Re:Why you can’t buy a thermapen on Amazon (2016)
by 8note on Tuesday May 11, 2021 @03:12PM
(#27122230)
Is density not a concern?
Re:Why you can’t buy a thermapen on Amazon (2016)
by simondotau on Tuesday May 11, 2021 @06:05PM
(#27124167)
Yes, which is precisely why I eschew cups and spoons for grams. There are standard conversions for most common ingredients, I’ll tend to use those for ingredients with the potential for high variation in density, like plain flour.
Obviously, the main concern is with repeatability in baking. But for me the biggest benefit is being able to pour all ingredients directly into your bowl (sitting on scales) without dirtying up a pile of measuring cups and spoons.
Re:Why you can’t buy a thermapen on Amazon (2016)
by URSpider94 on Wednesday May 12, 2021 @01:52AM
(#27127064)
To provide the correlate to @simondotau’s answer: in cooking, density hardly ever matters. All recipes should actually be solely in units of weight, never in units of volume. Professional chefs, and especially professional bakers, work solely in weights.
Liquid measures by volume are mostly ok, since liquids vary hardly at all in density (for a given liquid).
Solid measures by volume are a joke. It’s easy to be off by 10% or more, depending on how fluffy or packed down your ingredient is. When you’re baking a loaf of bread, this is the difference between a soggy mass and a dry pile of crumbs.
Tablespoons (for example) are often equating to 10-25g which even the cheapest, nastiest 1g precision kitchen scales can handle with greater precision and repeatability than using an actual tablespoon
It’s only when measuring half teaspoon stuff where I’ll either just use a teaspoon or pull out precision scales—it all depends how important it is to be accurate with an ingredient.