I have a commerical size receipe that calls for 4 ounces of liquid ingredient "A" to 2 gallons of liquid ingredient "B". I want to cut this down to home use size so I'd like to know how you convert to get the proportional usage for "A" for 1 pint of "B" and for 1 quart of "B". (I know once I get either the pint or quart measurement, the other is easy). I'm pretty good at math, but I falter I start to deal with fractional teaspoon measurements (plus I don't know how a weight (ounces) relates to a volume (teaspoon) in baking. If anyone can provide any help, I would much appreciate it. Thanks,
Joe (joemagiera at ameritech dot net) snipped-for-privacy@ameritech.net
One US gallon is 128 fluid ounces. Two gallons is obviously twice any of these units. These numbers are how many of the units make a gallon. 4 quarts (32 ounces) 8 pints (16 ounces, 2 to the quart) 16 cups (8 ounces, 2 to the pint) 256 tablespoons (1/2 ounce, 16 to the cup) 768 teaspoons (3 to the tablespoon)
There's no useful relationship between volume and weight. It varies with the ingredient. There are no fractional teaspoon measurements in this.
To convert the "A" amounts, you derive a factor for "B" as a ratio between the original amount and the desired amount, and multiply. For a quart of "B," you need 1/8 of the amount the original recipe calls for (8 quarts in 2 gallons). 1/8 means - to get the percent - to divide 1 by
8 = .125 or 12.5%. You only need 12.5% of the original amount of "A" for the new recipe.
For a pint, 1/16.
For a quart, it's what percent of the original "B" is the new amount? Multiply original "A" by that.(0.125 x 4)=.5 ounce or one tablespoon.
For a pint, same process. It's 1/4 ounce or 1/2 tablespoon or 1 1/2 teaspoons.
Having said all that, not all recipes can be "scaled" like this just by simple arithmetic. Ingredients have a funny way of misbehaving when so drastically changed from the original formulations. Seasonings come out different, batters and doughs stray... like that. It's experiment time.
Actually, I did all the calculations in my head because I already knew the measures I posted above. They're pretty simple: divide 4 by 8 and then by 16. Done. I daresay, a great deal simpler than going to grams, particularly for two gallons of an undetermined liquid to be mixed with
4 ounces of another undetermined liquid. If it's water, the two gallons weigh 7,556.848,884,2 grams but if it's a light oil, two gallons weigh somewhere between 5,261.671,492 grams 5,896.700,81 grams. Hardly an "easy conversion," particularly since we don't know what the substances are.
Two other things occur to me about that:
1) the ounces in the question are *fluid* ounces, not *weight* ounces.
2) we don't know what else might be in the recipe and if, in fact, it would be a good way to go.
FYI to all, I wasn't trying to hide the receipe or doing anything crazy, I was just trying to make it a generic description. It's a receipe for ice cream, the 2 gallons was the cream, and the 4 oz was the extract flavoring.
I didn't assume you were hiding anything, just trying to extract the principles and math behind scaling it down. It didn't really matter what it was for if using these calculations.
But my suggestion would be not to scale that recipe. There are zillions of recipes designed and tested for domestic quantities that don't need any scaling and the estimation, trial and error that goes with it.
What's the recipe for? What flavors? What style of ice cream?
I've added rec.food.cooking to the list above where this sort of discussion is more germane than a baking group.
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