Illustration by Anamaria Morris
If I baked a chocolate chip cookie for every person who told me they’re great at cooking but “just not a baker,” I could make chocolate chip cookies every day for a year and still need more. Each time I hear this, my first question is always, “But did you use a kitchen scale?” and each time the answer is no. So listen to me, your baking therapist: You need to stop the negative self-talk. It’s not you—it’s your measuring cup. And it’s letting you down!
Here’s why you should bake with a scale:
When I tried using measuring cups on five separate occasions. I got five totally different weights. This! Is! Not! Okay! We all measure flour differently. Some of us dip-and-sweep, others fluff-and-spoon, a few of us live on the edge and simply tilt the bag over the measuring cup, hoping for the best, and there are those who shall not be named who use liquid measuring cups (please don’t). With a baking scale, however, 125 grams of flour (the generally accepted standard weight of 1 cup all-purpose flour) remains 125 grams no matter where and who in the world you are.
Why am I so focused on flour? Because every crumbly cookie, sunken cake, or leaden bread that made you believe you’re a bad baker can almost always be traced back to too much or too little flour. Flour has a structural purpose in baking; given enough moisture and heat it forms a protein network that lends physical shape to your treats. Measuring cups absolutely suck at measuring flour—and when you mismeasure flour, things get weird.
Consider this 2015 hamantaschen recipe in our archives—it’s perfectly lovely on paper, but the reviews were kind of harsh. Readers repeatedly complained of a dry, crumbly dough that wouldn’t come together. When tasked with retesting the recipe, the first thing I did was bake the cookies in their original version with the given volume measurements. It was not great. Definitely crumbly.
This crumbly hamantaschen dough was made with volume measurements. Photo by Shilpa Uskokovic
Undeterred, I made them again, this time using metric weights from our BA standard conversion chart instead. And what do you know? They turned out perfectly. Crisp-edged, delightfully buttery, and hugging a soft belly of filling, they made the perfect case in favor of a baking scale. The only explanation for these vastly different results was that by using cups most bakers were likely putting in too much flour, throwing off the delicate balance between wet and dry ingredients.
The benefits of a baking scale go far beyond flour, though. Ever come across measurements like “a scant ½ cup”? (I’m sorry, what?). It’s never an issue when a recipe is written with weights. Or how about measuring sticky peanut butter or molasses or honey? Ugh, what a nightmare! Or what about when a recipe calls for chocolate or nuts? With so many variables—mini chips vs. regular chips vs. fèves, finely chopped vs. coarsely chopped nuts—a scale is the only way to ensure consistency. If baking makes you nervous, a scale is like a salve for your confidence. It eliminates so many little inaccuracies.
Photo by Shilpa Uskokovic
A baking scale transforms you into a precise and reliable baker. You can scale cookie dough and burger buns and cake batter into tidy, equal portions ensuring an even bake and exact yield. It will also help you to bake faster and with less mess. Why use a full set of measuring cups when you can simply place a bowl on a scale and hit tare to reset the weight to zero between ingredients? Even if a favorite recipe doesn’t list weights, you can use this immensely handy conversion chart from King Arthur Flour to figure them out yourself.
Once you understand the life-changing magic of baking with a scale, you may never, ever use measuring cups again. Hold onto those spoons, though: For very small amounts, like teaspoons, I prefer to stick to volume measures. Most scales measure in 1-gram increments, so they just aren’t sensitive enough to pick up the nuances of something like ¼ teaspoon baking soda.
But for everything else, stick to a certain easy-to-use, lightning-fast, battery-operated device that’s guaranteed to make you very, very happy.