Go to the Article: Choosing a Scale
I ended up getting the MyWeigh Palmscale 8 (300x0.01g) high accuracy pocket scale. It cost me about €40, plus shipping. It just arrived tonight and so far, my tests with it have shown that it's really quite accurate. It came with a 200g calibration weight.For high capacity, I just have a couple of relatively cheap 5kg capacity scales that I picked up from a local store, with just 1g precision. These can't be re-calibrated, but I put the calibration weight on them as a test and, surprisingly, both read exactly 200g. So it seems they're quite good after all.While researching the high accuracy scale, I found a lot of information on http://www.digitalscale.com/. It includes lots of descriptions about the manufacturers, brands, wholesalers and even comparisons of many different scales. It also includes links to quite a few online retailers in several countries in outside the US. This was nice because, for reasons I don't understand, Amazon will not let me order electronics to be shipped to Norway.
I ended up getting the MyWeigh Palmscale 8 (300x0.01g) pocket scale. It just arrived yesterday and so far, my tests with it have shown that it's really quite accurate. It came with a 200g calibration weight.For high capacity, I just have a couple of relatively cheap 5 kg capacity scales that I picked up from a local store, with just 1g precision. These can't be recalibrated, but I put the calibration weight on them as a test and, surprisingly, both read exactly 200g. So it seems they're quite good after all.While researching this, I found a lot of information on DigitalScale. com. It includes lots of descriptions about the manufacturers, brands, wholesalers and even comparisons of many different scales. It also includes links to quite a few online retailers in several countries in addition to the US, which was nice, because, for reasons I don't understand, Amazon will not let me order electronics to be shipped to Norway.
The Mira scale (consumer grade, high-capacity) is not for sale at the moment. Is there another you'd recommend at ChefSteps?
- originally posted by jobjob
Why is one scale so much drastically more expensive than another? I can understand the ability to get weights to a higher precision but is 1g that much more significant than .1 gram if you're weigh something most in the 100 to 500 gram range? The percent error seems to me to be acceptable, and if it is a smaller quantity I'd just use the pocket scale. I just want to know a practical situation where you'd say 'I'm glad I got that more expensive scale'
Products like xanthan gum, calcium chloride etc. require very precise measurements. These are practical cases, where you'd actually say you are glad to have that scale.
I have not bought a scale yet but looking at the Mettler Toledo scale I wonder about the clean ability. The structure of the weighing platform looks difficult to clean can it be disassembled?
It appears the Sartorius scale has been discontinued.
The Sartorius scale has been replaced by the Entris 5201-1S in their product line-up.
The Mettler Toledo is the wrong model. The model they have listed in the text is a scale with a 610g capacity (JL602-G/L), the model they use in the video as a 6001g (6kg) capacity (JL6001-G/L). Here is the link to the scale from their video. I pointed this out to Chef Steps months ago, but they haven't changed it.
i used to think that measuring with cups spoons etc is the best way. when i watched ur first video it was really suprising for me i will start using a scale definetelly but another problem will occure almost all the receipes given by measuring equipments.
Alright, I'm making the switch and getting a digital scale. But what do I do with all of my non-ChefSteps recipes that are not measured in grams, but in cups and spoons? Is there any easy way to convert them? Any go-to resources?
Travis, someone in another page suggested that you utilize the normal volume based measurements but weigh them and decide for yourself how much you normally take off. So say you're getting flour and you find the measuring cup you always use is(I'm making numbers up) 5g, and you need 1 cup of flour. You acquire a cup of flour as you normally would and then weigh it the combined amount, say, it comes out to 40g. You then would subtract the 5g from the 40, and you'd find that you needed 35g of flour to replicate the recipe with consistency.
A technique like this should make it feasible to at least give you a starting point.
Just a note on the two Mettler Toledo scales mentioned above as both are discontinued. The new versions are below: Mettler Toledo JL602GE Mettler Toledo JL6001GE
wished I'd read this. I ended up with a $500 scale for jewelry and no 6KG limit. Time to hope someone buys that off me and I get the ACTUAL one they recommend
I'm looking to upgrade from my second broken AWS high accuracy scale (both lasted a few years, so can't complain for the price). What's the benefit of springing for the Mettler Toledo over the mid-range Ohaus option?
Is there a good update to this article? Would be nice to have more variety.
Just my recommendations for scales:
KD8000 - my daily driver. It’s a bit big, but is what a lot of cooks use—especially bakers. Backlighting & variable auto-off settings including no auto-off. ≈$50 on Amazon
Smart Weigh Digital Pro Pocket Scale - I use this when I need 10ths of a gram or less precision (which is rare). ≈15 on Amazon
Hey, there are *lots* of others too—I know the OXO with the pull out readout gets good reviews—so shop around if you want something different.
Another trick you can use is to weigh the containers the ingredients are in, note down the weights, make the recipe, then weigh them again. Some simple subtraction gives you the amount of each ingredient you used. This can be really effective when you, e.g., add ingredients by taste.
In case that wasn't clear, an example: say you're adding salt to something by taste. Put your salt cellar on the scale, write down its weight. Maybe it's 400g. Cook the recipe, using salt from the cellar. After finishing cooking, weight the salt cellar again, and it's 392g. Conclusion: you used 400g - 392g = 8g of salt.
You will, of course, need a scale that both has enough capacity and accuracy to pull this off — might be hard if you're tweaking a tomato sauce by adding pinches of sugar from a 10lb bag. But, e.g., most spice containers weigh under the 500g limit you can get on an affordable 0.01g scale.
(of course, if its only one ingredient, on a lot of scales you could use tare and let the scale do the math for you. Beware auto-power-off...)
I use digital scales many many times per day, ranging from bulk measurements to fractions of a gram. I've tried MANY scales over the past few years and wanted to share my experiences in addition to (not instead of) the others here. I value not only accuracy but also repeatability and stability.
My primary scale is the Timemore Black Mirror Plus. Its a coffee scale that I first bought for fine measurements of espresso, but it's so good in terms of resolution and stability that it's now become my primary scale. Passes with flying colors the test of repeatability and consistency if you add/remove fractions of a gram. Measures to 0.1g and has a max capacity of 2000g. It's an absolute steal for $52 on Amazon.... I'm amazed it's so under the radar.
When I need finer 0.01g resolution (which isn't that often), I use this inexpensive scale that measures down to 0.01g quite accurately and reliably. Max capacity of 1000g and costs just $21. I've tried several of these inexpensive ones (including the one that Chefsteps recommends and like this one best in terms of usability and accuracy).
As an additional benefit, both have internal batteries and recharge vis USB.
FYI, the link to the Ohaus SJX1502N/E Scout Gold scale is incorrect. It links to the AWS scale's page right now.
Would love to see this list updated.
