Tracking Teaspoons/Tablespoons in Food Diary?

earm1511
earm1511 Posts: 1 Member
edited November 19 in Food and Nutrition
I'm new to MFP, just started yesterday. Last night I drizzled a half teaspoon of Pesto on some tomatoes and could not figure how to account for it in my diary. Serving size choices were in grams, ounces and pounds. How does one adjust?

Replies

  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,419 Member
    There are many conversion tools online.

    Or you can enter your own food into the database - I just use a converter.
  • Ready2Rock206
    Ready2Rock206 Posts: 9,487 Member
    Find a different entry that uses measuring spoons - or on your package where it says the serving size it should say teaspoons (or tablespoons or whatever) and then grams - so you'd use the gram entry and do the math.

    Remember - grams is always going to be the most accurate way to log, so if accuracy is something you're interested in, a food scale is a great investment. Put the plate of tomatoes on the scale - tare the scale - drizzle the pesto and log the weight.
  • sullus
    sullus Posts: 2,839 Member
    edited June 2017
    Put the tomatoes on a plate on a scale and hit the tare button. It should now be zero. Then drizzle your pesto, and note the reading in whatever units you're using.

    This is how I measure a lot of my food (esp things like salads):

    Plate, press tare.
    Ingredient #1 goes on, I take my reading, hit tare again.
    Ingredient #2 goes on .. Lather, rinse, repeat.

    If you don't have a scale that can do that, it would be a good investment.

    Also, a teaspoon is 1/6 fluid oz.

    Converting a teaspoon of olive oil to grams is around 4 - 4.5, but will vary based on the density of the olive oil.

    A digital scale with tare function will always be your best bet.
  • dfwesq
    dfwesq Posts: 592 Member
    I found a bunch of store-bought pestos in the database that are measured in tablespoons. You could use one of those. Or, you can do an online search to convert volume of common foods to weight. For example, search for <tablespoon of pesto in grams>. You should get a lot of answers.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    If you made the pesto, log the ingredients or make a recipe.

    If it's a specific brand, use that brand. Does it have teaspoon measurements? If not, you might need to convert it.
  • jaxonzhole
    jaxonzhole Posts: 14 Member
    Just found out that my flush tablespoon of peanut butter was more like 1 3/4 tablespoon. That is a LOT of extra calories. Now I way in grams....and I got another measuring spoon.
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