The evil food scale battery

you couldn't replace the battery?

I've tried measuring on a non-digital scale in the past... it is much less accurate, but it's better than guesstimating if that's all you have until you can get a new battery.

My first kitchen scale died so when I got a second one I got one that ran off regular AA batteries, simply to avoid the hassle of having to get a special kind of battery each time.

I don't know if you're in the US, but amazon sells the batteries online for cheaper than my local stores. They have bulk packs too if your scale goes through them that fast.

My first kitchen scale died so when I got a second one I got one that ran off regular AA batteries, simply to avoid the hassle of having to get a special kind of battery each time.

I did this too - the cells needed for my previous scale were so expensive it was easier to get a new one that used 'normal' sized batteries.

Until you have a functional digital scale then using a mechanical one and/or measuring cups will be better than nothing but usually wont give accuracy to the nearest 1g. I have a set of old cast iron scales and the smallest weight is 0.5 oz (approx 14 g).

Why would an analogue scale be inaccurate as long as it's calibrated and tared? Use the analogue scale and don't worry about it!

From personal experience, because the digital scale gives you the exact number of grams... the analogue scale unless it's an industrial size one like at a butchers or grocers, each mark on the scale is like 10 or 25g - measuring exactly 5g of something is difficult. When it comes to things like salad dressings, mayonnaise and so on, which are high in fat and eaten in small serving, then a few grams here and there can make quite a big difference in terms of the number of calories... a digital scale will accurately measure these small amounts of foods much better than the kinds of analogue scales used in the home for baking etc.

Well, it depends on your eyes!

Digital scales are only accurate to a degree. All measuring equipment has an error range built in.

Analogue scales can be accurate if you practice with them. I've been using a tape measure at work for years and although the smallest subdivision is a millimeter, I can tell if something is half a mil, or a quarter.

This is all aside the intrinsic error of calorific values per gramme of foodstuff (whatever you may be measuring).

TL;DR: there's only a certain level of accuracy you'll ever achieve with measuring. It's built into all equipment and the calorie estimates of foodstuffs (Get down small enough and it's built into the nature of matter itself). Gotta learn to be ok with it!