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kitchen scale or eyeballing...

luv2spin

luv2spin

Well-Known Member
Messages
140
Location
Kekova Bay
Type of diabetes
Prefer not to say
Treatment type
Other
Dislikes
people who think they know about Diabetes, but they really don't
Do you weigh your food and count carbs exactly, or do you estimate and eyeball it?
 
Initially I weighed, counted, or measured everything. It drove my husband mad. (He's the main cook) Once I had a diet that I was happy with I was able to judge serving sizes pretty well. My meter guided me, and still does.
 
I was like bluetit at the start, weighing and measuring everything. A year on I still weigh or measure new things but foods I eat regularly I go by eye. I know my meter will tell me off if I cheat! :joyful::hilarious:
 
As above. Rinse and repeat. :)

I weighed mainly because I think in imperial measures but everything these days is in metric so I weighed my portion sizes and then did the sums.
 
When I am at home and have time, I weigh.
Most of the time I eyeball.

By choice, I am more likely to weigh bread and fruit. This is because I find the density varies so much which affects the weight which affects the carbs.

But if I am out and about (or too hungry to care), I eyeball.
 
Right at the very beginning I was a bit too obsessive with the measuring. Even to the extent of cutting off the tiniest slither of cheese. Oh and once my husband dished up the meal, which included garden peas. I got the scales, scraped the peas into it, then returned them to my plate minus 5 of them. Hubby was not impressed.
 
I was like the others at the start - detailed weighing and counting until it all became so familiar that I was ok doing it by 'eyeball'. I tend to have the same-ish foods/meals anyway, so it was all fairly easy. Trouble for me was, that over time I think I've become a bit lax & things started to 'drift', carbs and possibly portion size as well (even though to me there doesn't seem to be any differences). My BG numbers have started to rise and it's not obvious to me why - so I'm now back to weighing and counting to see if it is just down to drift. Guess the message (for me at least) is when eyeballing, need to keep your eye on the ball as well.
 
I like the sheer exhilaration of eyeballing.... I usually stick to the same things (easier that way when cooking for yourself) and have got used to visually working out amounts etc, and only weigh if confronted with an alien foodstuff.

After doing LighterLife for a couple of months years ago, I found myself asking a very busy barista in an exceptionally busy coffee shop if they could give me the EXACT calorie count of a cappucino, with a long queue behind me. I realised that obsession was not a healthy thing and wouldn't win me friends and admirers..... Never done it since!
 
I never weighed as I do not count carbs I just cut out the starchy ones and the sugar stuff
 
To add to my comment above: as insulin to carb ratio is an estimate and, even when weighing, carb counting is an estimate*, I don't get obsessed by accurate weights.

*I believe the way they calculate carbs is to take a sample and burn it. Then weigh the ash (carbon) that remains.
For a slice of cake, they may take a slice with more currants in than average; for an apple, they may take one which is more ripe than the one you are eating or grown in different soil or ...
 
Other way round for me. Didn’t weigh or measure at first, just cut out all major carbs. Now I weigh and measure everything.
 
Like @Pinkorchid I initially just cut out all the suspect higher carb foods from the word go. I check nutritional information on any new foods, and reject anything I don't deem suitable which makes life much easier!

But I did do a bit of weighing initially, but in general the only time I weigh anything is if I'm baking. Since i have no choice but to buy online, most of my food comes packaged so I can easily guestimate - e.g. 350g pack of berries lasts me a week so i know roughly that I'm having a daily 50g portion. But I don't actually believe I could ever trust that I was getting exact quantities of anything, carbs, fats, protein, from precise weighing - I tend to agree with @helensaramay - I don't see that there can ever be an absolutely accurate value from nutrituional labelling - nature wasn't built in a lab, and I'm not a preprogrammed robot so an informed guestimate is usually sufficient for me. I don't actually believe it matters overall if my target is a little over or under - it's not going to kill me! My body and meter are my main guides, but even the meter isn't 100% as things other than food also affect my glucose levels.

This works for me and my weight and HbA1c have been fairly stable for over four years now... and eating a healthy and varied diet ensures I'm likely to be getting enough of what does me the most good!

Robbity
 
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