Volume to Weight Conversions

[Edward J]

Here's a good thread.

Sometime around 1900, US publishers decided to drop weight based measurement while publishers in the Britain, France, Spain, Germany, Russia, Italy, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Egypt, India, Pakistan, South Africa, Greece, Japan, China, Korea, The Philippines, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and many more countries continued to publish weight-based recipes for home and professional use.

Eh... no. Not Canada at least. Take a look at any Canadian non-professional "Cook book", cooking magazine, or "recipie" printed on the back of a food item package, and everything is in volume--except chocolate which is in ounces or 28 gr squares. Butter is still measured in tablespoons or the metric equivilent, as is sticky, messy items like corn syrup, honey, peanut butter, etc.

A point to ponder though.... You buy your flour, sugar, salt, etc by weight, as you do your meat and most produce. Is it practical then, that any professional would do inventory or recipie costing based on volume while purchasing ingredients by weight?

[heidih]

I grew up weighing the ingredients for baked goods on a metric scale and at some point in my childhood was tasked with converting the recipes to volume in order to be able to share recipes with cooks w/o scales. Everything still tasted wonderful though maybe not everyone's product tasted the same. Perhaps the difference between home cooks who want a tasty result, and commercial bakers who need to put out a consistent product is where the weight/volume issue becomes significantly critical.

[MelissaH]

Many baking cookbook authors will tell you how *they* measure flour. I'll look at this, and then when I make a recipe from a cookbook the first time, I'll measure it their way into a bowl on my scale, and note how much that is in the recipe. After a few repetitions, or a few different recipes from the same book, it's usually possible to figure out how much a cup of flour weighs according to that particular cookbook. (Bonus: if you don't like what happens the first time, and it's something that seems related to the amount of flour, it's possible to add a little more or less and make adjustments that should carry through the rest of the cookbook if the author was consistent.

But anymore, I have enough baking books that if I'm buying a new one, it really needs to have mass measurements.

[lebowits]

The weight of the flour can vary depending on the humidity, how "packed" the flour is when scooped out, and probably several other variables. In general, I recall that I've always used 5 oz (142 grams) as my "standard" cup of flour.

[Shel_B]

Staff note: This post and responses to it have been moved from the How big is an onion? discussion, to maintain topic focus.

 

15 hours ago, ElsieD said:

  To bad our cookbooks seldom have weights.

I'm in total agreement.

 

Some yeas ago a woman named Alice Medrich had a business in Berkeley making exquisite chocolate desserts.  I believe she was something of a pioneer in producing high-quality chocolates. She published a cookbook (Cocolat: Extraordinary Chocolate Desserts) that I discovered a couple of years ago, and I purchased the book.  Not a single recipe included a weight of the ingredients.  I was so disappointed that I gave the book to a friend ... sheesh!

[ElsieD]

1 minute ago, Shel_B said:

I'm in total agreement.

 

Some yeas ago a woman named Alice Medrich had a business in Berkeley making exquisite chocolate desserts.  I believe she was something of a pioneer in producing high-quality chocolates. She published a cookbook (Cocolat: Extraordinary Chocolate Desserts) that I discovered a couple of years ago, and I purchased the book.  Not a single recipe included a weight of the ingredients.  I was so disappointed that I gave the book to a friend ... sheesh!

Hard to believe she herself doesn't use weights.  I find baking books even more annoying when they don't show weights.  It's it really that much trouble to show both measures?

[blue_dolphin]

6 minutes ago, ElsieD said:

It's it really that much trouble to show both measures?

 

I totally agree. US cookbook editors/publishers seem to have a phobia when it comes to weights.  Or they think all of us do. Metric weights in particular. 

I purchased the UK edition of Diana Henry's Roast Figs, Sugar Snow, the revised 20th anniversary edition that came out last year.  It lists weights for most ingredients in both grams/ml and ounces which I thought was very smart so the US editors wouldn't need to muck things up.  Oh, but they did!  The Amazon preview for the US hardcover edition shows that they went through and REMOVED all the metric measures, leaving just the ounces and cups.  From what I can tell, they left the Kindle version alone but what a bunch of boneheads. 

 

I know there are people who love their measuring cups and don't want to deal with a scale. I'm the opposite but it's not that hard to satisfy both styles and show both measures. 

I understand one format or the other might not be neatly rounded off but the recipes would still work fine. 

 

In the meantime, I'll continue to order any cookbooks by UK authors from UK bookshops so I don't risk getting the dumbed down version!

[Alex]

1 hour ago, blue_dolphin said:

or use a tape measure to get the circumference and calculate the diameter from that.

 

Heh. That's what I would do. But then, I was a math major when I started college. 

[AlaMoi]

I have metal stamped/ground measuring cups, , , for the sole purpose of loading them up and dumping the contents onto a (tared) scale . . .

 

I have my failings.  like:  how much onion for a beef stew . . . really?  like +/- 70% is gonna' make some kind of difference?

 

onion - and others - are a really good example.  just like salt - Morton's vs. Diamond vs. the kid with the umbrella . . .

the weight of some "volume" can vary by a significant amount.  finer grains/grinds make for higher density . . . .

the volume of rough chop to diced to fine diced to minced makes a really huge difference when weighed "after the slice/dicing"

 

so,,, I'm all for weights vs volume - but there are some details to be attended to . . . .

[haresfur]

3 hours ago, blue_dolphin said:

 

I totally agree. US cookbook editors/publishers seem to have a phobia when it comes to weights.  Or they think all of us do. Metric weights in particular. 

I purchased the UK edition of Diana Henry's Roast Figs, Sugar Snow, the revised 20th anniversary edition that came out last year.  It lists weights for most ingredients in both grams/ml and ounces which I thought was very smart so the US editors wouldn't need to muck things up.  Oh, but they did!  The Amazon preview for the US hardcover edition shows that they went through and REMOVED all the metric measures, leaving just the ounces and cups.  From what I can tell, they left the Kindle version alone but what a bunch of boneheads. 

 

I know there are people who love their measuring cups and don't want to deal with a scale. I'm the opposite but it's not that hard to satisfy both styles and show both measures. 

I understand one format or the other might not be neatly rounded off but the recipes would still work fine. 

 

In the meantime, I'll continue to order any cookbooks by UK authors from UK bookshops so I don't risk getting the dumbed down version!

 

That is crazy to take out the original measures. I'd go further and say the recipe writers should test the recipe using the volume measurements that they calculate rather than trusting some table of conversions. In particular, going to the US, I would want to be sure that the conversion is correct since a cup is not always a cup.

[haresfur]

9 minutes ago, rotuts said:

@haresfur

 

''''    it doesn't really matter that much.   '''

 

Q,E.D.

 

So his rant is really more of a troll.

 

If it was a chemistry lab, with someone who actually understands analytical chemistry, you would put in decimal places to show the required precision. The last decimal place would be uncertain. So 1.0 kg could be 1.1 kg or 9.9 kg and 1 kg is a wild-ass guess.

 

In this case, it is still easier to use weight, which negates his argument.

[weinoo]

What @rotuts said.  I think weights are important for pastry and baking; for other types of cooking (braises, stews, soups, etc.), not so much.

[FlashJack]

7 hours ago, Shel_B said:

I was so disappointed that I gave the book to a friend

I have friends like that. Then I have good friends.

[Katie Meadow]

9 hours ago, Shel_B said:

I'm in total agreement.

 

Some yeas ago a woman named Alice Medrich had a business in Berkeley making exquisite chocolate desserts.  I believe she was something of a pioneer in producing high-quality chocolates. She published a cookbook (Cocolat: Extraordinary Chocolate Desserts) that I discovered a couple of years ago, and I purchased the book.  Not a single recipe included a weight of the ingredients.  I was so disappointed that I gave the book to a friend ... sheesh!

That book by Alice Medrich came out a long time ago. I think more recently published books, especially baking books, are aware now that it's important to give weights along with quantities

[weinoo]

7 hours ago, Katie Meadow said:

That book by Alice Medrich came out a long time ago. I think more recently published books, especially baking books, are aware now that it's important to give weights along with quantities

 

Exactly.  I'm pretty sure there was a time, not too long ago, where scales were not readily available to most home cooks.  Probably a reason why most cook books, especially baking, described how to measure flour.  Now that a decent scale can be had for much less than the price of a cook book, showing weight equivalents has become much more prevalent.

[pastrygirl]

23 hours ago, Shel_B said:

(Cocolat: Extraordinary Chocolate Desserts) that I discovered a couple of years ago, and I purchased the book.  Not a single recipe included a weight of the ingredients.

 

That book was published in 1990.  Although professionals were certainly weighing their ingredients it was still rare to see weights in cookbooks for home use.  I think RLB's Cake Bible in 1988 was notable for having weights for everything. 

 

Ok now I feel super old 😂

[Shel_B]

1 hour ago, pastrygirl said:

 

That book was published in 1990.  Although professionals were certainly weighing their ingredients it was still rare to see weights in cookbooks for home use.  I think RLB's Cake Bible in 1988 was notable for having weights for everything. 

 

Ok now I feel super old 😂

I lived near Cocolat and was introduced to Medrich's work shortly after she opened her shop, in the mid-late '70s.  At one point I think she was offering classes, but in any case, I found myself in her kitchen with two or three others. Without getting into minutia and trivial details, she was weighing ingredients while showing us how to make her by then well known chocolate truffles.

 

Clearly Alice knew the importance of weighing ingredients (at least for her products) and I was stunned not to see weights in the book's recipes.  Was the decision hers? The publishers? Just blindly following convention at the time?  <shrug>

[IndyRob]

I haven't read every page of this thread to see if this has been mentioned before, but wolframalpha.com does conversions from volume to weight (or vice versa) - often with the option to select specific products.

 

For instance, if you type in '1 tsp salt', it will allow you to select among coarse sea salt, kosher salt, fine sea salt and kosher flakes (is just 'salt' table salt?  I don't know)

 

But sometimes with other products it gets down to specific brands.

[AlaMoi]

wow.  seldom have I seen more absurdity on the web....

using "1 tsp salt" the best it comes up with is 0.099 ounces per teaspoon.

everyone in Europe - where tsp is not so common... - has a scale that will measure 0.099 ounces

[IndyRob]

35 minutes ago, AlaMoi said:

wow.  seldom have I seen more absurdity on the web....

using "1 tsp salt" the best it comes up with is 0.099 ounces per teaspoon.

everyone in Europe - where tsp is not so common... - has a scale that will measure 0.099 ounces

 

Not sure what you're looking at.  When I do the search it says 6 grams per teaspoon (Edit: 0.2116 oz).  I just measured 1 tsp of table salt and it was 7 grams (on my scale that only measures to the nearest gram).

 

I measure salt by weight all the time (usually in greater quantities).

 

Edit: Do people in Europe measure in ounces? I think America is the last bastion of that antiquated measurement system.

Edited April 23 by IndyRob (log)

[AlaMoi]

inputting 1 tsp:

 

 

and that illustrates the issue.

[IndyRob]

16 minutes ago, AlaMoi said:

inputting 1 tsp:

 

 

and that illustrates the issue.

We are somehow passing in the night as I do not see that at all.

Physical properties

 

 

https://www.wolframalpha.com/input?i=1+tsp+salt

 

Edit: It appears we agree on the volumetric measure, but not on the density.

 

 

Edited April 23 by IndyRob
Clarification (log)

[AlaMoi]

well, "1+tsp+salt"

does not produce the same result as "1 tsp salt"

so . . . there is that . . .

[IndyRob]

1 hour ago, AlaMoi said:

well, "1+tsp+salt"

does not produce the same result as "1 tsp salt"

so . . . there is that . . .

 

In my browser it does.  The + is just what a space gets converted to in the URL.

[haresfur]

Well, according to google

1 US tsp = 4.9 ml

1 Imperial tsp = 5.9 ml

 

According to the ones in my drawer with tsp and ml marked, I think both from the US and Australia, but at this point I'm not always sure

1 tsp = 5 ml

 

According to what I pull up on google, 1 tsp fine salt or table salt is 5.7 g and 1 tsp unspecified salt is 6 g. My guess would be that these are 5 ml tsp, but that is just an assumption

 

Epicurious has a weight conversion chart that shows it is all over the place but unfortunately goes from g to volume, and I am more interested in the other direction since I will use weight if it is given and my brain doesn't want to do the work to calculate volume to weight.