Has anyone thought of weighing their empty plates for quicker and easier weighing of food?

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oahmed64
oahmed64 Posts: 1 Member
in Food and Nutrition
For those of us who don't actually prepare their own food, would it be easier to pre weigh and label plates so that when they food is served in them, the food could be weighed quickly by subtracting the weight of the plate instead of having to remove the food, tare, then weigh again?

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  • sytchequeen
    sytchequeen Posts: 526 Member
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    oahmed64 wrote: »
    For those of us who don't actually prepare their own food, would it be easier to pre weigh and label plates so that when they food is served in them, the food could be weighed quickly by subtracting the weight of the plate instead of having to remove the food, tare, then weigh again?

    If you're going to try that don't put the label on the bottom. Just saying ;)
  • emmies_123
    emmies_123 Posts: 513 Member
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    Fflpnari wrote: »
    I put my plate or bowl on the scale zero it, and zero it between each item. No math needed

    I do something similar to this. Have to use smaller plate/saucer to weigh the food as I cant see readout past dinner plate edge. So i have one plate that i put the food on, weigh in, transfer to regular plate, repeat for each item. Then just wipe the small plate clean afterwards
  • MikePTY
    MikePTY Posts: 3,814 Member
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    I do this. I got a good scale that has it's readout on the side so I can put a larger plate on it and still see the weight. I cook in bulk, so I usually make several servings of the same meal at once. Doing this allows me to understand how much of the prepared meal I am actually eating. It is also helpful with food I order from my local lunch place.
  • Lift_Run_Eat
    Lift_Run_Eat Posts: 986 Member
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    oahmed64 wrote: »
    For those of us who don't actually prepare their own food, would it be easier to pre weigh and label plates so that when they food is served in them, the food could be weighed quickly by subtracting the weight of the plate instead of having to remove the food, tare, then weigh again?

    Well, you could do this, but make sure each plate/bowl/etc you weigh and write on it. Each item, even though it looks the same, actually weighs different.

    I just find it easier to put my plate on the scale. Turn on (it zeros), put food on, tare, then next, then tare, etc.... Or weight separately then put in the meal prep dish I use. Trying to figure out math without something to write the weights on in my kitchen is too much work.
  • Lounmoun
    Lounmoun Posts: 8,426 Member
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    You could do that but I have also found plates or bowls from the same set do not weigh exactly the same so you might want to check that.
    Maybe just ask the person to not put your food on the plate for you so you can tare the scale after putting the dish on it and then add the food.
  • CarvedTones
    CarvedTones Posts: 2,340 Member
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    As others have mentioned, you can zero out (tare) the scale with the plate on and between items. There is a situation where I do another little trick with the zeroing and end up doing math. That's when I have a big pan or other container that blocks the readout. I can still slide my hand under and press the button to zero the scale. So I do that with the pan on and then take it off and see the weight as a negative number. I put it back on the scale, add the food, reach under and zero again, move it off and see the weight as a negative number. The difference between the tow is the weight of the food. This may or may not be necessary or work for your scale, but I have a pretty common one (the Amazon basics one).
  • nutmegoreo
    nutmegoreo Posts: 15,532 Member
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    Or just weigh the empty plate after you've eaten, if someone else dished it up. The only issue this brings up, is the accuracy of the items logged. If it's a casserole or some other multi-item food, you really don't know his much over each item is in there.
  • happytree923
    happytree923 Posts: 463 Member
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    Is there a reason you can't put the food on your own plate after someone else prepares it? Then just weigh plate, tare, weigh food. I have some tupperware containers that I wrote the tare weights on but that's just to see how many grams I have left of a batch recipe.
  • deannalfisher
    deannalfisher Posts: 5,600 Member
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    i have a note on my phone that has the common weights of the different dishes i use when i cook - so that way when i measure the finished product i have a quick reference of weight to subtract
  • puffbrat
    puffbrat Posts: 2,806 Member
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    I agree with the others in asking why you can't put the food on your plate yourself after it's prepared.

    For the situation you describe though, you can also just weigh the plate full of food, and then weigh the empty plate after you're done eating to get the same result.
  • CarvedTones
    CarvedTones Posts: 2,340 Member
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    crazyravr wrote: »
    Each and every day people look for another way to over complicate their life.

    I gotta have a hobby. ;)

    I have gotten sloppier since I am in maintenance, but I think one reason I made it is because I tried very hard not to be sloppy while I was losing. I do guesstimates of a lot of things these days and watch scale trends. that really would not have worked for me on the way down.
  • youngmomtaz
    youngmomtaz Posts: 1,075 Member
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    My dinner plates all weigh in at 499/500gm. So if I forget to tare them out it is easy to do the math in my head.
  • hikinggal11
    hikinggal11 Posts: 59 Member
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    COGypsy wrote: »
    emmies_123 wrote: »
    Fflpnari wrote: »
    I put my plate or bowl on the scale zero it, and zero it between each item. No math needed

    I do something similar to this. Have to use smaller plate/saucer to weigh the food as I cant see readout past dinner plate edge. So i have one plate that i put the food on, weigh in, transfer to regular plate, repeat for each item. Then just wipe the small plate clean afterwards

    You'll save yourself a BUNCH of dishes if you put an empty bowl on the scale and your dinner plate on top of that. Tare them both and start loading your plate. The height will let you see the readout and you'll only have to tare the scale between food items. No more need to dirty extra dishes just to weigh dinner!

  • hikinggal11
    hikinggal11 Posts: 59 Member
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    Simply genius!

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