Portions, weights and measures confusion.
eisenbau
Posts: 4 Member
I'm getting more and more frustrated when I try and select previous entries of food into my diary from the database. What use are portion sizes like, 'a piece', 'one whole pie', 'a slice', 'a portion', 'a serving'? And while I understand a 'cup' is a known US measure, it is a measure of volume, not mass! So you cannot e.g. have a cup of apple pie, unless you have liquidised it first, which is unlikely! I have asked a couple of times if the website can be re-designed so that you choose between weight and volume. Then if you choose weight entry has to be a unit of weight, if you choose volume, likewise has to be a unit of volume! Easy. And NO selection possible of anything like piece or portion. Finally delete all existing entries using these ridiculous and meaningless measures which are clogging up the application and driving me to think more and more about a different app.
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Replies
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use the database entries that have a 100g option, or make your own entries.4
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You are missing the point. Why should I have to wade through rows of the garbage that has been entered to find something meaningful? Example, a slice of apple pie can be anything from 170 to 515 calories. How do I know the size of the 'slice'??? If I buy apple pie in a bakery and know its about 150 grammes, I should be able to quickly find an entry based on weight and not waste time scrolling down a meaningless list. And having the entries verified is just crazy! See example below (and by the way there are over 100 entries in the database using 'apple' and 'slice'......)
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You are missing the point. Why should I have to wade through rows of the garbage that has been entered to find something meaningful? Example, a slice of apple pie can be anything from 170 to 515 calories. How do I know the size of the 'slice'??? If I buy apple pie in a bakery and know its about 150 grammes, I should be able to quickly find an entry based on weight and not waste time scrolling down a meaningless list. And having the entries verified is just crazy! See example below
its a free website... you get what you pay for....6 -
Nothings free... adverts....
or you do pay...
It's not really much to ask given how smart the website is to make it more professional. If they can take the trouble to create all the cool reports e.g., then making a minor change to the food creation tool is very easy and make the whole site more attractive / easy to use and give it a far more professional look and feel.6 -
Nothings free... adverts.... or you do pay...
It's not really much to ask given how smart the website is to make it more professional. If they can take the trouble to create all the cool reports e.g., then making a minor change to the food creation tool is very easy and make the whole site more attractive / easy to use and give it a far more professional look and feel.
so tell them... posting on here wont help?3 -
I tried. Twice And they wouldn't change. I was hoping if more users raised the topic they might listen........ Or I might run a macro to create thousands of foods with serving descriptions like 'a smidge', 'a tadge', 'a bit', 'some', 'humongous', '10 billion atoms', 'greedy person size'., 'not that hungry portion' etc........ but I suspect that would just get my account cancelled...
Meanwhile I will now create my low calorie lunch of a small piece of a slice of a portion of steak, half a cup of whole large potatoes, some fluid ounces of salad, and a slice or portion of a bowl of some size of fruit. 8 -
Let's take your example - apple pie. Even if you could find a weight measure for one slice, how do you know the apple pie you're eating is the same as another apple pie with the same weight? The main reason for the calorie fluctuations has more to do with the ingredients than the size of the slice. Unless you know the exact ingredients in your local bakery's pie, you're never going to get an accurate calorie count. The most accurate way to get calorie counts is to go by the serving size on the package. A slice of bread is not a slice of bread, even if you know the exact weight. In my experience, all basic foods (fruits, vegetables, cuts of meat) all have weight options.3
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Typically, if you're more specific, you'll get better options - apple, raw instead of apple. Or type usda in your search.
For prepared foods, it's just a guess anyway... but you'll get better at it with time (buying a pie from a place that gives nutrition information, for example, will make it easier for you to compare your own slice with that one).
I agree that the database needs work but unfortunately, it's made by users... and people like sharing useless entries.0 -
Find one and stick to it. Might be wrong, but at least it is consistent. Just mho1
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Try adding "gram" or "grams" to your database search. Or "USDA". And even then (using your example), you don't know how that particular apple pie was made. Unless you made something yourself, with carefully measured ingredients from known correct database entries, it's always an estimate to some degree.
Don't count on the database being revised/corrected. There are probably hundreds of thousands of entries in it, no way MFP is going to sort through every one of them, do the research to verify their correctness and delete/edit the bogus ones. Do what you can with what you have - plenty of people have successfully lost a lot of weight using the existing database.5 -
Try adding "gram" or "grams" to your database search. Or "USDA". And even then (using your example), you don't know how that particular apple pie was made. Unless you made something yourself, with carefully measured ingredients from known correct database entries, it's always an estimate to some degree.
Don't count on the database being revised/corrected. There are probably hundreds of thousands of entries in it, no way MFP is going to sort through every one of them, do the research to verify their correctness and delete/edit the bogus ones. Do what you can with what you have - plenty of people have successfully lost a lot of weight using the existing database.
Plus, the last time they tried to do an overhaul of units in existing database entries (adding metric equivalents to U.S. entries and vice versa, i.e., adding milliters to fluid ounce, cup, tablespoon entries and grams to ounce entries) they screwed up a lot of entries, eliminated useful serving units from others, etc. They don't want to put the money into doing a competent job on the software end. Those reports you think are nifty have basically been in that form since before UA bought the site.5 -
I'm getting more and more frustrated when I try and select previous entries of food into my diary from the database. What use are portion sizes like, 'a piece', 'one whole pie', 'a slice', 'a portion', 'a serving'? And while I understand a 'cup' is a known US measure, it is a measure of volume, not mass! So you cannot e.g. have a cup of apple pie, unless you have liquidised it first, which is unlikely! I have asked a couple of times if the website can be re-designed so that you choose between weight and volume. Then if you choose weight entry has to be a unit of weight, if you choose volume, likewise has to be a unit of volume! Easy. And NO selection possible of anything like piece or portion. Finally delete all existing entries using these ridiculous and meaningless measures which are clogging up the application and driving me to think more and more about a different app.
Feel free.5 -
Look, I get your need to vent. Heck, I've cursed at some of those entries myself.
But unfortunately I doubt it's going to accomplish much. Overhauling the database would be a titanic job and having been here a year, it's clear that none of the suggestions users are posting (relating to the food database or others) are being listened to.
I just focus on building my regular food entries 'collection' and recipes. And for new foods that I probably won't eat again (not cooked myself), I google them first for a ball park idea of the calories (for example supermarket foods) and then find a similar entry in MFP.1 -
Get a different app. You are needlessly whining.1
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One of the major draws of MFP is the size of the database, which they created for "free" due to allowing users to make the entries. The drawback of that is not everyone wants to log exactly as you do, so they'll create entries that reflect how they prefer to log. And some users may not have the focus on accuracy that others do, creating additional issues.
I personally choose to just ignore the entries that don't work for me. Since most of us tend to eat the same foods regularly, it's really not that difficult to create a collection of "trusted" entries and learn how to search for the ones that work best for us.
But if you decide to leave MFP over it, that's okay too. Nobody is making you stay.3 -
The data base is huge but highly flawed. As stated, above, it takes some finesse to get it right. After about 1000 food entries you will feel comfortable weeding through the mistakes to get the right answers. And then you can check the important ones on external data sets.0
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Typically, if you're more specific, you'll get better options - apple, raw instead of apple. Or type usda in your search.
For prepared foods, it's just a guess anyway... but you'll get better at it with time (buying a pie from a place that gives nutrition information, for example, will make it easier for you to compare your own slice with that one).
I agree that the database needs work but unfortunately, it's made by users... and people like sharing useless entries.
WTF? Where have you been, woman?! Did I invoke you????
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Typically, if you're more specific, you'll get better options - apple, raw instead of apple. Or type usda in your search.
For prepared foods, it's just a guess anyway... but you'll get better at it with time (buying a pie from a place that gives nutrition information, for example, will make it easier for you to compare your own slice with that one).
I agree that the database needs work but unfortunately, it's made by users... and people like sharing useless entries.
WTF? Where have you been, woman?! Did I invoke you????
This is a zombie thread.0 -
quiksylver296 wrote: »Typically, if you're more specific, you'll get better options - apple, raw instead of apple. Or type usda in your search.
For prepared foods, it's just a guess anyway... but you'll get better at it with time (buying a pie from a place that gives nutrition information, for example, will make it easier for you to compare your own slice with that one).
I agree that the database needs work but unfortunately, it's made by users... and people like sharing useless entries.
WTF? Where have you been, woman?! Did I invoke you????
This is a zombie thread.
That apparently I revived. Which is bizarre since I only look at the Recent Discussions, so it must have glitched its way in there
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quiksylver296 wrote: »Typically, if you're more specific, you'll get better options - apple, raw instead of apple. Or type usda in your search.
For prepared foods, it's just a guess anyway... but you'll get better at it with time (buying a pie from a place that gives nutrition information, for example, will make it easier for you to compare your own slice with that one).
I agree that the database needs work but unfortunately, it's made by users... and people like sharing useless entries.
WTF? Where have you been, woman?! Did I invoke you????
This is a zombie thread.
That apparently I revived. Which is bizarre since I only look at the Recent Discussions, so it must have glitched its way in there
Actually the OP revived it with some comment to me that has since been removed.2 -
Ah OK, I thought I was hallucinating! (I think I remember the not so nice comment)0
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You are missing the point. Why should I have to wade through rows of the garbage that has been entered to find something meaningful? Example, a slice of apple pie can be anything from 170 to 515 calories. How do I know the size of the 'slice'??? If I buy apple pie in a bakery and know its about 150 grammes, I should be able to quickly find an entry based on weight and not waste time scrolling down a meaningless list. And having the entries verified is just crazy! See example below (and by the way there are over 100 entries in the database using 'apple' and 'slice'......)
Due to the cluttered, glitchy database, I would never pay for Premium.
"Pie, apple, prepared from recipe" sounds like an entry that MFP pulled from the USDA database, and when I look at it, the fact that it has both "piece" and weight options seems to confirm it.
Unfortunately, the green check marks in the MFP database are used for both user-created entries and admin-created entries that MFP pulled from the USDA database. To find admin entries for whole foods, I get the syntax from the USDA database and paste that into MFP.
The USDA changed the platform for their database in 2019 and it is unfortunately a little more difficult to use. I uncheck everything but SR Legacy - that seems to be what MFP used to pull in entries.
Note: any MFP entry that includes "USDA" was user entered.
For packaged foods, I verify the label against what I find in MFP. (Alas, you cannot just scan with your phone and assume what you get is correct.)
Since most of the entries I use either come from the USDA database or are recipes I enter myself, I make the MFP database work for me with tolerable aggravation.1 -
quiksylver296 wrote: »Typically, if you're more specific, you'll get better options - apple, raw instead of apple. Or type usda in your search.
For prepared foods, it's just a guess anyway... but you'll get better at it with time (buying a pie from a place that gives nutrition information, for example, will make it easier for you to compare your own slice with that one).
I agree that the database needs work but unfortunately, it's made by users... and people like sharing useless entries.
WTF? Where have you been, woman?! Did I invoke you????
This is a zombie thread.
Well, that's just mean! 0 -
or search using a brand name like "McDonald's Apple Pie" or "Costco Apple Pie". i notice there are more specific serving sizes that way usually - like these when i looked for Costco Apple Pie and Sara Lee Apple Pie:
Lattice Apple Pie
Costco, 125 grams or 4.4 oz, 430 calories
Apple Pie
Sara Lee, 0.125 (1/8) Pie (121g), 340 calories
drat - i only just noticed that this was a necro thread.
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