American recipes --- need help !!

[Cuddles]

So I look on the internet sometimes to find recipes to try out and ther´s loads that sound great BUT I don´t understand the american ones AT ALL And this has botheres me for years on en now.

The problem-
In europe we have the exact measurements but american recipes sound terribly vague somehow and I can never figure out what they´re actually talking about, so I never try them.

So my question is : Just what is meant by a f*cking cup, exactly??
I mean if only they used fl oz and oz... Well, that still sucks for someone who´s just to the metric system but that can be worked out with an online calculator after all.

But a CUP? How much is a cup ?!?!?!
If anyone here can translate this I´d be very grateful and you´ll get a buch of flowers from me too

 

[Switcher56]

A cup is 8 oz. TBS, there are 2 delta cups... One for dry ingredients and one for fluids in NA. I hear your frustrations because I have a "Greek" cookbook that calls for a tea cup. Now put that in your pipe and smoke it. The book was acquired in '95, and up until last week I used 6oz for it where, in actual fact a tea cup = 4.5oz.

I am a foodie or connoisseur of fine foods. When I google, I ask for "authentic or original recipes" TBS, the proper roots = "authentic". I seldom use a "my take" on it recipes from Americans.

 

[Douglas.Curtis]

8.3 fluid oz in a 'Cup'

Should you wish to regularly cook using american recipes, I would strongly suggest buying a set of standard usa measuring cups. Very easy to find a set of 1 cup, 3/4 cup, 1/2 cup, 1/3rd cup and 1/4 cup measures. There's even a 2 Cup glass measuring style cup which is a very commonly found item.

 

[Cuddles]

A cup is 8 oz. TBS, there are 2 delta cups... One for dry ingredients and one for fluids in NA. I hear your frustrations because I have a "Greek" cookbook that calls for a tea cup. Now put that in your pipe and smoke it. The book was acquired in '95, and up until last week I used 6oz for it where, in actual fact a tea cup = 4.5oz.

I am a foodie or connoisseur of fine foods. When I google, I ask for "authentic or original recipes" TBS, the proper roots = "authentic". I seldom use a "my take" on it recipes from Americans.

Yeah, I can see how this can be confusing too Over here we have 2 types - tea/coffee cup and mugs.
I checked the ones I have, which are both standard size ones. The average mug holds 250 ml, which is 1/2 pint.
The tea cup holds aprox. 175 ml. But there are actually smaller cups too ( my parents have smaller ones).
Of course there´s even more cup sizes, such as mocca, espresso etc

So you see why the term `cup ´ is so irritating to non-americans

The right measurents really matter when cooking but they´re even more important when you´re baking. too much or too little fluid in your dough and everything is buggered

 

[Switcher56]

8.3 fluid oz in a 'Cup'

Should you wish to regularly cook using american recipes, I would strongly suggest buying a set of standard usa measuring cups. Very easy to find a set of 1 cup, 3/4 cup, 1/2 cup, 1/3rd cup and 1/4 cup measures. There's even a 2 Cup glass measuring style cup which is a very commonly found item.
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Those stainless cups are for dry ingredients only!

 

[Switcher56]

Yeah, I can see how this can be confusing too Over here we have 2 types - tea/coffee cup and mugs.
I checked the ones I have, which are both standard size ones. The average mug holds 250 ml, which is 1/2 pint.
The tea cup holds aprox. 175 ml. But there are actually smaller cups too ( my parents have smaller ones).
Of course there´s even more cup sizes, such as mocca, espresso etc

So you see why the term `cup ´ is so irritating to non-americans

The right measurents really matter when cooking but they´re even more important when you´re baking. too much or too little fluid in your dough and everything is buggered

Understood! Especially when baking

​

The average mug holds 250 ml, which is 1/2 pint.

... which is an American measure. 2 pints to a qt = 32oz. 4 qts to a gallon = 128oz. Our imperial gallon is 160oz. Based on the short ton of 2000lbs (200gals), whereas the long ton which is 2240 lbs or 1000l or 2.24lbs per litre.
Understood! Especially when baking

 

[Cuddles]

8.3 fluid oz in a 'Cup'

Should you wish to regularly cook using american recipes, I would strongly suggest buying a set of standard usa measuring cups. Very easy to find a set of 1 cup, 3/4 cup, 1/2 cup, 1/3rd cup and 1/4 cup measures. There's even a 2 Cup glass measuring style cup which is a very commonly found item.

Thanks, I didn´t know those things existed.
but 5 extra pieces of equipment in the kitchen? I don´t think I´ll bother lol.
I prefer the stuff I use like a measuring beaker which is properly labeled - eg. 50 m,100,ml etc. basically like a 3D ruler

8.3 fluid oz in a 'Cup'

does this go for stuff like flour etc too? I´m guessing yes

 

[HempKat]

So I look on the internet sometimes to find recipes to try out and ther´s loads that sound great BUT I don´t understand the american ones AT ALL And this has botheres me for years on en now.

The problem-
In europe we have the exact measurements but american recipes sound terribly vague somehow and I can never figure out what they´re actually talking about, so I never try them.

So my question is : Just what is meant by a f*cking cup, exactly??
I mean if only they used fl oz and oz... Well, that still sucks for someone who´s just to the metric system but that can be worked out with an online calculator after all.

But a CUP? How much is a cup ?!?!?!
If anyone here can translate this I´d be very grateful and you´ll get a buch of flowers from me too

Most all recipes in the US the portions are in the form of Gallons, fraction of gallons, quarts, pints, cups and fractions of a cup and for smaller ingredients like spices and such it's in tablespoons, teaspoons and fractions of teaspoons. It's kind of like how here we have miles and there you have kilometers or here we have degrees Fahrenheit and you have degrees Celsius. Fortunately just like for those conversions you can look up on Google or your favorite search engine for a cup to ml converter like this one: https://www.thecalculatorsite.com/cooking/cups-ml.php and since that site is for cooking there is a tab there where you can find converters for Tablespoons or Teaspoons to grams or ml.

Now there is also some more obscure measurements that pop up from time to time and are roughly the same, one is a smidge and one is a pinch now for dry ingredients both mean literally a pinch between your thumb and forefinger ((also referred to as index finger, first finger, pointer finger, trigger finger, digitus secundus, digitus II, and many other terms).

Now in the case of smidgen you might also see that used as a liquid measure but don't worry a pinch is never used in a liquid measure because you can't really pinch a liquid now can you? A Smidgen in liquid measure is basically two drops like might be produced from an eye dropper.

There are a couple more even more obscure terms but they seldom turn up in recipes.

There is something called a Tad which basically is the same as a 1.4th Teaspoon.

Next is a Dash which is for liquid measurement only and is equal to 1/8th Teaspoon or 8 Drops.

And finally there is Drop which is said to be 1/64th Teaspoon but come on, first of all I've never seen a 1/64th teaspoon ever and for crying out loud whose going to bother measuring out the amount when they can just squeeze of a drop from an eye dropper (which to be clear does not actually drop eyes but rather drops liquid into eyes in the from of drops hence the name eye dropper)

Also it's worth noting that American recipes also talk in terms of ounces, fractions of ounces and grams and those can be applied to both liquids and solids, like for a cup = 8 ounces but that's a liquid ounce which is more about volume where as ounces used for solids is more about weight. Now since cups are 8 ounces they often come with markings for each of those ounces, so if you need an ounce of milk you could pour to the one ounce mark and that would be correct. If however someone want to buy an ounce of weed from you and you filled that cup to the one ounce mark and tried to sell it as an ounce you might get punched in the face. But wait it gets even more confusing. It's not always as simple as just saying okay ounces are liquids because you can have ounces in a recipe that are solids like an ounces of chicken or ounces of hamburger, or pork or tuna, generally if the item is a solid then that's ounce based on mass which is measured on a scale. Hold on though believe it or not there is another twist sometimes with fine particle solids like flour or sugar you might see it listed in ounces and in those cases they mean the same as fluid ounces and so you would use a cup with the ounce measure on it rather then a scale.

I mean it's really all kind of bonkers when you stop to think about it and with all our recipes written like this it's a wonder us Yanks ever made enough worth eating to survive.

Anyway hope that help clear things up for you because believe it or not we really did mange to come up with quite a few tasty dishes

 

[Cuddles]

Most all recipes in the US the portions are in the form of Gallons, fraction of gallons, quarts, pints, cups and fractions of a cup and for smaller ingredients like spices and such it's in tablespoons, teaspoons and fractions of teaspoons. It's kind of like how here we have miles and there you have kilometers or here we have degrees Fahrenheit and you have degrees Celsius. Fortunately just like for those conversions you can look up on Google or your favorite search engine for a cup to ml converter like this one: https://www.thecalculatorsite.com/cooking/cups-ml.php and since that site is for cooking there is a tab there where you can find converters for Tablespoons or Teaspoons to grams or ml.

Now there is also some more obscure measurements that pop up from time to time and are roughly the same, one is a smidge and one is a pinch now for dry ingredients both mean literally a pinch between your thumb and forefinger ((also referred to as index finger, first finger, pointer finger, trigger finger, digitus secundus, digitus II, and many other terms).

Now in the case of smidgen you might also see that used as a liquid measure but don't worry a pinch is never used in a liquid measure because you can't really pinch a liquid now can you? A Smidgen in liquid measure is basically two drops like might be produced from an eye dropper.

There are a couple more even more obscure terms but they seldom turn up in recipes.

There is something called a Tad which basically is the same as a 1.4th Teaspoon.

Next is a Dash which is for liquid measurement only and is equal to 1/8th Teaspoon or 8 Drops.

And finally there is Drop which is said to be 1/64th Teaspoon but come on, first of all I've never seen a 1/64th teaspoon ever and for crying out loud whose going to bother measuring out the amount when they can just squeeze of a drop from an eye dropper (which to be clear does not actually drop eyes but rather drops liquid into eyes in the from of drops hence the name eye dropper)

Also it's worth noting that American recipes also talk in terms of ounces, fractions of ounces and grams and those can be applied to both liquids and solids, like for a cup = 8 ounces but that's a liquid ounce which is more about volume where as ounces used for solids is more about weight. Now since cups are 8 ounces they often come with markings for each of those ounces, so if you need an ounce of milk you could pour to the one ounce mark and that would be correct. If however someone want to buy an ounce of weed from you and you filled that cup to the one ounce mark and tried to sell it as an ounce you might get punched in the face. But wait it gets even more confusing. It's not always as simple as just saying okay ounces are liquids because you can have ounces in a recipe that are solids like an ounces of chicken or ounces of hamburger, or pork or tuna, generally if the item is a solid then that's ounce based on mass which is measured on a scale. Hold on though believe it or not there is another twist sometimes with fine particle solids like flour or sugar you might see it listed in ounces and in those cases they mean the same as fluid ounces and so you would use a cup with the ounce measure on it rather then a scale.

I mean it's really all kind of bonkers when you stop to think about it and with all our recipes written like this it's a wonder us Yanks ever made enough worth eating to survive.

Anyway hope that help clear things up for you because believe it or not we really did mange to come up with quite a few tasty dishes

thanks for the link to the cups converter ! didn´t know there was such a thing!

Yes, a lot of the recipes on the american sites really look worth trying and a lot of the asian ones are indeed from americans but it´s really the term cup which has always tripped me up somehow. And it´s important to know when you´re making sauces for exampe
I´ll feel a little more confident trying those recipes from now on. Although I may have the odd Q from time to time

 

[944s2]

Good luck trying to make a Baked Alaska Cuddles lol,,
we have tried and failed miserably plus it’s a long way to go for a desert,,lol,,,,s2

 

[HempKat]

thanks for the link to the cups converter ! didn´t know there was such a thing!

Yes, a lot of the recipes on the american sites really look worth trying and a lot of the asian ones are indeed from americans but it´s really the term cup which has always tripped me up somehow. And it´s important to know when you´re making sauces for exampe
I´ll feel a little more confident trying those recipes from now on. Although I may have the odd Q from time to time

No problem, now that you're armed with converters I'm confident you'll have great culinary success with American recipes. :yay:

 

[Cuddles]

Good luck trying to make a Baked Alaska Cuddles lol,,
we have tried and failed miserably plus it’s a long way to go for a desert,,lol,,,,s2

I´ve heard about baked alaska but I don´t believe I´ve ever had it. Is it really that good?
Besides I´m trying to lose some more weight, so these kinds of deserts are a no-go
Might treat myself to a desert next week though but only cause it´s my b-day I usually tend to avoid them because they contain too much sugar.

 

[944s2]

Had Heston Blaumathals from Waitrose and it was horrible,,,
MandS BA was lovely,,,,s2

 

[Cuddles]

Had Heston Blaumathals from Waitrose and it was horrible,,,
MandS BA was lovely,,,,s2

maybe they got their cups and ounces wrong,lol

 

[Amynamous]

Good luck trying to make a Baked Alaska Cuddles lol,,
we have tried and failed miserably plus it’s a long way to go for a desert,,lol,,,,s2

I was often baked when i lived in Alaska.

 

[HempKat]

I´ve heard about baked alaska but I don´t believe I´ve ever had it. Is it really that good?
Besides I´m trying to lose some more weight, so these kinds of deserts are a no-go
Might treat myself to a desert next week though but only cause it´s my b-day I usually tend to avoid them because they contain too much sugar.

Happy early birthday For the record, while baked Alaska is a tasty dessert it's not all that great in my personal opinion, I think people go for it more just for the wow factor of it being served on fire. Also because it's usually thought of as a high class kind of dessert.

 

[944s2]

I was often baked when i lived in Alaska.

Lol,lol,,
good one,,,

 

[Three Berries]

I have an android app called Unit Converter that can convert just about any unit. Really helpful. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=kr.sira.unit

 

[shithawk420]

Oh it's cuddles b day? Happy b day! As a rule baking any fish will work.just can't over cook it

 

[Cuddles]

I have an android app called Unit Converter that can convert just about any unit. Really helpful. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=kr.sira.unit

thanks for this link. I might just download it - Even though I HATE google play store