Cooking and baking require measuring ingredients, and a scale is your key to accuracy and ease.

Many North American recipes (especially those from the US) use what is called volumetric measurement, where they use units of volume (ie. cups) to determine how much of an ingredient to add.

This may work fine for wet ingredients, but for dry ingredients it is problematic.

There’s a reason why there are so many Internet articles explaining how to measure flour, sugar, etc., with “cups”.

There are so many variables when it comes to how much stuff can fit in a “cup” that it is hard to actually get it right. Factors like density, scooping technique, and even your altitude and humidity will play a role.

If we asked 5 different people to measure ingredients using measuring cups we will get 5 different amounts. But, if we asked the same people to measure ingredients by weight, they would all come out the same.

Cooking by weight is always so much easier and consistent.

Why We Love Using a Scale

We find that using a scale is beneficial for so many ingredients:

• It doesn’t matter what shape or size an item – a diced carrot and a whole carrot will weigh the same
• Measuring sticky items like honey, molasses, or syrup is much less messy
• You can easily adjust the amount you want to make (dividing 50 g in half is easier that dividing 1/3 Cup in half)
• Most recipes outside of the US are already written using weight instead of volume

It took me a while to convert to cooking with a scale and now I can’t imagine going back to my stockpile of cups.

The following video is a great cooking segment with Dan Kohler from Renegade Kitchen explaining weight versus volume in when cooking.

 

This video comes from America’s Test Kitchen and discusses using a scale and reviews an array of scales.

To learn more about how to clear up measurement conversion confusion, visit this article.