The benefits of weighing ingredients...

[tan319]

Wondering how many chefs out there use weight measuring out there vs volume measure on the savory side.

Iacopo Falai was featured in a very good Melissa Clark article where he discussed, as a pastry chef and a savory chef (much like a Michel Richard or Phillipe Conticini) he applied scaling ingredients as a consistancy issue.

As a pastry chef I'm in total agreement with him.

What do you think?

[Timh]

I had my staff weigh everything and put into portion containers for service. Consistency in portion costs as well as finished product. This isn't as uncommon as you might think.

[tan319]

That's good, interesting.

You look at a european cookbook for instance, any El Bulli book, everything is weighed out.

Thanks for the response!

[hathor]

Weighing is the most accurate method of portioning. I always use a scale and it's amazing how when I'm teaching, you can see the light bulb go off in people's heads when they see how consistent and easy it is to use a scale.

[broadway]

Wondering how many chefs out there use weight measuring out there vs volume measure on the savory side.

Iacopo Falai was featured in a very good Melissa Clark article where he discussed, as a pastry chef and a savory chef (much like a Michel Richard or Phillipe Conticini) he applied scaling ingredients  as a consistancy issue.

As a pastry chef I'm in total agreement with him.

What do you think?

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and then the recipe was listed using volumes ..........

[tan319]

Wondering how many chefs out there use weight measuring out there vs volume measure on the savory side.

Iacopo Falai was featured in a very good Melissa Clark article where he discussed, as a pastry chef and a savory chef (much like a Michel Richard or Phillipe Conticini) he applied scaling ingredients  as a consistancy issue.

As a pastry chef I'm in total agreement with him.

What do you think?

←

and then the recipe was listed using volumes ..........

←

Hmmmm...that must have frustrated him!

Have to admit I didn't notice but I think she usually does an adaptation in her test kitchen.

[Chris Amirault]

eGullet Society members have been keen on scales for a long while, dating back to the Kitchen Scale Manifesto.

[tan319]

Yes, this is focused more on the savory kitchen, where most measurements are going to be volume, except in more, well, I would expect people like Mason, Ong, Liebrandt, Keller et al, to be using metric, if anyone is reading from one of those, maybe they can input?

Food cost can be controlled if everything is consistent bang on.

oh, if your scale is digital and packs up on you ( breaks down) you can jump on gourmetsleuth.com and convert your grams into oz. or vice versa.

I had to employ it the other day

Edited October 22, 2008 by tan319 (log)

[chiantiglace]

Ted, I have probably worked, staged and trailed in around 35 kitchens across the country, the only person who had weights for savory menus was in a restaurant run and owned by a pastry chef.

Cooks are generally afraid of a scale, I have no idea why. Something about turning it on I guess. I have tried so hard to convert people. They keep telling me its faster to use a measuring cup yet they walk around the kitchen for a half an hour looking for one and the scales never move but a couple feet.

It may be a verryy long time before weighing becomes a dominate feature, maybe never.

[gfweb]

I think that it is a cultural thing. Savory cooks hate pastry cooking/baking because it is so much like a chem lab...weigh this weigh that..."no artistry/finesse".

If restaurants employed quality control programs like other industries do, there would be a quickly mandated conversion to careful measurement and outcomes monitoring and a lot of the status quo would change, I think.

Having said this, I hate to measure anything... :-)

[chiantiglace]

I think that it is a cultural thing.  Savory cooks hate pastry cooking/baking because it is so much like a chem lab...weigh this weigh that..."no artistry/finesse".

If restaurants employed quality control programs like other industries do, there would be a quickly mandated conversion to careful measurement and outcomes monitoring and a lot of the status quo would change, I think.

Having said this, I hate to measure anything...  :-)

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Oh yea, there is so much artistry and finesse in messing up a recipe because a recipe calls for cup up chopped pineapple or a teaspoon of orange peel? what?

I guess in an artists mind a gumbo is much more artistic than a composed pastry.

I am not picking on you gfweb, I know thats not your quote, I am picking on all those cooks who told me pastry is a science and cooking is an art. thats like saying dry walling is a science and roofing is an art. what?

My argument can go on all day with this one simple ignorant quote. What that person should say is "my cognitive ways limit my drive to be better".

[Kayakado]

I also think weighing makes a lot less mess and less dirty measuring equipment. I can use parchment and coffee filters to weigh out ingredients and not have anything to wash.

[tan319]

I'm borrowing the coffee filter idea, excellent!!!

If savory measure people would get bonus's raise more often, perhaps...

I get tired of people freaking out over food cost's ( not at me), it stresses the other side out so much, it's crap.

Yes, and there's always resistance from the throw in the measuring cups or bowl people, it's funny

I was asked about some IQF stuff I lock up and saw the recipe which also called for "a bag of berries...

tan319:" what's a bag of berries???"

cook: "y'know, a bag of blackberries"

tan319:" a bag of..blackberries...and?..."

cook:'???..."

Holy-sh-t...

[chiantiglace]

you know, from that company we always get them from, except this week because they ran out so we got them from another company.

Does this bag look bigger to you?

I don't know, does it matter?

Probably not, a bag is a bag is a bag.

[tan319]

you know, from that company we always get them from, except this week because they ran out so we got them from another company. 

Does this bag look bigger to you?

I don't know, does it matter?

Probably not, a bag is a bag is a bag.

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!!!

La Puta Vida indeed!