on (the tare). It has a glass top that is easy cleanable and runs on battery... and shuts itself off automatically.
  • Lyadeia
    Lyadeia Posts: 4,603 Member
    I measure before so I can accurately follow the recipes that I added into MFP.

    I used the recipe function on this website and added all the ingredients to the list that I would use to make the recipe. For example, I added 6.67 ounces of raw lean beef to my lean cheeseburger recipe because that is exactly the right size for my recipe to give me the amount of calories that I prefer. When you cook meat, even though it gets smaller and weighs less, the calorie count of that piece of meat doesn't change as much as you would think. Sometimes it could actually increase because most of the time, people forget to add in the cooking oil calories, for example, when they count calories for the meal.

    I also find it easier to measure before, because if I have to wait until after I cook it to measure it, then chances are I cooked the wrong amount and either need to cook more or cut some off and give it to the cats...but as long as you measure before and use the count for raw instead of cooked on MFP, you will get an accurate account of what you are eating.
  • ruthcooper
    ruthcooper Posts: 22 Member
    OXO has the best one, even America's Test Kitchen says so. It has features none of the others have, like being able to separate the flat part of the scale from the visual part so if you have something large you can still see the weight. Has all the other bells and whistles also. I bought one on sale at Macy's the other w/ coupon at BBB. Stainless steel, very sleek looking.
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