hacks that make weighing your food simple
Weighing your food is something that can seem completely overwhelming at first. Little did I know this handy little scale was way easier to use than using the measuring cups and spoons I was more familiar with. And it created WAY less dishes!
Using a food scale also ensures accuracy that spoons and cups just can’t do.
Despite all the reasons WHY you should use a food scale and weigh all your food, there are plenty of ways you can make weighing your food even easier. And if you’re more likely to actually weigh your food and be accurate, the more likely you will be sticking to your macros. And sticking to your macros will ENSURE your weight loss, GUARANTEED. Guaranteed without any gimmicks and without any money out of your pocket for diet plans or special supplies. It’s science.
hacks that make weighing your food simple
1. Weighing your food using the right app
You don’t need to use an app, and I know crazy people who do this without one (namely – my husband), it is absolutely worth the $3 to purchase the MyMacros+ app (available for both Apple and Android).
This app allows for absolute customization and accuracy where other apps do not have this ability. There is a learning curve on how to use the app. You will need to log the foods you regularly eat into the app which will take some time. Setting this up is so important because this is the only way you can ensure complete accuracy in your macros. Other apps (or even MM+) may list a food but the nutrition information may not be accurate. We don’t know either way because someone else entered that nutrition information. Or you may be mistaken and the food item is actually something different than what you think it is.
MyMacros+ app even allows you to create recipes for homemade meals and therefore calculate the nutrition facts from your own foods! If you don’t have the ability to do this, it becomes very easy to make these foods a “cheat”. This ultimately limits your ability to adhere to your macro numbers and achieve your goals. I’m sometimes surprised what I discover when I use the recipe function. Sometimes these items can actually be incorporated into my daily eating without needing to be a “cheat”, which makes me a lot happier and WAY less guilty.
2. Pre-logging food (and sometimes pre-weighing your food)
Completely done in advance
You can map out what you are going to eat for the day or even the week. You prep foods and weigh them, log them, and put them in your refrigerator in an organized manner. When it’s time to eat it’s already tracked in your app and you know that it’s meeting your nutritional guidelines for the day. The added bonus is no surprises at the end of the day whether you are “over” or “under” your target.
Partially done in advance
You can log the foods you plan on eating without weights so you have a reminder of what is on your personal menu for the day. When it comes time to eat, portion out and track the weight of the food item thats already under the right meal instead of searching for it. It is very simple to update the weights of the foods on the screen where you can see the meal.
You don’t need to do this type of logging the day before. I find it most convenient to do this while I’m prepping dinner, but before I sit down with my family and start serving and weighing my portions to limit my phone engagement at the table. This is a time I naturally want to be focused on my family and our time together and not fumbling through my phone to find food items to track.
Eating repeat meals
A HUGE bonus to the MM+ app is that you can copy and paste a meal from one day into the next! Whether you are eating the same meal for dinner two nights in a row, or having leftovers for your lunch, it will copy and paste all the foods and their weights into the next day for you to modify the weights (if needed). You can even select certain foods you want to copy and not others from that meal.
I have a routine of eating the same breakfast two days in a row because it makes preparation easier in the morning. Muscle memory from the day before (and even having some of the foods prepped or leftover from the day before), and using the copy function works great. It saves time and mental energy. We often rely on dinner leftovers for our lunches so this copy and paste function works great for those times as well.
3. Weighing your food using the negative weight technique
This makes things so much easier! One way I use this is when I make omelettes.
I grate cheese, cut up ham and scramble a bunch of eggs for all of our omelettes at once. When its time to pour my egg into the pan I place the bowl with the egg on the scale and “tare” it, making the weight zero. Then I pour my egg out into the pan and place the bowl back onto the scale. The negative weight is the amount of grams of egg I used in my omelette. Then with the cheese, I tare the plate with the ham and cheese, put the cheese on the omelette, and write down the negative weight. Repeat for the ham taring the weight back to zero. It’s so convenient and saves dishes.
I’ve also used this technique after weighing my chicken with bones, or my oranges with skin. After eating, I put my plate with the skins or bones on the scale, tare it, then discard the items I didn’t eat from the plate. The negative weight is the weight of the items that I can deduct from my previously logged weight of chicken or oranges to make it accurate. This works too if you serve yourself too much and you don’t end up eating it all.
oranges photo before and after
4. Weighing your food using the TARE function
The tare function on the scale “zeros” the weight of whatever item is on there, allowing you to add (or subtract) weight from that item. So for adding milk to my tea, or butter to my corn, just press TARE, make the weight zero, and then add the item and jot down the weight. Repeat as many times as necessary.
For the life of me I couldn’t figure out how to calculate the weight of pancakes when we made them. The tare function and a sticky note was key for this.
I keep a plate with a cloche (large pot lid) on top of my scale. As pancakes come off the griddle, I place them on the TARED plate and jot down their weight. Then I can serve these pancakes if needed. Every time a batch of pancakes comes off the griddle, I tare the plate with the pancakes on it, add more pancakes, and jot down their weight. Once I am done cooking pancakes, I total the weights and add them as the cooked weight to my recipe. Now when I sit down to have my pancakes I can have completely accurate nutrition information for that batch of pancakes.
5. Keep a note of the weights of certain pots and serving dishes
I have a sticky note on the inside of my cabinet door with the weights of certain pots and pyrex dishes. When you make a recipe on MM+, you need the before weight of your ingredients and the weight of the ingredients once they are cooked.
First, prep all your ingredients in the bowl on top of the scale, taring before each ingredient is added and logging their weights. Then put the meal in a pre-weighed baking dish and cook it up. Once it comes out of the oven, place a hot plate on the scale and tare it. Place the baking dish with the food in it on the scale. Pull out a calculator and subtract the weight of the dish from the weight on the scale. Lastly enter the final weight into the app and voila! You have the per gram nutritional information of your favorite recipe.
how to weigh your food: hacked!
I hope these tips and tricks make weighing your food less intimidating and much easier than you expected. Using a food scale is the only way to ensure complete accuracy and accountability with what you are eating. Knowing and applying these tips and tricks will make weighing your food easier. This can help you overcome any resistance you may have to counting macros and get you on the pathway to weight goal success.
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