macro's before or after cooking?

[Lunk1]

I'm sure, like most things, this has been covered but...is it best to count the macro's of the raw meat or cooked. In lean ground beef for example, there is a significant weight difference after it's cooked. Assuming a lot of the fat is cooked off, this would change the macro breakdown significantly. 8 oz raw can cook down to nearly 4.5 oz and that changes the numbers a lot.

[Brett N]

I use myfitnesspal phone app. Many recommend raw but in that app it has macros for both.

For meats and brown rice I weight after the cooking because I cook large amounts at a time like 5 pounds of chicken breasts. Veggies I weigh before, this includes my sweet and red potatoes I eat also.

I highly recommend that app though if you have a smart phone, it makes tracking macros so easy that it doesn't even seem like an inconvenience.

[Lunk1]

Any other insight??

[Back In Black]

I weigh everything in its uncooked state. You can go by cooked macro's as long as you cook it according to instructions every time. With a raw/uncooked/dry weight the end macro's are always the same even if you cook for different lengths of time.

Take your lean ground beef, let's say you weigh it only after cooking. Cook the same raw weight in 2 pans. One pan you cook it 5 minutes and the other pan you cook it 10 minutes. Different weights at the end (as one has lost more water/steam) but same macro's. The fat doesn't really 'cook off' although there will be some evaporation of it but it will be negligible and not worth calculating the loss.

Does this make sense? I'm sure there's a simpler weigh (get it) of explaining it.

[Lunk1]

I weigh everything in its uncooked state. You can go by cooked macro's as long as you cook it according to instructions every time. With a raw/uncooked/dry weight the end macro's are always the same even if you cook for different lengths of time.

Take your lean ground beef, let's say you weigh it only after cooking. Cook the same raw weight in 2 pans. One pan you cook it 5 minutes and the other pan you cook it 10 minutes. Different weights at the end (as one has lost more water/steam) but same macro's. The fat doesn't really 'cook off' although there will be some evaporation of it but it will be negligible and not worth calculating the loss.

Does this make sense? I'm sure there's a simpler weigh (get it) of explaining it.

I'm not sure that I can completely agree if we are speaking of ground beef only. Seems to me a lot of fat gets cooked off. In some cases the calories vary greatly between cooked weight and non cooked weight. Can be over 100 calories in the 2oz difference.

[Back In Black]

I'm not sure that I can completely agree if we are speaking of ground beef only. Seems to me a lot of fat gets cooked off. In some cases the calories vary greatly between cooked weight and non cooked weight. Can be over 100 calories in the 2oz difference.

No, that was just the example you gave. Eg rice and pasta will absorb more, or less, water depending how they are cooked. Meats will lose weight as they cook. Particularly fatty meats will definitely have rendering and, unless you consume the run off, will be lower yes.

I was assuming that we weren't talking about high fat meats though. Although lean ground beef always seems a whole lot more fatty than extra lean. I don't really use anything with more than 5% fat for regular consumption so I just allow for the intake of those uncooked fat values.