7 reasons I use a gram scale to bake
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Let’s chat about why I use a gram scale to bake.
I didn’t always use a gram scale, but it has grown to become one of my most trusted tools in the kitchen. Being American, I grew up with imperial measurements (cups and teaspoons and tablespoons) etc. I also have an extensive collection of cookbooks from many different eras.
At some point, I started noting more of a shift in how people were writing recipes. For me, I noticed it with King Arthur’s recipes online that they started noting grams instead of cups. Being a curious baker, I bought my first scale. After more than a decade of using a scale, I will never not own a gram scale.
If it seems too much like inside baseball to argue for using a gram scale to bake, I urge you to read on. My hope is that you’ll grow to love your own gram scale!
bakingwithtradition.com is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a way for websites to earn advertising revenues by advertising and linking to recommended products. Some of the links below are affiliate links. This means that, at zero cost to you, I will earn an affiliate commission if you click through the link and finalize a purchase.
Why I use a gram scale to bake (and why you should too!)
Accuracy and consistency
The first reason I love to use a gram scale to bake is because it helps me be more precise in my baking.
If you read a lot of recipes, (and I do), you’ll quickly discover that there’s no universal standard for how much flour there is in 1 cup of flour.
When I read a recipe, I prefer it if the recipe writer tells me both measurements; that way I can see at a glance what weight they’ve (hopefully not arbitrarily) tested their recipes with. In cookbooks, a lot of times, you’ll see whatever that measurement is in the first chapter. It’s kind of like reading a sewing pattern and knowing what your seam allowances are.
For me, I’ve tested this many times; when I measure cups properly (stirring up flour in a container or the bag, spooning it in lightly, then leveling with a straight edge), I average within a gram or two of 130 grams.
Regardless of anything, a gram is a gram. A cup of flour or sugar (especially brown) for that matter could have a huge variation in weights.
Too much flour or sugar in a recipe will hugely change the end results. I’ve watched my students get frustrated over this. In almost every case, a failed recipe has come down to one of them packing in the flour as tight as possible in a measuring cup.
Since baking is a more a science (literally baking is chemistry that you can eat), a gram scale will help you achieve the precision you need. That way I can reproduce my own best recipes time after time after time.
Use a gram scale in baking for more even results
Since I teach baking, I’m always looking for ways to help get my students get engaged in the process.
What this means for me is often needing to divide recipes evenly so that each student can get his or her hands on the end result. Yesterday this looked like making 6 mini loaves of Shauna Sever’s Potica recipe from Midwest Made. I could have eyeballed it, but I pulled out my gram scale and carefully measured the dough and the filling into 6 parts.
Not only were my petite poticas super cute, but they baked EVENLY because they were all the same size. When you’re baking multiples of the same item (cookies, muffins etc.), when they all weigh the same, you have a much better chance of them baking at the same rate.
I would never have been able to make this amazing dobostorta without being able to weigh the layers and the butter cream. So much less stress.
If you’re baking in quantity at all, a gram scale is one of the items you can use to help you get evenly sized portions every single time.
Do less dishes with a gram scale when you bake
I tell my students all the time that a gram scale is the lazy baker’s best friend. And if your style of lazy includes wanting to save time on doing dishes, make space for a gram scale now.
When I use my gram scale, I can use ONE bowl to measure everything into.
Need to add another ingredient? No problem, just push the tare button to reset to zero and go on your merry way.
Need to measure a hatefully messy ingredient like peanut butter or honey? Just calculate the gram weight by looking at the nutrition facts (I know them so well–it’s 32 g for 2 tablespoons of PB and 21 g per tablespoon of honey) and enjoy not having to clean a measuring cup filled with goopy syrupy schmoo.
If you’ve ever had the misfortune of cleaning shortening or peanut butter from one of those “measure it all” cups (you know the ones that work like a push pop), trust me, that gram scale will heal the scars of that memory.
Gram scales are not space hogs
A stand mixer takes up some serious real estate on your counter. So does a microwave or toaster oven.
A gram scale? I put my salt and pepper and olive oil that I always have on my counter ON TOP of it.
This way it literally takes up no extra space in my kitchen. When I need it, I can pull off the couple things on the weighing area and get to work.
If you have a slightly different setup, set up your gram scale vertically against your counter wall. This way you can slide it out in a second.
When I use a gram scale to bake, I take better notes
Writing recipes is hard. You have to come up with an idea, test that idea, test it more, and adjust as necessary.
If I have a bread that felt too dense, I can look back at my predicted weight of flour and take off a few grams and note the changes in another test.
In my notebook I can quickly note to add in a little more sugar for a cake that tasted a little too lacking in flavor.
I’ve actually found I can test recipes quicker with gram measurements that with traditional cups.
Pie dough and I were never friends in the past because I hated the vague “just add a little water until it’s the right consistency” type of directions. It’s only now that I go back to those classic recipes that I can approach those recipes with the eye of finding out the exact amount of water to make the kind of pie dough that I want.
Gram scales make math much much quicker
If you need to scale up or scale down a recipe, it can be a hassle to divide tablespoons and teaspoons.
Forget about trying to add or subtract in fractions of an egg without a gram scale.
My pet peeve growing up was to encounter a recipe that measured in 1/3 cups AND 1/2 cups. Trying to divide 1/3 cups is miserable. Many eyeballs were used before the gram scale entered my kitchen!
Now, all I do is multiply and divide as necessary. If you hate math, that may not be a selling point, LOL.
Gram scales make it easy to cook from international recipes
More and more, we have access to recipes from around the world. Since most of the world uses the metric system, having a gram scale makes it easier to use recipes from other countries.
So if you’re a fan of the Great British Bake Off and want to make one of Paul Hollywood’s recipes, you best be getting a gram scale.
Butter conversions: Since we measure our butter in the US buy the pound (454 grams), our stick measurements are weird! 113 g for a stick of butter is always going to be awkward. My favorite German YouTuber–Einfache Rezepte annoyed me for a while until I realized that she was measuring from blocks of butter that were 250 g or 500 g. When I bake from her recipes, I often have weird bobs of leftover butter. Good things there’s bread!
The best things to weigh with a gram scale
- Flour: If you get a gram scale, test yourself. Measure a cup of flour; weigh it. Repeat. Chances are you’ll get different results. With a scale, 130 grams is always 130 grams.
- Sugar: The typical method for measuring brown sugar is to “pack it into the cup”. It’s kind of satisfying to do this because the resulting sugar pops out into the bowl in the perfect shape of your measuring cup. Yet, once in a while I’ll see a recipe note, “only loosely measure the brown sugar into the cup”. To me, it’s much easier to say, “160 grams brown sugar” vs. a non-specific amount of sugar not packed too heavily into a cup.
- Grains: Since buying my grain mill, I’m always weighing out my grains beforehand. This helps me better estimate the amount of grain I need to add if I sift out the bran. It also helps me take better notes since milling and baking with freshly milled flour is a little bit of a trial and error process.
- Eggs: Once in a while you need to measure eggs by weight. Many recipes involving egg whites fall into this category. If you’ve made macarons you know this. Since eggs are all a little different, it’s much easier to pop a little bowl on the scale and know without a doubt how big that hen made that egg white.
- Liquid anything: Measuring in liquid measuring cups is always a little hairy, making sure your eye is level with the cup. With a scale, there is no guessing.
The things you don’t need to weigh with a gram scale
Don’t chuck your measuring cups and spoons just because I’ve been singing the praises of my scale.
Things that don’t weigh much are still more easily measured with teaspoons and tablespoons. Flavorings or mix-ins are also more simply measured traditionally. Here’s some examples:
- Spices: Most gram scales aren’t accurate down to less than a gram. Since many spices are very strong in more than a gram, keep your smaller measuring spoons handy. Sometimes a pinch just needs to be a pinch.
- Salt
- Leavening: baking soda, baking powder, yeast
- Mix-ins: in the case of most cookie recipes 1/3 cup of nuts vs. 1/2 cup of nuts won’t make much of a difference. Sometimes you use what you have available (like all the times I forgot that pistachio shells actually weigh something). Mostly mix-in ingredients are there just for texture, not the success or failure of a recipe. Feel free to measure these without your scale.
What to look for in a good gram scale (recommendations)
It might surprise you that a good gram scale doesn’t have to be expensive. My current scale was around $30. I went through two scales that were around $75. I payed that price because they had the features that I wanted. Now, it’s much easier to find scales that have all the bells and whistles at a lower price point.
A good gram scale should:
- Be easy to clean: Wipe and go, or it’s a no no.
- Have a good weight limit: My favorite Salter Aquatronic scale and the Oxo stainless kitchen scale both weigh up to 11 lbs. This is awesome for just about everything. My current Tanita scale has a smaller limit, and it’s probably what will make me buy another Aquatronic.
- Can go between liquid and dry ingredients: Once upon a time, the Aquatronic was the only home scale that could do this. These days, most scales can. Because I still use my old cookbooks that measure traditionally, being able to turn on the fluid ounces is really handy.
- Be flat with a decent sized weighing area: For the sake of storage, always pick a flat profile scale. A large for the size weighing area will give you more options when you are weighing items.
Try out your gram scale!
