Logging Casseroles

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NancyLL24
NancyLL24 Posts: 3 Member
in Food and Nutrition
I am trying to tighten up my logging and be more precise about serving sizes. I cook from scratch quite a bit. One problem I run into is how to determine what a serving is for a casserole baked in a 9x13 pan.

For example, I made baked ziti for tonight's dinner and I logged the recipe at 12 servings. Other than eyeballing, how can I figure out an accurate measurement of my portion of tonight's dinner? I suppose if I had thought far enough ahead I could have weighed the whole thing before I put it in the pan, but at this point I can't do that without wrecking the dish. Thoughts?

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  • capaul42
    capaul42 Posts: 1,390 Member
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    I usually weigh the completed dish (minus pan weight) and log that as servings. Then I weigh my serving and enter that.

    Pan is 1500g
    Total is 2400g
    So I would log the recipe as 900 servings. And then if I have a 100g serving, I log 100 servings.
  • lightenup2016
    lightenup2016 Posts: 1,055 Member
    edited October 2016
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    For my shepherd's pie, I scored the whole thing with a knife on the top, so that I could see 10 similar-sized portions. That is close enough for me. I have also weighed the whole meal/dish and subtracted the weight of the dish itself, but that does take forethought. I figure I'll lose some water weight from the food at some point as well when cooked or reheated, so I don't know if that is any more accurate.
  • NancyLL24
    NancyLL24 Posts: 3 Member
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    I have usually just scored it and semi-eyeballed a serving in the past. It probably is close enough, I'm just trying to follow the mantra of weighing and measuring every food item as accurately as possible.

    Knowing what the pan weighs is a good idea going forward. If I save that number I can just subtract it from the final product. I guess that seems obvious now, but for some reason I didn't think of it. Thanks!
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,372 Member
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    Use the recipe tool, weigh dish empty, weigh after it's cooked, subtract the dish weight and enter that as the amount if servings.
  • PriceK01
    PriceK01 Posts: 834 Member
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    Yep, weigh the completed dish, then weigh your servings :)
  • kuroshii
    kuroshii Posts: 168 Member
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    Since there's just me eating it, I just take however many servings the recipe says it makes and "divide." If it's not exactly even I figure it comes out in the wash by the time I've eaten it all. ;)
  • Evamutt
    Evamutt Posts: 2,340 Member
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    I've only done this with soup so far. I measured how many 1& 1/2 cups(one servings) of water i put in, i guess that doesn't help. a few casserols i made i cut it into servings & put that in amt of servings after putting in all ingredients in recipes. I still don't get how to do it the other way
  • capaul42
    capaul42 Posts: 1,390 Member
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    dehleyg9ejn5.png

    As you can see, my spaghetti the other night came out to a final weight of 719grams (not counting the pot). So I logged it as 719 servings. When I plate it up, I weigh my portion, usually 100-150 grams depending on what I'm having with it. I would then add it to my diary as the weight I plated, that particular night I believe I had 145 grams as I had a salad with it.

    g11dx7to2qpz.png

  • dkginger
    dkginger Posts: 167 Member
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    Except you either didn't put ground beef in it or forgot to weigh it. Your ground beef entry is 0g but 1/2 cup for 0 calories.
  • Sherni823
    Sherni823 Posts: 14 Member
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    Weigh it.
  • capaul42
    capaul42 Posts: 1,390 Member
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    dkginger wrote: »
    Except you either didn't put ground beef in it or forgot to weigh it. Your ground beef entry is 0g but 1/2 cup for 0 calories.

    Because sometimes I add it and sometimes I don't. Instead of deleting it, I just 0 it out.
  • NinjaJinja
    NinjaJinja Posts: 147 Member
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    I would weigh every ingredient BEFORE cooking it, add that to the recipe calculator, and then divide it by however many servings, which I would determine by what's easiest to dip out of the pan - like 6th or 8ths. That way I'm a) not dealing with weighing the dish itself and b) not dealing with things weighing differently once they're cooked.

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