Subject: Measuring food
Hello!
I like to be specific. How much does a cup of lettuce weigh? A cup of spinach? Green onion? Etc.
I ask because what one person considers a cup loosly packed could be another persons cup very compacted. It could be two lettuce leaves or six lettuce leaves. Another thing, when they say diced celery, depending on how you dice something (lg. or sm.) you can fit more or less in the cup. A tomato, a peach, or a bell pepper all vary in size so saying two tomatoes is one block is confusing.
Two roma tomatoes is much different than two brandywine tomatoes. By weight, no mater how it is compacted, cut, or grown it is the same weight. Where can I find a list of fruits and veggies with their nutritional values by weight (grams or ounces). The one good book I have found is listed as "one medium tomato", "one cup of spinach", or "five radishes".
Help please!
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Reply from toodlepip:
Hmmm I think you may be going overboard. Lettuce has negligible carbs so why worry about it? I make huge salads and never think twice about how many cups or carbs it is.
When you are eating healthy carbs like celery and strawberries etc I don't think it makes a blind bit of difference if there is an extra strawberry or a few extra chunks of celery.
As for tomatoes, peaches etc....if you are so concerned consider a medium size to be the norm...so if a recipe says two tomatoes are one block they are not talking about an extra large size of your head tomato.
However I really don't get hung up on the small stuff. The whole point for me is not to be manic about it all. To get a feel for what balances in terms of blocks and not worry about the carbs unless I'm having a piece of chocolate or something. Then I want to know exactly what I'm eating.
A good listing if you want more specific measurements is
http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/cgi-bin/nut_search.pl
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My reply back:
I completly understand what you are saying and kind of expected a responce like that, but I would still like to know. You haven't seen my salads!
If I make a 3 block salad and eat an apple (again...size does matter) that could really set me off by at least a whole block or more. When you add all of the little carb items together it can be overdone. I am sure everyone here has been doing this way longer than me, but I am pretty anal when it comes to measureing or weighing or anything mathmatical. (On the other hand my spelling could use some help!)
Anyways, I would really like a reference that compares cup or size to ounces or grams.
Thank you for your advice.
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That is the whole thread so far from The Zone forum so people don't have to go to it anymore. Thank you slimshady for your help!