Food weights - watch out!

[GeorgeA12]

Given everything that is going on with the cost of living I thought i would weigh my food to check what is stated on the pack is what you are getting. So far Ive weighed two items:

Galloway block of cheese states 350g actual weight is 340g
Lurpak butter states 250g but i weighed it including the tub and it came to only 240g! I reckon the tub is probably 15-20grams.

I know that they are allowed to do some sort of averaging out as they can never get it exact but i reckon it will be hard to find any products above the weight stated on the packet for their food. Putting this post on to help raise awareness of this potential issue and to see if someone can prove me wrong and find some food in the packaging that is above the weight stated!

I was surprised when I opened the 1KG tub of Clover and it wasn't full. It was printed on the outside it was now 900g, but they clearly still had the KG tubs to use up!!
I di weight that and it was correct to 900g but sneaky packing it in the old tubs.

I hadn't noticed things not being what they say. Broccoli is annoying at the moment, as 2 small heads are being packed as one, so thats a lot more stalk than top in the weight you are paying for.

Lot's of cat food is in the same boxes but the pouches are now 85g instead of 100g without specifying they have changed on the box.

Yes that is very sneaky practice to use the larger tubs for less butter. I didnt much think about the double broccoli heads but come to think of it now, yes you are probably right. Ive been noticing for a long time that the broccoli stalks seem to be growing :-)!

I also noticed that M & S ginger nuts were tiny. I think there should be a law that they have to put what they have done on the packaging for three months instead of all this sneakiness.

I did complain about the cheese tubs, many of them have a large indentation at the bottom of the tub to make you think like you are getting more, but apparently it is required as part of the process for sterilising the cheese, or so they said!

FYI Broccoli stalks are delicious. Use in stir fries and soups all the time. Don’t ever throw away

Oh we eat a fair way down the stalk, and I cut the rough outer off the lower stalk and sliced thin was great in minestrone, but it's not really the point I meant, it's cheating the consumer when most people won't eat it, or know you can.

If there’s an e next to the weight then it’s an estimation. It can be over or under by a certain percentage depending on overall weight.

This article explains it E next to weight

More likely to be under though these days!

What are you weighing them with? I'd bet more money on your scales being out.

Electronic scales. Looks fine to me.

Your scales will be out.

Yes I know about the E being the average. Thats fair enough. Im betting that no one can find a popular product where it weighs more than the stated weight though! If the manufacturers are following this then you should find some if the weights on the packaging is an average.

I think they're allowed to be within 10% tolerance

So the tub of lurpak, as long as it was at least 225g, then its allowed

I think

Yes but the 'E' on the pack means an average so you would also expect some foods to be heavier and some lighter in the packet to get that average. My challenge is can you find any foods where the food weight is higher than stated on the packaging to prove this?

Bags of cashew nuts are the same. Some way way under, like not even close numbers to the packer. I only found out when I weighed them into portions. I did one packet twice just to check my scales.

ages ago I was making a cake that needed 200g of chocolate. I had a 200g bar of chocolate from Aldi. Weighed it and it was just over 180g.

since then weighed it every time and is 180g. Packaging states 200g.

my scales aren’t out!

it depends on the food weight. The tolerances are below

Amount (g or ml) between Accepted margin
5 50 9%
50 100 4-5 g
100 200 4-5 %
200 300 9 g
300 500 3 %
500 1000 15 g
1000 10000 1-5 %

So my 250g tub of LurPak should be no less than 227.5g excluding the tub. I think my tub must be just about bang on or less than this as it was 240g with the tub. So you would expect some tubs to be more than 250g to balance out this average. But how would we ever find this out unless we all got together and weighed our tubs, and know whether the manufacturer is always supplying less or not, we just assume they are doing this correctly.

Exactly! It looks like your chocolate bars are at the complete minimum tolerance of 182g according to the table. So you would think you would eventually get one that was more than 200g.

My worry is manufacturers are using these tolerances to provide the minimum they can. Can anyone find a popular food product that is more than the stated weight?

Tuna used to be in 100g and 200g tins
The 'large size tin is (and has been fir at least a couple of years) 140g drained weight. So annoying and skews the true price for a meal.

But have you weighed the tuna out of the tin to see if you are even getting the 140g? I bet you are not and it's under.

You keep bleating that your scales aren't out but weigh the same food stuffs and get the same result each time.

As Einstein said, insanity is repeating the same action again and again and expecting a different result.

Unless any of you own a set of calibrated scales ie scientific quality and not just for kitchen use and can perform a proper experiment using a control weight of known mass then I refuse to believe that you're being ripped off every time. Granted many products vary in weight due to an average, but I refuse to believe that it's 10% less each time.

Having worked in the manufacture of industrial weighing equipment, the machinery used is far more accurate and precise. The precise bit is more important than your average set of scales.