[Stevi-rocks]

I have shopped on line for a digital nutritional scale and have ended up confused. I'm not comfortable purchasing a scale I haven't operated for $50-$100. I thought maybe some of the ladies here might have some suggestions. Are they useful? Is the manual scale gonna do the trick, so save my $$$? If you use one, do you like it? Which one do you have? Any input would be appreciated.

[tobetheman]

I also need to measure a lot, and wasn't even thinking of one but now I am as I did a google search on ur question. If u decide to go with digital then here's a site that gives info on important things to consider when searching for one. http://www.digitalscalenews.com/dietscales.htm

I personally don't know that I would throw down 50 or more for one unless I was always cooking meals from scratch.

[Gardenwife]

We bought one that serves double duty for us. I wrote a review of it here: Tipping the Scale: The My Weigh Ultraship 50. We've had it since November and it's still going strong.

I love its features and appreciate being able to weigh big packages AND bulk quantities of stuff; when I make a big pot of bean soup, I can just weigh the empty pot first, then weigh the full pot and subtract the pot's weight. That way, I don't have to fuss with measuring out how many cups of it there are...I know how many ounces of food there are total and I can measure it out into various sized containers for freezing without measuring each portion.

It makes it so much easier to figure the calories per serving when I make a lot of something!

Hope that helps!

[sugarlove]

Nutritional scales are different than regular scales - they do more than just weigh food, they actually provide information (based on the weight) such as the calories, fat and carbs of the item being weighed. I just wanted to mention that, as the above posts are geared more to regular scales, not nutritional scales.

My child has Type 1 diabetes, and as a result of this, we need to know the exact carb count for everything he eats. We bought the Salter Nutritional Scale, model 1450 - this was based on a recommendation from the dietician on his diabetes care team.

http://www.rightonscales.com/web/1450.htm

The scale is amazing - I wouldn't trade it for the world!!!! We opted for the 1450 over the 1400 as we liked the look of it better, and because we liked the built in food database (over 1400 foods, compared to 900) of the 1450 over the manual-entry database (you have to look up a food code and enter it) of the 1400. It works incredibly well, and is something we all use every day now. It's helped us so much - for instance, if my son wants a banana, instead of guessing the carbs based on a calorie/carb book (the banana in front of me never seems to match the size of the one in the book!), I can weigh the actual banana he's going to eat and find out the exact carb count for THAT banana.

I'm calorie counting, and the scale is worth it's weight in gold for that reason, too. It's wonderful to be able to weigh a chicken breast, for example, and know not only the weight but the actual calories for that piece of chicken (I hate guesstimating based on a calorie-counting book!). You also get other information, such as fat, saturated fat, fibre, GI rating, etc.

Other features of the 1450 are the ability to add your own custom foods to the database, and a handy "quick list" of the foods you weigh the most. I'd highly recommend it, and it's more than worth the money....can't say enough good things about it!

[Canadian_Mickey]

Susie, I bought the 1400 Salter scale, and I LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!! My hubby is diabetic, and it is great! Definately a good deal!!! Our Diatician let us borrow one for a few weeks, to see if we liked it before we justwent out and bought it... LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!!!

[wkempy23]

the EatSmart Nutrition Scale. I bought the item off Amazon last year after it was recommended to me at my local Joslin Diabetes Center. Its a little pricey at $75, but i found it to be very practical. The database of 1000 foods contained items I should be eating (no junk). The two major advantages of the Salter i used to have was that a) i could weight foods with a USDA nutrition facts label via their "nutrition facts calculator" and b) i could fit a plate onto the scale and not block the display.

To me highly recommended and well worth the money.

[mayness]

If you'll be logging your food on a site that calculates calories anyway (which is what I've always done) just a plain old digital scale will be fine. I bought a $30 one from Salter, it has two buttons -- one to turn it on and zero it, and one to change between ounces/pounds and grams. It has lasted me over 2 years now, and I've only changed the battery once! It's very similar to this one.