About this notebook
Who writes it, why everything is measured, and what you won’t find here.
Portion Notes is a cooking notebook kept by an amateur home cook in a small kitchen. I’m not a chef, and I’m not trying to tell anyone how much they should eat. I just like cooking things more than once and getting them right the second time.
That’s where the measuring comes in. Most of my kitchen disasters weren’t about flavour: they were about quantities. Too much pasta, too little soup, a smoothie that turned out to be four glasses, a splash of milk that changed every morning. Writing down the amounts, in grams, millilitres, ladles or palms, turned out to be the simplest way to cook the same meal twice.
What you’ll find here
- Recipes with the portions written down: how many bowls, boxes or plates a recipe really makes, and how I divide it.
- Kitchen basics: dry and cooked weights, halving a recipe, the containers and spoons I measure once and then trust.
- Hand portions and the plate sketch: rough visual comparisons I use when the scale stays in the cupboard.
- Meal prep and the freezer: dividing a batch before it’s packed away, labels and lists.
- Drink portions: what a glass actually holds, checked with a measuring jug.
What you won’t find
No diets, no promises about what any food will do for you, and no advice tailored to anyone’s health. If you have specific dietary needs, a qualified professional is the right person to ask, not a notebook on the internet.
There are no adverts, no sponsored posts and nothing to buy. I don’t mention brands, partly because it doesn’t matter which tin of tomatoes you buy, and partly because I like it that way.
Why no name?
Because the recipes matter more than the cook. This is a personal notebook that happens to be public, and I’d rather keep it about the food. You won’t find my face here either, only my hand, occasionally, next to a plate.
A note on the numbers
Every quantity on this site comes from my kitchen: my scales, my jug, my spoons and my appetite. They’re starting points, not standards. Where I give approximate calories, as on the drink portions page, they’re rounded examples and the label on your own food always wins.
If you’re new here, the hand-portion cheat sheet and the six-bowl lentil soup are good places to start.