Post Punk Kitchen Forum

my husband was making me the mac n cheese recipe from Vegan Table last night and it calls for 3.5 cups "milk" and .5 cups oil.
i always measure them seperately.
he measured the almond milk in my liquid measuring device and then poured the oil in on top of it until he got to 4 cups.

i see where he is going with this. he is very black and white with his thinking. he is an electrical engineer and to him it was exactly the same as measuring it seperately.

i cant prove it but it felt wrong to do it that way.
ALSO when i was blending the sauce together in my food processor there was so much of it it came gushing out the side and when i took the bowl off it had leaked a ton underneath the bowl too. it seemed like there was more than when i make it.....

the only other thing that could have possibly contributed to this (other than him just reading the recipe wrong) is i soaked the cashews for a couple hours before i made the recipe. the recipe does not call for soaking.

That is the same as measuring separately since they are both liquids. Even if they had mixed, the volume of liquid would still be the same.

Soaking cashews shouldn't make too much difference. I soak or not in various recipes depending on my planning ahead skills.

I measure the way your husband does, especially at work (in a deli/bakery) where we have a very limited number of measuring cups. That's my anecdotal evidence, but lots of people measure differently. Either way it's important to look at the measurements at eye level.

it feels so wrong to me.
i was like GOOD GOD WHAT ARE YOU DOING MAN!!!!

i dont think i will share with him he was ok to do it that way ;-)

Yup. I do that all the time.

I've started measuring the way your hubby does. The nerd is me thinks it is soooo cool how the oil floats on top! Plus as much as I love to have separate ramekins and things for all my ingredients before I start to cook, it is a bit of a chore to clean it all up afterwards so I'm all for carefully combining things in a measuring cup when I can ;)

i dont combine but i will use the same measuring device over.
for this i probably would have measured the almond milk, dumped it in the pot, and then measured the oil in the same measuring cup i had just used.

alot of times i like to measure the oil first and then put something like vinegar in it after cause in my mind the vinegar helps get some of the oil out before i wash it.

not sure if that holds up to scientific testing but in my brain it works.

Measuring the way your hubby does pretty much validates learning how to add fractions back in grade school. I love doing it that way because I'm all, "Look at me! I'm using my maths!" and I'm dirtying fewer dishes.

i never did like fractions.......

That's totally normal and I do that all the time?

Heh. I always use dry measuring cups, even when I'm measuring liquids, and my boyfriend doesn't like it. It might be wrong, but my food turns out fine!
It's interesting how we all have our own way of doing things.

I measure almost everything by eye, without cups or scales, unless it's something wacky I've never made anything similar to before and most things turn out peachy.

But yeah, when measuring by volume like that, 3.5+.5=4 whatever way you do it.

I am crepe at measuring, which is why I am a crepe baker. One time I was baking something in front of a friend of mine. And she was all WHAT THE HELL ARE DOING! YOU CANT MEASURE LIKE THAT! But my zucchini bread came out just fine and she ate it! So there perfect measuring people. All though I do have to admit that I've had more than my fair share of baking mishaps.

Me too! Allatime.

Oilk.

this is what i see everyone do on tv and im always like HOW DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH?!?!?!?!

i guess with professional chefs so much of it must just be instinct. i do it sometimes with savory thing but NEVER with baking and never with large amounts of things.

Doesn't have to be correct.

"Ethanol-water mixtures have less volume than the sum of their individual components at the given fractions. Mixing equal volumes of ethanol and water results in only 1.92 volumes of mixture."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethanol

I measure that way for one store-bought cake mix, because I need to mix egg replacer with more liquid than just the water called for one "egg". But, with most recipes, the first time I make a dish I measure the volume, weigh the ingredients, write the mass of every ingredient into the cookbook and every other time I just weigh the ingredients, even water. Often I don't need to measure the volume of ingredients at all. For oil I calculate the mass taking the density of 0.9 grams per millilitre. If I need 1/2 cup of oil, that's about 110 g. 1 cup of cashews is 100 g. 1 cup of flour is 140 g. (That's for a metric cup, 250 ml, I own metric measuring cups and spoons.) I love my kitchen scales.

You can calculate the deviation by weighing the ingredients, but it probably isn't significant.

My measuring cup is a big coffee mug. I sorta know what 1/4, 1/3, 1/2 etc cup look like in there and I've never had problems with recipes.

+1 yummy. Also, it makes it way easier when you're measuring something that's not as easy to level, like say, pumpkin puree (assuming they will be mixed together). If you need 1 cup milk and 1/2 cup puree, putting the milk in first and then adding pumpkin to the 1 1/2 cup mark is a lot easier than measuring them separately.

It's usually just fine when 'cooking', but baking is science* and accurate measuring is important if you want any sort of consistent result.






*(...for hungry people)

I have always been anti dry measuring cups for liquids. I don't know why but since I've started doing most of my cooking at the bfs house and he only has dry measuring cups, I've had no choice but to use them for liquids. Seems to work just fine. But I will still probably end up buying him a liquid measuring cup soon.

Yeah, I do that sort of thing, too. Saves dishes.

yep. i always use the displacement method. (i even do it for measuring butters, pumpkin puree, nuts, chocolate chips, and so-on if they need to be mixed with liquids before being added to the dry. as long as it's something that doesn't absorb liquid, it'll work.)

fewer things to clean is a bonus in my book.

A cup of nuts contains a lot of air.

Yeah, the displacement method isn't an accurate way of measuring liquids plus chocolate chips or nuts. If you measure out 1/2 cup of choc chips in a liquid measuring cup, them add enough soymilk to make 2 cups, you'll end up with more than 1 1/2 cups soymilk because it's filling in all the spaces between the chocolate chips. It might not be enough extra milk to matter, but I still wouldn't do that unless it was a particularly fool-proof recipe.