Weighing food- mac and cheese

babypunkprincess
babypunkprincess Posts: 109 Member
edited October 2016 in Food and Nutrition
OK so made kraft dinner mac and cheese (lol) and I followed the prepared "recipe". So it says the entire box is 225g. But when I weighed a portion which was less than Tha half it said 260g! Then I weighed the rest to put away and it said 306g.....wtf?

A whole box is supposed to be around 1000 calories but with the weight I've got its waaaaay over that.

EDIT- so I just looked up that pasta doubles it's size and weight after its cooked. Oops! So I way over ate then :neutral:

Replies

  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    Likely the box is referring to dry weights and yours is prepared.
  • babypunkprincess
    babypunkprincess Posts: 109 Member
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    Likely the box is referring to dry weights and yours is prepared.

    Dry mix and prepared is only a 30 calorie difference. I'm confused lol
  • cityruss
    cityruss Posts: 2,493 Member
    Prepare as directed. Eat the whole box.

    1000 calories.

    Accuracy.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    Ditto's to above - remember that water has no calories.

    Did you prep happen to have some water absorbed?

    I know it did.

    And since that is highly variable, they give dry weight pre-prep. (and more inaccurate volume measurement cooked usually - don't even bother with that).

    If you want some accuracy - weigh the bowl you are going to serve it from.

    Now when done cooking, weigh that bowl with all the food in it and subtract bowl so you know how much just the food weighs. Say 566g.
    Then weigh the amount you take. Say 260g.

    Yours 260 / 566 Total = 46% of box you ate.

    (use the box stats now, unless you weigh dry and it's very different total, I'm just using bogus figures as example)

    Total weight of dry product 255g / weight per serving 60g x 46% = 1.96 number of servings you ate to log.
    (255g / 60g =4.25 servings per box, they'd probably say "about 4" x 0.46 = 1.96)
    Doesn't matter if entry says by cups or by weight, you know how many servings to log, as long as correct product with facts right.

    Pretty simple with scale, just need total food weight after cooking, and your portion of it.
    Rest is math from nutrition label.

    This method applies to anything in which water can be absorbed (pastas) or burned off (think frozen skillet dishes or potatoes), meaning you start with dry or frozen weight.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    babypunkprincess wrote: »
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    Likely the box is referring to dry weights and yours is prepared.

    Dry mix and prepared is only a 30 calorie difference. I'm confused lol

    It weighs more if you prepare it (because of the added water and other ingredients). The calories stay the same (but for the ingredients with calories). If you weigh it after, you are OVERestimating calories in this case (or with any rice, pasta, etc.).

    If you are going to eat it all, just log half and then log the other half of the box when you eat the rest. In the future it's easiest to measure any dry noodles before they are prepared.
  • babypunkprincess
    babypunkprincess Posts: 109 Member
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    babypunkprincess wrote: »
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    Likely the box is referring to dry weights and yours is prepared.

    Dry mix and prepared is only a 30 calorie difference. I'm confused lol

    It weighs more if you prepare it (because of the added water and other ingredients). The calories stay the same (but for the ingredients with calories). If you weigh it after, you are OVERestimating calories in this case (or with any rice, pasta, etc.).

    If you are going to eat it all, just log half and then log the other half of the box when you eat the rest. In the future it's easiest to measure any dry noodles before they are prepared.

    Awesome thanks! Gives me a huge piece of mind. And now I know to weigh is raw
  • babypunkprincess
    babypunkprincess Posts: 109 Member
    heybales wrote: »
    Ditto's to above - remember that water has no calories.

    Did you prep happen to have some water absorbed?

    I know it did.

    And since that is highly variable, they give dry weight pre-prep. (and more inaccurate volume measurement cooked usually - don't even bother with that).

    If you want some accuracy - weigh the bowl you are going to serve it from.

    Now when done cooking, weigh that bowl with all the food in it and subtract bowl so you know how much just the food weighs. Say 566g.
    Then weigh the amount you take. Say 260g.

    Yours 260 / 566 Total = 46% of box you ate.

    (use the box stats now, unless you weigh dry and it's very different total, I'm just using bogus figures as example)

    Total weight of dry product 255g / weight per serving 60g x 46% = 1.96 number of servings you ate to log.
    (255g / 60g =4.25 servings per box, they'd probably say "about 4" x 0.46 = 1.96)
    Doesn't matter if entry says by cups or by weight, you know how many servings to log, as long as correct product with facts right.

    Pretty simple with scale, just need total food weight after cooking, and your portion of it.
    Rest is math from nutrition label.

    This method applies to anything in which water can be absorbed (pastas) or burned off (think frozen skillet dishes or potatoes), meaning you start with dry or frozen weight.

    Wow....lots of math and not my strong suit but Thanks so much! Makes me feel so much better. And I didn't even think about water absorbing but not having extra Calories! Thanks!!
  • jessiferrrb
    jessiferrrb Posts: 1,758 Member
    if you weigh the dry ingredients and they are accurate then you can just do it by portion sizes too. so if the whole box is 4 portions then you weigh the entire box prepared and divide that by 4.
  • malibu927
    malibu927 Posts: 17,562 Member
    As others have said, the weight is dry. It doesn't account for the water absorbed while the noodles cook, or the use of milk/butter.

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