I’m tired of guessing which country the author is from when they use cup measurement and how densely they put flour in it.

  • BakerBagel@midwest.social
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    4 days ago

    It really doesn’t matter that much. When was the last time you had your kitchen scale calibrated? Are you actually putting in exactly 200g of flour? Or are you calling it good at anything between 190-210? I was a chemistry minor in college and no one was meticulously measuring out the eaxct amount or reagents they needed, they got it to the ball park and made sure to record exactly how much they used. You’re a home cook making a treat for your friends and family, not the royal pastry chef. And guess what? Those royal pastry chefs in the 18th century were also doing recipes by volume since precision scales weren’t readily available. Meanwhile i get frustrated when i run into a recipe that only uses weights because I’m not used to it. I already have incredibly limited counterspace, and find somewhere to set up my kitchen scale immediately throws me off my game.

    As someone said elsewhere in this thread, you aren’t upset at volumetric measurements, you’re upset at American cultural hegemony.

    • originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com
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      4 days ago

      bad practices become bad policies. minor issues scale terribly. its not crazy to want to do things appropriately.

      as others have pointed out, scaling is far easier than washing handfuls of measuring devices. i can easily counter with your process sucks and takes more work just because you lack counterspace as opposed to dishwashing space.

      just because you dont want to be exact doesnt mean others cant or shouldnt.

      • BakerBagel@midwest.social
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        4 days ago

        I’m getting high as fuck and baking treats for my friends and coworkers, not making something for a competition or dignitary. The process is irrelevant, what i was saying is that whatever you are comfortable with you should use. I can quickly scoop out 3 cups of flour and a cup and a half of sugar in the same time you can weigh them out. And at the end of the day no one will be able to tell the difference between our cookies. The temperature and humidity of your kitchen is going to have way more of an impact on your final product than a 2-5% variation in the quantity of ingredients.

      • BakerBagel@midwest.social
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        4 days ago

        Please tell me about how your universities ran their chemistry labs then, because that’s how they were at every college i attended.

        • TonyTonyChopper@mander.xyz
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          3 days ago

          I have a chemistry B.S. and Ph.D. Some reactions don’t need to go to completion or are not expected to, like organic syntheses. In other cases it’s important to get the ratio of the reactants correct, otherwise you get precursor mixed in with your product. For baking you don’t want leftover baking soda, or flour, etc.

    • Sir_Kevin@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      4 days ago

      You’re a home cook making a treat for your friends and family

      And with those methods, you’ll never amount to anything more. Why improve your craft when you can be an underachiever, right?

      • CancerMancer@sh.itjust.works
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        4 days ago

        Especially such an easy win as weighing out ingredients? It takes even less effort than counting the spoonfuls or having to sift flour into a measuring cup to prevent compacting and ruining the volumetric measurement.