Portioning recipes?

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jdbrrw
jdbrrw Posts: 16 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Hey guys, I have a question.

So I bought a food scale around three weeks ago and have been using it to weigh everything. It's helped me a lot.
My question is about doing portion sizes for recipes.
I don't have a problem with weighing out the ingredients I'm using...but when I have the finished product, what's the best way to figure out how much my serving size is?
Say I'm cooking a meal that has four servings and I just want to eat one.
Should I just try and add up the weight of all the ingredients and then divide it by 4, and weigh out that much?
Is that even feasible? Or is there a better way?
What if the recipe has chopped meat or veggies in it...won't there be some portions with more meat/veggies than others?
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Replies

  • Laurend224
    Laurend224 Posts: 1,748 Member
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    I weigh the whole finished product (minus the dish), and divide the whole thing by the amount of servings in it. I make a lot of one pot meals and just make sure I get an even distribution of veggies/grains/beans in each serving.
  • jdbrrw
    jdbrrw Posts: 16 Member
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    I guess I just don't know how that would work with some stuff...like if I make a casserole or something that's kind of large and has a lot of servings, I'm not sure how I would weigh that on my scale.
    The measurements of my scale are about 7 1/2" L x 5 1/2" W
    Can a larger dish that extends over the sides of the scale quite a bit be accurately weighed on it?
    Sorry, I'm a bit new to all of this! Thanks for your help.
  • flabassmcgee
    flabassmcgee Posts: 659 Member
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    I weigh my dish before adding the ingredients, then weigh it afterward and subtract the total from the weight of the dish to get a total amount of ingredient weight. Then I'll divide it into the amount of portions it contains and use that number of grams or ounces when serving it.
  • VeryKatie
    VeryKatie Posts: 5,931 Member
    edited January 2015
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    You can weigh the whole thing after cooking and divide by the same number of servings you used to calculate it. You'd probably have to put a pan or plate on your scale, zero it, and then transfer it to that to weigh it. Or you could weigh it in it's cooking dish, then transfer it to left over containers and your plate and then weigh the cooking dish again and subtract it from the original. That gives you the weight of the food.

    Now, if you are going to eventually be eating the whole thing (over several days or weeks if it's frozen and not sharing much of it with other people), I think it's fine to eyeball it. It'll all even out in the end.
  • TimothyFish
    TimothyFish Posts: 4,925 Member
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    jdbrrw wrote: »
    I guess I just don't know how that would work with some stuff...like if I make a casserole or something that's kind of large and has a lot of servings, I'm not sure how I would weigh that on my scale.
    The measurements of my scale are about 7 1/2" L x 5 1/2" W
    Can a larger dish that extends over the sides of the scale quite a bit be accurately weighed on it?
    Sorry, I'm a bit new to all of this! Thanks for your help.

    As long as the dish doesn't touch anything else and it doesn't exceed the weight limits of the scale, there's nothing wrong with that. Of course, you need to zero out the scale with the empty dish sitting on it before you fill it with the casserole.
  • MrsSchimmy
    MrsSchimmy Posts: 255 Member
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    Honestly? I guesstimate.

    I've tried to do like the previous people suggested and it consumed WAY too much time and helped create an obsession down to the littlest gram.

    Now, if I have lasagna (for example), I know there are 12 servings in a large dish I make so I cut it into 12 pieces then eat one piece. I put it into my recipe maker at the beginning (still weight things going into it, just not the final product) and put that there is 12 servings. Log how much you eat.

    For soup-like things, I usually base servings on cups.
  • lemon629
    lemon629 Posts: 501 Member
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    Why is everyone weighing casseroles? Just weigh and measure all the ingredients in the recipe, then use My Fitness Pal's recipe function. If you end up eating three servings when you have the recipe set for four, just edit the recipe. Or enter 1.3 servings in your diary.
  • jgnatca
    jgnatca Posts: 14,464 Member
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    What MrsSchimmy does.
  • Laurend224
    Laurend224 Posts: 1,748 Member
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    lemon629 wrote: »
    Why is everyone weighing casseroles? Just weigh and measure all the ingredients in the recipe, then use My Fitness Pal's recipe function. If you end up eating three servings when you have the recipe set for four, just edit the recipe. Or enter 1.3 servings in your diary.


    I often cook in bulk, because I am feeding 5 people and I like leftovers. When I have a gigantic pot of rice and beans that serves 16 people, it's pretty hard to judge what one serving is without weighing it.
  • Sued0nim
    Sued0nim Posts: 17,456 Member
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    I weigh all the ingredients and log them in the recipe

    Then I weigh the whole cooked dish and divide it into 100g servings so I can take any quantity of it I want and just weigh it to get a more accurate calorie count
  • jdbrrw
    jdbrrw Posts: 16 Member
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    Laurend224 wrote: »
    lemon629 wrote: »
    Why is everyone weighing casseroles? Just weigh and measure all the ingredients in the recipe, then use My Fitness Pal's recipe function. If you end up eating three servings when you have the recipe set for four, just edit the recipe. Or enter 1.3 servings in your diary.


    I often cook in bulk, because I am feeding 5 people and I like leftovers. When I have a gigantic pot of rice and beans that serves 16 people, it's pretty hard to judge what one serving is without weighing it.

    ^same. I'm pretty busy and don't like to spend a huge amount of time cooking, so I try to cook a lot at once so it will tie us over for a few days.
  • obscuremusicreference
    obscuremusicreference Posts: 1,320 Member
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    lemon629 wrote: »
    Why is everyone weighing casseroles? Just weigh and measure all the ingredients in the recipe, then use My Fitness Pal's recipe function. If you end up eating three servings when you have the recipe set for four, just edit the recipe. Or enter 1.3 servings in your diary.

    I prefer the precision of weighing. I'm trying to tighten up my logging. Also, I don't cook for myself alone and it's hard to tell how much I will eat.
  • sgthaggard
    sgthaggard Posts: 581 Member
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    obscuremusicreference wrote: »
    1. Weigh your pan (make a list and tape it inside a cabinet door)
    2. Weigh/measure raw ingredients as they go in and then again when they're all together
    3. Input recipe and set it to 1-or-2-gram servings (you should end up with a recipe that makes several hundred servings)
    4. Spoon it onto your plate and input how many servings you had
    5. Enjoy your 82 servings of mashed potatoes, you magnificent being you
    That's what I do - every serving = one gram. :blush:

  • misschoppo
    misschoppo Posts: 463 Member
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    I do the 1g serving calculation too...weigh everything raw before creating the meal. Weigh the finished product and then enter the number or servings into the MFP recipe creator as the number of grams so if the finished meal weighs 2500g then I enter it as 2500 servings and can then have a portion of any size I like and just enter the number of grams of my serving as the portion size for logging.
  • lemon629
    lemon629 Posts: 501 Member
    edited January 2015
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    obscuremusicreference wrote: »
    lemon629 wrote: »
    Why is everyone weighing casseroles? Just weigh and measure all the ingredients in the recipe, then use My Fitness Pal's recipe function. If you end up eating three servings when you have the recipe set for four, just edit the recipe. Or enter 1.3 servings in your diary.

    I prefer the precision of weighing. I'm trying to tighten up my logging. Also, I don't cook for myself alone and it's hard to tell how much I will eat.

    You're still weighing. Do as others suggest and have one serving = one ounce or something like that. Then weigh each serving. No need to weigh the casserole dish separately, then with food, etc. However, if you want to take the time do it that way, go right ahead.

    You should know, though, that it doesn't matter how precise you are with weighing and measuring food. You will always be off by some amount unless you do a full chemical analysis of each food item you eat. A 100g potato, for example, doesn't always have the same calorie count as a different 100g potato would. The type of soil it was grown in, the weather while it was being grown, how long it has been stored and at what temperature, etc., all affect the calorie and nutrient count.
  • obscuremusicreference
    obscuremusicreference Posts: 1,320 Member
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    I do realize that a potato doesn't always equal a potato, but that's beyond my control and I am unsure whether one can eat a potato that they've frozen in liquid nitrogen and pounded into a fine dust.

    You're losing weight your way, I'm losing weight mine, just goes to show there isn't One True Way to get in that caloric deficit.
  • StaciMarie1974
    StaciMarie1974 Posts: 4,138 Member
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    Several ways you can do it.

    1. Find weight of entire meal. Divide by 100 to find out how many 100 gram portions there are. Say its 2500g / 100 = 25 servings. So enter recipe, enter as 25 servings and perhaps note that each serving = 100 grams. Then weigh what you eat. If its 225 grams, you're eating 2.25 servings.

    2. Find weight of entire meal. Divide by what you think is a reasonable # of portions. Maybe its 8. Say its 2500g/8 = 312.5g per serving. If you eat 225 grams, take 225 (your portion) and divide by a serving so 225/312.5 = .72 servings logged.

    #1 is a little easier as there is only one calculation needed.
    jdbrrw wrote: »
    Hey guys, I have a question.

    So I bought a food scale around three weeks ago and have been using it to weigh everything. It's helped me a lot.
    My question is about doing portion sizes for recipes.
    I don't have a problem with weighing out the ingredients I'm using...but when I have the finished product, what's the best way to figure out how much my serving size is?
    Say I'm cooking a meal that has four servings and I just want to eat one.
    Should I just try and add up the weight of all the ingredients and then divide it by 4, and weigh out that much?
    Is that even feasible? Or is there a better way?
    What if the recipe has chopped meat or veggies in it...won't there be some portions with more meat/veggies than others?

  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,372 Member
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    I do one serving = one gram of finished product as well. Much easier to keep track of.
  • ijsantos2005
    ijsantos2005 Posts: 306 Member
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    obscuremusicreference wrote: »
    1. Weigh your pan (make a list and tape it inside a cabinet door)
    2. Weigh/measure raw ingredients as they go in and then again when they're all together
    3. Input recipe and set it to 1-or-2-gram servings (you should end up with a recipe that makes several hundred servings)
    4. Spoon it onto your plate and input how many servings you had
    5. Enjoy your 82 servings of mashed potatoes, you magnificent being you

    Brilliant!

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