I'm all for respecting cultural differences, but...

[EscargotChic]

I love the internet as a source of recipes, but when they give ingredients US-style it drives me nuts. I think the one currently in the oven will be fine with approximate amounts which is good because it called for a pint of cherry tomatoes and a quarter of a cup chopped onion.
Not wanting to disrespect lovely US Mumsnetters, but seriously, kitchen scales are an amazing invention!

I’m still using pound an ounces!

Rude.

It’s 4oz of butter.

No 😂 it's a really normal set of digital scales but my husband insists on putting the batteries in the wrong way inbetween uses so they don't 'drain'. I've never even bothered to find out if this is a thing.

It's enough of a barrier to stop me getting them out the bottom drawer 😂

I do also quite enjoy the scoop and dump of the cups. I feel like a pioneer woman.

Just get some cups.

The recipes that are half fo flour or whatever are the easiest to remember & the most flexible !!

Why do American recipes always call for chicken to be seasoned with about 5 different spices or spice mixes before being fried and then added to a completely different sauce? So many competing flavours!

Yes digital scales are wonderful

.

OMG is he this tight/anal in other things?? I could NOT be done with that!!

I have no idea if they drain or not, but as they're properly off when not in use (unlike tv etc in stand by) I really doubt it. But I don't GAF, a 2032 battery is cheap enough & lasts for ages. Just tell him not to be such a twat.

To mitigate this whole cups/grams/pints/litres thing (oh an American pint is smaller than an Imperial pint BTW) when I google for a recipe I always add UK at the end. It doesn't completely get rid of the American versions, but they are not top of the list.

Yes much better than the plastic ones with a specific dish on top & lots of squinting to see where the needle is... but as I said, I'd LOVE the space to have a really old set with weights!

I'm exactly the same. As I am usually in a rush I scroll past any recipe with cups etc until I find something with weights of any type.

He's actually not tight at all!! In fact, this is the first time I've ever thought about this particular idiosyncracy and I'm going to go and ask him why we don't also turn them round in the remote controls 😂😂

And you are really rude

I’ve not read every post, but from a scan through I don’t think anyone has mentioned the measuring tool I find most useful. I always call it a Tala measurer, as my mother did, but I think there are other brands. It’s a cone sitting on a flat base. The inside is marked with lines showing weights eg for rice, flour, sugar. It therefore measures by volume, but recognises that each dry ingredient has a different weight for its volume. It’s quick to grab and tip in the ingredient without having to weigh it.
I tend to use it more if I only have one or two things to measure eg if I want to put 50g rice to cook I’ll measure that, then use twice the volume of water. If I’m following a more detailed recipe I’ll use the scales.

I can’t believe this is still ongoing. If you have Alexa or Siri within shouting distance while you are baking, they will do the conversions for you. About half of the recipes I use are American measurements.

“Alexa, how many grams is in 3/4 of a cup of flour”

And even if you don’t have a smart speaker, just open your phone to google and go from there.

People really are becoming softer!!

Me. I bought a set because all the best vegan cake recipes are from the US for some reason!

I do. Have lots of American baking and cook books. It's really easy to do.

I don’t understand the logic of cups. I have got them because they have the ml equivalent on the handles for liquids but I don’t like using them for flour, butter etc, always scales for those.

I agree. I don't understand how a country so advanced in so many things still expects us to measure butter in tablespoons (yes I really did see that in an American recipe recently ) or broccoli in cups.

Foods don't necessarily have the same weight or density in a cup, depending on how big or small they are chopped or ground, or whether they are solid or liquid. Soft brown sugar is just one example of something that could be densely packed or very loose and the weight would be different, but it would still be a cup. Things like butter or peanut butter are a nightmare because there are always big gaps around the ingredients in the cup unless the stuff is so soft it's practically liquid, or you spend ages squishing it all down into the gaps and levelling it off, only to have to scrape it all out again. It's all a bit vague and sketchy. Just so unnecessary in the 21st century.

And they say 'heaping' tablespoons instead of heaped, which really annoys me.

Quarter of a cup is a definite amount; one onion isn't. It's really not a big deal to use measuring cups.

Maybe not but they still don’t make sense when such a thing as scales exist.

I do possess cup measures but they are a bit rubbish for everything except liquids.