I don't think the average volumetric recipe user is that precise when preparing meals, especially when filling cups. Volumetric cooking may be more popular among the masses because it takes less effort then mass cooking and is less precise. Thus there is no need to get hung up on precise conversions.
There are no American terms. What you refer to as spoons and cups are also used elsewhere and even if the US has defined them, the US definitions won't apply everywhere. Thus when you encounter the word cup, even in an American recipe, you have no idea if that cup was intended to be the American version. Unlike the CGPM and BIPM, there is no universal authority to assure a cup means the same thing everywhere. If there was, you would not have different pints and gallons everywhere. The dessertspoon is 10 mL. See below: Cuchara de postre De Wikipedia, la enciclopedia libre Saltar a navegación, búsqueda Típica cuchara de postre. La Cuchara de postre se trata de una cuchara de tamaño similar a la cuchara de sopa pero se distingue de esta última en que su cavidad es más esférica, de forma muy similar a una cuchara del café o del té. Su capacidad es de casi 10 mililitros (2 cucharaditas). En las comidas formales esta cuchara se añade al final justo en el instante de comenzar a servir los postres, en las comidas informales se pone desde el principio en la cubertería de la mesa, generalmente en la parte superior del plato. http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuchara_de_postre You can still preserve an old recipe in metric form. As long as you can preserve the flavor and other aspects of the food, there should be no need to preserve it in English/imperial form especially if that form is imprecise anyway. Jerry ________________________________ From: John M. Steele <jmsteele9...@sbcglobal.net> To: U.S. Metric Association <usma@colostate.edu> Sent: Saturday, April 4, 2009 2:19:59 PM Subject: [USMA:44340] Re: Even with "dual," you can't please everybody Because the ratio of that ingredient to other ingredients measured accurately won't be right. The set of 240:30:15:5 is not exactly right, but they are in the right proportions. The recipe is just scaled about 1.4% larger. You are free to weigh everything. I am not advocating one style of cooking over another. I am merely challenging the claim that American terms are unclear. They may be unfamiliar, it may be necessary to dig to learn what they mean, but there is no uncertainty in what they mean. I suspect all the odd dessertspoons, etc used in former UK cooking all have precise meanings too, if only we could find them. Precisely determining their meaning and documenting it in metric equivalents is the way to preserve those old recipes. --- On Sat, 4/4/09, Jeremiah MacGregor <jeremiahmacgre...@rocketmail.com> wrote: From: Jeremiah MacGregor <jeremiahmacgre...@rocketmail.com> Subject: [USMA:44331] Re: Even with "dual," you can't please everybody To: "U.S. Metric Association" <usma@colostate.edu> Date: Saturday, April 4, 2009, 12:23 PM Since the US cups with metric on one side is up to 250 mL, then why not just use 250 mL to define a cup? It would be easier to use then to try to fill to the 240 mL line. Jerry ________________________________ From: John M. Steele <jmsteele9...@sbcglobal.net> To: U.S. Metric Association <usma@colostate.edu> Sent: Saturday, April 4, 2009 10:35:46 AM Subject: [USMA:44329] Re: Even with "dual," you can't please everybody Pat, You understandably write from a Commonwealth or Australian perspective (I don't mean spelling), and as a metric consultant, you may have a vested interest in making old measurements sound more confusing than they are. I am confused by spoons and cups in recipes from Commonwealth nations. However, if you receive a recipe from the US, there is no confusion; the terms are well-defined and have been for some time. I regularly use a recipe from my greatgrandmother which dates to around 1890. Common cups and spoons may be of any size, but measuring cups and spoons are well defined. They are as important to us as your scales (most are marked in metric as well). Each term is followed by a definition in Customary units, an overly exact metric conversion, and a practically rounded metric conversion: cup: 8 US fl oz, 236.5882 mL, 240 mL ounce: 1 US fl oz, 29.573 53 mL, 30 mL Tablespoon: 0.5 US fl oz, 14.786 76 mL, 15 mL teaspoon: 0.1666... US fl oz, 4.928 922 mL, 5 mL Dry and wet measuring cups are of different designs, but the same capacity. Dry cups are brim fill, stricken level with the back edge of a knife. Wet cups are fill-to-mark. American cooking is entirely volumetric, and it is probably easier to convert to metric volume than determine the density of everything. The cup and tablespoon are noticably different than Australian, but no confusion as the terms are well defined and standardized by NIST (handbook 44 Appendix, C, SP811, etc) Now, if only we could get Americans to convert the above volumes to metric. --- On Sat, 4/4/09, Pat Naughtin <pat.naugh...@metricationmatters.com> wrote: From: Pat Naughtin <pat.naugh...@metricationmatters.com> Subject: [USMA:44327] Re: Even with "dual," you can't please everybody To: "U.S. Metric Association" <usma@colostate.edu> Date: Saturday, April 4, 2009, 9:34 AM Dear John, I have posted a response to this that you can find at the same address at http://www.t-g.com/blogs/bettybrown/entry/26458/ Cheers, Pat Naughtin PO Box 305 Belmont 3216, Geelong, Australia Phone: 61 3 5241 2008 Metric system consultant, writer, and speaker, Pat Naughtin, has helped thousands of people and hundreds of companies upgrade to the modern metric system smoothly, quickly, and so economically that they now save thousands each year when buying, processing, or selling for their businesses. Pat provides services and resources for many different trades, crafts, and professions for commercial, industrial and government metrication leaders in Asia, Europe, and in the USA. Pat's clients include the Australian Government, Google, NASA, NIST, and the metric associations of Canada, the UK, and the USA. See http://www.metricationmatters.com/ to subscribe.
