If you’re cutting calories or just trying to establish how MUCH food your are consuming, weighing your food is a necessity. It’s hard to know what you are eating without feedback of a food log. The first week of just measuring my food and drink was extremely eye-opening. This was one of the first things I did. To do this you need some tools, the main three being a scale, a way to log your food, such as MyFitnessPal, and patience.
To measure your portions, it’s time to shop. My first food scale was a Sharper Image model and a random find at a Tuesday Morning store. I think it cost $20 around 10 years ago. The good news is you can find a huge selection now and almost every store that sells kitchen utensils will have them. I just ordered a new one about two weeks ago and settled on this one from Elekcity. I like this one because it is flat and gives me several units to choose from. When logging your food, you can use measurements such as Tsp/Tbsp/Cup, but whenever you can, use ounces or even better, grams. Grams will give you the most precision.
There are definitely some tools that will aid in your measuring, such as a small bowl. I chose some small stainless bowls (set of 6) because they’re super easy to store and clean with each use and extremely versatile. I also use one to hold my plates above the scale allowing me to read the screen of the scale. Be aware: a caveat of these scales is that the overall size is only about 6-8 inches square. You’ll also want some parchment paper or small foil to place on top of the scale when measuring smaller items like cheese or peppers.
Helpful Hint
If you’re measuring a small amount out of a big container, like pancake mix from a box, rather than dumping from the box into a bowl, try placing the box on the scale… tare/zero-out the scale… then pull from the box directly into your cooking container. The scale will show negative results and keep doing that until you reach the desired amount.
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