Measuring food

JoshuaL86
JoshuaL86 Posts: 403 Member
in Food and Nutrition
Hey everyone! Tonight I had some penne pasta for dinner, and as I was weighing it I encountered a slight problem. I used a measuring cup and measured out two cups of pasta. I then weighed the pasta on my food scale, and it said the pasta was on 10 oz! It should have been 16. The pasta was cooked at the time ( I know it's better to weigh it dry, but I forgot to lol ). Which would be more accurate? The measuring cup or the scale?

Replies

  • wftiger
    wftiger Posts: 1,283 Member
    I always use the scale. I can shove an awful lot of cheese in 1/4 cup so I learned my lesson that it is 28grams for a serving of that.

    I only use the cups for liquid measures. All solids go on the scale.
  • ericgAU
    ericgAU Posts: 271
    The scales dont lie.
  • LAS_1980
    LAS_1980 Posts: 156
    Personally I would say the measuring cups!! You watch exactly how big they measure and if you see with your own eyes how much you're putting in them, then to me, that would be better. A scale can be off by a little or alot, whether it is digital or not. Just my opinion!! :)
  • dls06
    dls06 Posts: 6,774 Member
    After it's cooked a serving of pasta is 1 cup.
  • Nokarot
    Nokarot Posts: 15 Member
    Keep in mind that some pasta is more dense when stacked atop of itself than other pasta. For example, a cup of spaghetti has less air between noodles than a cup of penne would. As another example, if you cut down some trees and stack the logs on top of eachother, it'll weigh a lot. However, if you hollow out those logs, it'll weigh less and still take up the same amount of space. Penne is kinda shaped like a hollowed out log, in that sense.

    When it comes to pasta, accurate measurements are done via scale, not by measuring cups. Measuring cups were designed for liquids and powders.
  • karenjoy
    karenjoy Posts: 1,840 Member
    scale....in the UK we don't use the cups, and my son is a professional chef and he says that if its important to have your ingredients accurate then you have to weigh them.
  • hailzp
    hailzp Posts: 903 Member
    the scales without a doubt. A cup is too subjective in my opinion. I can shove more food in a cup but the scales may only be off by a gram or two.
  • 42kgirl
    42kgirl Posts: 692 Member
    The scale. After a while, you'll learn to eyeball it.
  • CherryPie606
    CherryPie606 Posts: 44 Member
    Digital food scale every time for me
  • CMB1979
    CMB1979 Posts: 588 Member
    Use a digital scale. They are designed for weight while measuring cups are designed for volume and are less accurate.
  • Elena1964
    Elena1964 Posts: 4
    Use the scale for weighing meats,poultry,seafood, fruits and vegetables. Use measuring cup for liquids, vegs, and some fruit. But if you really want to lose weight. Stay away from the wasted carbs that are in Pasta and Breads. Good luck
  • trud72
    trud72 Posts: 1,912 Member
    scale..
  • warmachinejt
    warmachinejt Posts: 2,162 Member
    scale all day everyday....and yea you're right about measuring dry
  • TourThePast
    TourThePast Posts: 1,753 Member
    Digital food scale.

    Cheap.

    Accurate.

    Simple to use.

    Don't get me started on how *cough* "not entirely smart" it is to rely on something as daft as volume to measure foods like pasta, which have entirely different densities depending on their differing shapes!

    Also, weigh pasta dry. How heavy it is when it's cooked depends on how much you cook it - pasta absorbs more water the longer you cook it, pasta cooked al dente pasta will have more calories per gram (and per given volume), than pasta that's boiled until it's all flobbledy dobbledy, but the calories in an amount of pasta weighed raw will remain constant however much you cook it.
  • mfp_1
    mfp_1 Posts: 516 Member
    Weight is more accurate. Cups are the devil's measure.
  • samb330
    samb330 Posts: 328 Member
    After it's cooked a serving of pasta is 1 cup.





    ^^this^^
  • TourThePast
    TourThePast Posts: 1,753 Member
    After it's cooked a serving of pasta is 1 cup.



    ^^this^^

    A statement which is as accurate and helpful as the idea of measuring irregularly shaped solids in terms of volume! :bigsmile:

    EDITED TO ADD: You may as well measure pasta by length!
  • amuhlou
    amuhlou Posts: 693 Member
    I personally prefer the scale and use whatever the package says a serving is in grams/ounces. That way i know im as close as possible to what the Calories are.

    To me, There's too much variation in measuring solids by anything but weight. I always wonder how tightly you're supposed to pack 1 cup of something to get what the manufacturers consider a serving. With things like pasta and rice, the Calorie difference can be huge.
  • EmRobo
    EmRobo Posts: 146 Member
    Digital food scale, in the UK we don't use cups, and our cups are different sizes :P

    Also I weight the pasta dry
  • Di3012
    Di3012 Posts: 2,247 Member
    Hey everyone! Tonight I had some penne pasta for dinner, and as I was weighing it I encountered a slight problem. I used a measuring cup and measured out two cups of pasta. I then weighed the pasta on my food scale, and it said the pasta was on 10 oz! It should have been 16. The pasta was cooked at the time ( I know it's better to weigh it dry, but I forgot to lol ). Which would be more accurate? The measuring cup or the scale?

    The scales are more accurate.
  • Di3012
    Di3012 Posts: 2,247 Member
    Personally I would say the measuring cups!! You watch exactly how big they measure and if you see with your own eyes how much you're putting in them, then to me, that would be better. A scale can be off by a little or alot, whether it is digital or not. Just my opinion!! :)

    The cup can be even further off.

    Somebody posted a video from YouTube regarding foods that are not measured and how far out cups can be, it was astonishing and the end results were the difference between a few hundred calories in some cases.

    Digital scales are rarely off, at all.
  • Di3012
    Di3012 Posts: 2,247 Member
    After it's cooked a serving of pasta is 1 cup.

    How much is a serving though, in weight I mean. You see, the difference in calories can be a lot if it is not measured accurately.
  • goron59
    goron59 Posts: 890 Member
    Ordinarily I'd say scale every time, but US cooking culture is so tightly bound to the use of volume measures (eg cups) for weight, that I might use that if I was there.

    Of course, if you actually want to find out truly how much you're eating, use the scale.

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