"Why should I use a food scale?"
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TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »What if I were to tell you that the weight of pasta does change?
Then I would look at you funny.
The only way in which the mass of an item can change is if you either add mass to it (eg water mass when you cook it) or remove mass from it.
I am looking forwards to hearing how the dry weight of pasta changes.
Manufacturers aim for a moisture content of 12% in dry pasta and the nutritional information is probably based on pasta with 12% moisture content. But it is legal to ship dry pasta with as much as 13% moisture content and I doubt a manufacturer would destroy a batch of pasta if the moisture content was 11% instead of the desired 12%. The humidity in the air is generally higher than 12%, so pasta that is exposed to air will tend to increase in moisture content over time, but in a dry climate it could decrease in moisture content.
Immaterial to the discussion at hand. We're talking horseshoes and hand grenades here - close enough. There will always be a margin of error in calorie counting. The difference in a serving size weighed vs measured was significant enough to have a material effect one's daily deficit. A 1% variation in moisture content of dry pasta is not, nor is it within our control to account for, unlike the method of measurement.13 -
jennypapage wrote: »Jthanmyfitnesspal wrote: »Pasta is a pain. You need to weigh it dry, but who cooks just one serving? I'm always eyeballing my serving once cooked and I suspect it's not very accurate.
that's easy to do. weigh the amount of servings you want to cook dry. let's say you cook for 4 people, so 4 servings. that would be 340gr. of dry pasta (85gr/serv.)After cooking, weigh the cooked pasta. Divide the weight by 4. That number is the weight per serving.
Pasta is like a science experiment in my house. 2 kids a serving each, a bulking bf who eats about 3 lol (bowls everywhere)
in that case you can do it this way. put a recipe in the recipe builder. one ingredient being the weight of uncooked pasta, and water and salt as 2nd and 3rd ingredient. Weigh the pasta after you cook it and that number will be the serving size (something weird like 1453 grams). When you eat, weigh as much as you want to eat (like 320grams) and that will be 320 servings basically.Then you don't have to worry about what the others will eat cause you make your own serving as big or as little as you want.4 -
TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »What if I were to tell you that the weight of pasta does change?
Then I would look at you funny.
The only way in which the mass of an item can change is if you either add mass to it (eg water mass when you cook it) or remove mass from it.
I am looking forwards to hearing how the dry weight of pasta changes.
Manufacturers aim for a moisture content of 12% in dry pasta and the nutritional information is probably based on pasta with 12% moisture content. But it is legal to ship dry pasta with as much as 13% moisture content and I doubt a manufacturer would destroy a batch of pasta if the moisture content was 11% instead of the desired 12%. The humidity in the air is generally higher than 12%, so pasta that is exposed to air will tend to increase in moisture content over time, but in a dry climate it could decrease in moisture content.
This is getting very esoteric and does not in any way illustrate how the cup measure would be better than the dry weight measure.
Have I at any point even suggested that a cup measure is better than measuring by weight? The whole thing about the changing weight of pasta came up because Wynterbourne declared with great confidence that 81 grams of pasta is 289 calories. We don't actually know that. Yeah, it is probably somewhere between 280 and 300 calories, but we don't actually know that it is exactly 289 calories. The argument against measuring cups usually goes along the lines of "Cups gives a different amount than a scale. The scale is accurate. Therefore, cups are inaccurate, so use a scale." But if the reason people shouldn't use cups is because they are inaccurate and we can show that a food scale also gives an inaccurate calorie count, doesn't that imply that the food scale shouldn't be used either? Or turn that around. If it is okay to use a food scale even though it is inaccurate, why are people so adamant that people shouldn't use cups?
P.S.: My preferred method of measuring pasta is the two hand method. I reach into the pasta container and grab a couple of small handfuls of pasta and throw it in the pot. It is somewhere around a single serving of pasta. Why dirty up a measuring cup if you don't have to?3 -
TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »What if I were to tell you that the weight of pasta does change?
Then I would look at you funny.
The only way in which the mass of an item can change is if you either add mass to it (eg water mass when you cook it) or remove mass from it.
I am looking forwards to hearing how the dry weight of pasta changes.
Manufacturers aim for a moisture content of 12% in dry pasta and the nutritional information is probably based on pasta with 12% moisture content. But it is legal to ship dry pasta with as much as 13% moisture content and I doubt a manufacturer would destroy a batch of pasta if the moisture content was 11% instead of the desired 12%. The humidity in the air is generally higher than 12%, so pasta that is exposed to air will tend to increase in moisture content over time, but in a dry climate it could decrease in moisture content.
This is getting very esoteric and does not in any way illustrate how the cup measure would be better than the dry weight measure.
Have I at any point even suggested that a cup measure is better than measuring by weight? The whole thing about the changing weight of pasta came up because Wynterbourne declared with great confidence that 81 grams of pasta is 289 calories. We don't actually know that. Yeah, it is probably somewhere between 280 and 300 calories, but we don't actually know that it is exactly 289 calories. The argument against measuring cups usually goes along the lines of "Cups gives a different amount than a scale. The scale is accurate. Therefore, cups are inaccurate, so use a scale." But if the reason people shouldn't use cups is because they are inaccurate and we can show that a food scale also gives an inaccurate calorie count, doesn't that imply that the food scale shouldn't be used either? Or turn that around. If it is okay to use a food scale even though it is inaccurate, why are people so adamant that people shouldn't use cups?
P.S.: My preferred method of measuring pasta is the two hand method. I reach into the pasta container and grab a couple of small handfuls of pasta and throw it in the pot. It is somewhere around a single serving of pasta. Why dirty up a measuring cup if you don't have to?
Is it your contention that all calories in all foods are unknowable in any way, shape, or form? Because I've gotta wonder why you bother being here then.
Go back and read about precision vs accuracy. Some of us need it. Some of us find a food scale essier than other methods. Why insist that it's so worthless?15 -
TimothyFish wrote: »P.S.: My preferred method of measuring pasta is the two hand method. I reach into the pasta container and grab a couple of small handfuls of pasta and throw it in the pot. It is somewhere around a single serving of pasta. Why dirty up a measuring cup if you don't have to?
So, I just ran off to the kitchen to try this three times. I thought that I was grabbing the same size every time with my relatively small girly hands, but my first bowl was 65 g. My second was 60 g. Third was 70 g. Cool is it works for you, but lol I'll just keep using my scale.
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TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »What if I were to tell you that the weight of pasta does change?
Then I would look at you funny.
The only way in which the mass of an item can change is if you either add mass to it (eg water mass when you cook it) or remove mass from it.
I am looking forwards to hearing how the dry weight of pasta changes.
Manufacturers aim for a moisture content of 12% in dry pasta and the nutritional information is probably based on pasta with 12% moisture content. But it is legal to ship dry pasta with as much as 13% moisture content and I doubt a manufacturer would destroy a batch of pasta if the moisture content was 11% instead of the desired 12%. The humidity in the air is generally higher than 12%, so pasta that is exposed to air will tend to increase in moisture content over time, but in a dry climate it could decrease in moisture content.
This is getting very esoteric and does not in any way illustrate how the cup measure would be better than the dry weight measure.
Have I at any point even suggested that a cup measure is better than measuring by weight? The whole thing about the changing weight of pasta came up because Wynterbourne declared with great confidence that 81 grams of pasta is 289 calories. We don't actually know that. Yeah, it is probably somewhere between 280 and 300 calories, but we don't actually know that it is exactly 289 calories. The argument against measuring cups usually goes along the lines of "Cups gives a different amount than a scale. The scale is accurate. Therefore, cups are inaccurate, so use a scale." But if the reason people shouldn't use cups is because they are inaccurate and we can show that a food scale also gives an inaccurate calorie count, doesn't that imply that the food scale shouldn't be used either? Or turn that around. If it is okay to use a food scale even though it is inaccurate, why are people so adamant that people shouldn't use cups?
P.S.: My preferred method of measuring pasta is the two hand method. I reach into the pasta container and grab a couple of small handfuls of pasta and throw it in the pot. It is somewhere around a single serving of pasta. Why dirty up a measuring cup if you don't have to?
Degrees of inaccuracy. Your '2 hand' method would be far too inaccurate for my taste, but apparently it suits you well so by all means continue measuring that way! No one is telling you not to.
I usually weigh dry things such as pasta in whatever bowl I'm going to serve them in after cooking. It's no bother and isn't dirtying up another dish. I hardly think scooping some dry pasta into a cup is 'dirtying' it, though. I find that preferable to reaching my hand into the box. Your staunch opposition of food scales is frankly baffling at this point.7 -
Let's not get overly pedantic here.
A scale is essential when you are starting out and when you are stalled but think you are eating to lose. If you are in a predictable rhythm in your eating and loss, it doesn't matter much if you used your hand or a dry cup for liquids.
I weigh things when I'm curious or following a recipe. So far my loss stalls were caused by salt, not under the radar over-consumption.4 -
It's not that the manufacturer's cup measurement is less accurate than their weight measurement, it's that it's unlikely individuals will pack the pasta into the cup the same way the manufacturer did
Less of a problem with small elbow macaroni, but a really big problem with large tube where the way the product is oriented in the cup dictates more or less airspace. Weighing eliminates that variability.4 -
Let's not get overly pedantic here.
A scale is essential when you are starting out and when you are stalled but think you are eating to lose. If you are in a predictable rhythm in your eating and loss, it doesn't matter much if you used your hand or a dry cup for liquids.
I weigh things when I'm curious or following a recipe. So far my loss stalls were caused by salt, not under the radar over-consumption.
So, the bolded part is exactly why I posted this in the weight loss section of the forum. It was actually inspired by seeing a bunch of discouraged and stalled posters.
For the italicized part, I just wanted to say for the love of all that is good in the world, please don't measure liquids in a dry cup if you're baking. I agree with the sentiment of your post, but I just wanted to add this in case someone heeds that advice and switches between cups when baking. Your results won't come out as intended.0 -
Let's not get overly pedantic here.
A scale is essential when you are starting out and when you are stalled but think you are eating to lose. If you are in a predictable rhythm in your eating and loss, it doesn't matter much if you used your hand or a dry cup for liquids.
I weigh things when I'm curious or following a recipe. So far my loss stalls were caused by salt, not under the radar over-consumption.
I weigh most things. I think I will continue to weigh most things throughout my weight loss and into maintenance. Any time I guess and then check, I'm off. I don't trust my hands or a dry cup. And I can easily see how I can be off 200-300 calories a day without the scale.
So you and I are different. In 6 months I don't have the rhythm you speak of. Maybe that isn't long enough, but who knows if I ever will. We each will need to find our sweet spot and work with it.2 -
yellingkimber wrote: »Let's not get overly pedantic here.
A scale is essential when you are starting out and when you are stalled but think you are eating to lose. If you are in a predictable rhythm in your eating and loss, it doesn't matter much if you used your hand or a dry cup for liquids.
I weigh things when I'm curious or following a recipe. So far my loss stalls were caused by salt, not under the radar over-consumption.
So, the bolded part is exactly why I posted this in the weight loss section of the forum. It was actually inspired by seeing a bunch of discouraged and stalled posters.
For the italicized part, I just wanted to say for the love of all that is good in the world, please don't measure liquids in a dry cup if you're baking. I agree with the sentiment of your post, but I just wanted to add this in case someone heeds that advice and switches between cups when baking. Your results won't come out as intended.
You original post was a great example for many people (who did not over-analyze it.) Thank you for helping the community.
@TimothyFish OMG - just stop already!
You are making a subject that should be simple such a cluster*kitten* 11 -
My mother-in-law can't understand why she is overweight when "I just have a little bowl of rice and some turkey" and "I only have a light breakfast, just a croissant heated up quickly in the microwave" (like the speed makes a difference!!) yet "I'd love a scrambled egg but its too fatty" (shall we compare the fat content of one egg and a croissant?? No, better not!.
Rice in particular, even simply boiled, is much higher in calories than pasta or potatoes of the same weight.
ETA A scale is also essential in maintenance, or that 30g portion of cereal is 45g before you know it, 100g pasta is 130g and so on.....3 -
Let's not get overly pedantic here.
A scale is essential when you are starting out and when you are stalled but think you are eating to lose. If you are in a predictable rhythm in your eating and loss, it doesn't matter much if you used your hand or a dry cup for liquids.
I weigh things when I'm curious or following a recipe. So far my loss stalls were caused by salt, not under the radar over-consumption.
Well, I've been regularly weighing my food for almost two decades now, even when I'm not logging. Why wouldn't I use a very simple tool that is easy to use, accurate, sits right there on my kitchen counter, and completely takes out any guesswork.
And It makes recipes easier to follow! I so wish recipes in the US used more weight measurements and less cups.
At most, I might have to throw one or two more bowls in the dishwasher if I'm not eating out of the dish I'm weighing in.
Anyway, it is much easier when to keep in a deficit when you have a lot of weight to lose. I don't. I generally maintain in my current range. Every winter i put on some weight (5-7 pounds) when I'm not logging and enjoying time with family and friends. Every spring I take it off, when I am logging. What doesn't change is my activity level or the fact that I weigh the food I prepare.
Edit: I'd also like to add that I find habits are easy to break, easy to maintain, but hard to create.
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TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »What if I were to tell you that the weight of pasta does change?
Then I would look at you funny.
The only way in which the mass of an item can change is if you either add mass to it (eg water mass when you cook it) or remove mass from it.
I am looking forwards to hearing how the dry weight of pasta changes.
Manufacturers aim for a moisture content of 12% in dry pasta and the nutritional information is probably based on pasta with 12% moisture content. But it is legal to ship dry pasta with as much as 13% moisture content and I doubt a manufacturer would destroy a batch of pasta if the moisture content was 11% instead of the desired 12%. The humidity in the air is generally higher than 12%, so pasta that is exposed to air will tend to increase in moisture content over time, but in a dry climate it could decrease in moisture content.
This is getting very esoteric and does not in any way illustrate how the cup measure would be better than the dry weight measure.
Have I at any point even suggested that a cup measure is better than measuring by weight? The whole thing about the changing weight of pasta came up because Wynterbourne declared with great confidence that 81 grams of pasta is 289 calories. We don't actually know that. Yeah, it is probably somewhere between 280 and 300 calories, but we don't actually know that it is exactly 289 calories. The argument against measuring cups usually goes along the lines of "Cups gives a different amount than a scale. The scale is accurate. Therefore, cups are inaccurate, so use a scale." But if the reason people shouldn't use cups is because they are inaccurate and we can show that a food scale also gives an inaccurate calorie count, doesn't that imply that the food scale shouldn't be used either? Or turn that around. If it is okay to use a food scale even though it is inaccurate, why are people so adamant that people shouldn't use cups?
P.S.: My preferred method of measuring pasta is the two hand method. I reach into the pasta container and grab a couple of small handfuls of pasta and throw it in the pot. It is somewhere around a single serving of pasta. Why dirty up a measuring cup if you don't have to?
Degrees of inaccuracy. Your '2 hand' method would be far too inaccurate for my taste, but apparently it suits you well so by all means continue measuring that way! No one is telling you not to.
I usually weigh dry things such as pasta in whatever bowl I'm going to serve them in after cooking. It's no bother and isn't dirtying up another dish. I hardly think scooping some dry pasta into a cup is 'dirtying' it, though. I find that preferable to reaching my hand into the box. Your staunch opposition of food scales is frankly baffling at this point.
I just think the discussion is all wrong. I couldn't care less whether people use measuring cups or use a scale. What I have an issue with is the holier-than-thou attitude that people seem to have about using a scale. I own a scale and I use it. I own measuring cups and I use those. I also have hands and eyes. Those work pretty good too. If people are going to claim that the scale will give them an accurate calorie count, but they can't demonstrate that it does give them an accurate calorie count then they're no better off than the person who is trusting that a measuring cup will give them an accurate calorie count. But I suspect they are worse off than the person who is using an inaccurate measuring device knowing that it won't provide an accurate calorie count.2 -
Usually the scale users aren't the ones claiming to eat 1200 exercise 4x/week and not "loosing" tho, to be fair. It's a demonstration of the degree of inaccuracy. Your argument is semantics. Everything works until it doesn't work and she's simply demonstrating the WHY10
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Usually the scale users aren't the ones claiming to eat 1200 exercise 4x/week and not "loosing" tho, to be fair. It's a demonstration of the degree of inaccuracy. Your argument is semantics. Everything works until it doesn't work and she's simply demonstrating the WHY
Exactly and I have seen that cup measuring and eyeballing doesn't work well for a lot of people...
me included...a scale does work well and is more accurate than cups and eyeballing for a lot of people...
If people aren't being as accurate as they can be chances are frustrations could set in...when things aren't going the way they are suppose to so I always wonder why people jump on those people who say her is why a scale is great/better than cups...5 -
TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »TimothyFish wrote: »What if I were to tell you that the weight of pasta does change?
Then I would look at you funny.
The only way in which the mass of an item can change is if you either add mass to it (eg water mass when you cook it) or remove mass from it.
I am looking forwards to hearing how the dry weight of pasta changes.
Manufacturers aim for a moisture content of 12% in dry pasta and the nutritional information is probably based on pasta with 12% moisture content. But it is legal to ship dry pasta with as much as 13% moisture content and I doubt a manufacturer would destroy a batch of pasta if the moisture content was 11% instead of the desired 12%. The humidity in the air is generally higher than 12%, so pasta that is exposed to air will tend to increase in moisture content over time, but in a dry climate it could decrease in moisture content.
This is getting very esoteric and does not in any way illustrate how the cup measure would be better than the dry weight measure.
Have I at any point even suggested that a cup measure is better than measuring by weight? The whole thing about the changing weight of pasta came up because Wynterbourne declared with great confidence that 81 grams of pasta is 289 calories. We don't actually know that. Yeah, it is probably somewhere between 280 and 300 calories, but we don't actually know that it is exactly 289 calories. The argument against measuring cups usually goes along the lines of "Cups gives a different amount than a scale. The scale is accurate. Therefore, cups are inaccurate, so use a scale." But if the reason people shouldn't use cups is because they are inaccurate and we can show that a food scale also gives an inaccurate calorie count, doesn't that imply that the food scale shouldn't be used either? Or turn that around. If it is okay to use a food scale even though it is inaccurate, why are people so adamant that people shouldn't use cups?
P.S.: My preferred method of measuring pasta is the two hand method. I reach into the pasta container and grab a couple of small handfuls of pasta and throw it in the pot. It is somewhere around a single serving of pasta. Why dirty up a measuring cup if you don't have to?
Degrees of inaccuracy. Your '2 hand' method would be far too inaccurate for my taste, but apparently it suits you well so by all means continue measuring that way! No one is telling you not to.
I usually weigh dry things such as pasta in whatever bowl I'm going to serve them in after cooking. It's no bother and isn't dirtying up another dish. I hardly think scooping some dry pasta into a cup is 'dirtying' it, though. I find that preferable to reaching my hand into the box. Your staunch opposition of food scales is frankly baffling at this point.
I just think the discussion is all wrong. I couldn't care less whether people use measuring cups or use a scale. What I have an issue with is the holier-than-thou attitude that people seem to have about using a scale. I own a scale and I use it. I own measuring cups and I use those. I also have hands and eyes. Those work pretty good too. If people are going to claim that the scale will give them an accurate calorie count, but they can't demonstrate that it does give them an accurate calorie count then they're no better off than the person who is trusting that a measuring cup will give them an accurate calorie count. But I suspect they are worse off than the person who is using an inaccurate measuring device knowing that it won't provide an accurate calorie count.
Read the original post again in the context of how it was offered. You're being pedantic just for the sake of argument. Majoring in the minors isn't helpful to anybody.
My n=1; I've occasionally used a food scale throughout my weight loss, but I eyeball a lot of things. My weight loss has proceeded pretty much as predicted (with the normal, expected fluctuations along the way), so what I'm doing is working and I don't mess with it. But if I was doing the exact same thing and not losing any weight over time (as many, many posters here on MFP seem to experience), my first thought would be that my calorie intake is too high and I'd start weighing everything to tighten it up. Because I understand that if I'm not losing weight, I'm taking in too many calories.
It's irresponsible to extrapolate your own n=1 into n=all.13 -
JaydedMiss wrote: »just had this with my bread, 40g is the 1 slice serving....every single slice in the pack weighed 65-68 g
I checked my bread a while ago. I weighed the entire loaf, then divided it by the number of slices. The calories per slice were only off by 4 after doing my calculations. Each individual slice was either a couple of grams over or a couple under the label so, since I live alone and will eventually eat the entire loaf I decided that I would use the label information.
Certain brands were way off so I stick to the ones I found were the most accurate (Orowheat/Brownberry)1 -
After all this back and forth, I still find the starches (inc pasta, rice, potato) to be tricky.
Often, I'm served some (or serve myself some) that I haven't cooked myself, and I'd like to come up with an estimate for the cals. I usually just imagine how much could fit in a cup and call that a serving.
Even at home, if we have pasta, how much is in a serving? Most tables list the cals per cup. I've so far fought the urge to jam as much cooked spaghetti into a cup as I can...4 -
what they need is those pasta water bag things like the boil in a bag rice... first world problems
Have you looked at the nutrition label on boil in a bag rice? It's like 4 bags in a box, but there are 'about 10' servings in a box or something. You pretty much have to weigh each bag before cooking if you want to be accurate too.
At least that was the case a year ago when I still used the stuff.0
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