Recipe Weights, Scaling & Evaporation

The Recipe Editor gives you full control over ingredient weights, recipe scaling, volume conversions, and cooking evaporation — all in one place. Whether you need to resize a recipe for a different batch size, convert a cup measurement to grams, or account for water lost during pasteurisation, this guide covers every weight and evaporation feature available.

The Weight Summary Bar

In the Recipe Editor you will find three editable fields that control the recipe’s total weight and evaporation. Changing any one of them automatically recalculates the others, so they always stay in sync.

Mix Weight

Mix Weight is the total weight of all base ingredients in the recipe, excluding add-ins (inclusions and infusions). This is the weight of liquid mix that goes into your pot or pasteuriser.

You can type a new value directly into this field and the entire recipe will scale proportionally to match. For example, if your recipe totals 1500 g but you want to make a 2000 g batch, simply type 2000 in the Mix Weight field and every ingredient scales up by the same ratio — no manual maths required.

Final Weight

Final Weight shows the recipe weight after evaporation has been applied. This field is also editable, and its behaviour depends on the current evaporation setting:

• If evaporation is currently 0 % — editing Final Weight calculates and sets the evaporation percentage needed to go from the current mix weight down to the value you entered. This is the easiest way to set evaporation: cook your mix, weigh it, and type the result.
• If evaporation is already set — editing Final Weight scales the mix weight up or down so that after the same evaporation process you end up with the final weight you want.

Evaporation %

The Evaporation field lets you set the percentage of water lost during cooking or pasteurisation. You can type a value directly or use the stepper, which adjusts in increments of 0.5 %.

When you heat an ice cream mix on the stove, water evaporates. The amount depends on several factors:

• Cooking time — longer cooking means more water loss
• Temperature — higher heat increases evaporation
• Pan size and shape — a wide, shallow pan exposes more surface area and loses water faster than a tall, narrow pot
• Whether the pot is covered — a lid dramatically reduces evaporation

For home and artisan producers cooking on the stove, typical evaporation is in the range of 2 % to 5 %. A quick pasteurisation at 72 °C might lose only 2 %, while a longer cook at 85 °C in a wide pot could lose 5 % or more.

For professional pasteurisers and batch freezers, evaporation is usually close to 0 % because these machines have sealed lids and condensation recovery. If you use a commercial pasteuriser, you can often leave this field at 0.

Why does this matter? Evaporation concentrates everything in the mix — sugars, fats, solids — which shifts the recipe balance. A 5 % evaporation on a 2000 g mix means 100 g of water is gone, and all your carefully calculated percentages have shifted. The calculator accounts for this so your final nutritional values and balance targets reflect what actually ends up in the bowl.

The field also shows a tooltip explaining the effective evaporation when some ingredients are marked as cold additions (see Exclude From Evaporation below). The calculator validates that the evaporation percentage does not exceed what is physically possible based on the water content of the recipe.

Changing Individual Ingredient Weights

Direct Weight Entry

Each ingredient in the recipe table has a Weight (g) field. Click it, type a new weight, and press Enter or Tab. The field auto-selects on focus so you can immediately start typing your new value.

Volume-to-Weight Conversion

Each ingredient row has a Volume button (flask icon) that opens the Volume Conversion Dialog. This lets you enter a measurement in millilitres, litres, cups, tablespoons, or teaspoons and convert it to grams — handy when following a recipe that uses volume measurements.

The conversion uses ingredient-specific density data, so cream converts differently from milk, and cocoa powder differently from sugar. For egg ingredients, the dialog includes a special Egg Count converter — enter the number of eggs and the dialog calculates the weight based on standard egg sizes.

Advanced Weight Dialog

For more control over how a weight change affects the rest of the recipe, click the Advanced Weight button to open a dialog with three scaling modes:

• Apply Only — changes only the selected ingredient’s weight. All other ingredients remain unchanged. Use this when you simply want to override a single weight without affecting anything else.
• Scale Proportionally — scales the entire recipe up or down based on the ratio of your change. If you change 500 g of cream to 600 g (a 1.2× increase), every other ingredient also increases by 1.2×.
• Keep Total Weight — adjusts the selected ingredient to your new weight and redistributes the difference across all other unlocked ingredients proportionally, so the recipe total stays the same.

The dialog includes a preview panel listing every ingredient with trend arrows (up, down, or unchanged) so you can see the impact of your change before confirming.

Example: Your recipe calls for 1300 g of cream but you only have 1000 g in stock. Open the Advanced Weight Dialog for cream, type 1000, and choose Scale Proportionally to scale the whole recipe down proportionally — or choose Keep Total Weight to redistribute the 300 g difference across the other ingredients while keeping the same total batch size.

Locking Ingredients

You can lock an ingredient to protect it from being changed during recipe scaling and balancing operations. Locked ingredients display a lock icon and are excluded from proportional adjustments in the Advanced Weight Dialog’s “Keep Total Weight” mode. This is useful for ingredients where the exact amount matters — for example, a stabiliser blend that must stay at precisely 6 g per kilogram.

Recipe-Level Scaling

The Recipe Tools dialog (opened from the Recipe Editor TOOLS button) provides several ways to scale the entire recipe to a specific target size. These go beyond simply editing the Mix Weight field — they let you scale to a volume or to fit a specific machine.

Scale to Mix Volume

Scale the recipe to a target mix volume in millilitres or litres. This is the volume before churning and overrun. The calculator uses each ingredient’s displacement value to determine how much physical space the mix occupies, then scales all ingredients proportionally to reach your target.

This is particularly useful when your equipment measures in litres rather than grams — for example, filling a 4-litre pasteuriser.

Scale to Ice Cream Volume

Scale the recipe to a target finished ice cream volume, accounting for overrun — the air incorporated during churning. If your machine typically adds 30 % overrun, the calculator works backwards from your desired output volume to determine how much mix you need, then scales accordingly.

This is the best option when you need to fill a specific number of containers. If you need 5 litres of finished gelato and your overrun is 25 %, the calculator figures out the exact mix weight required.

Scale to Machine Volume

If you have saved ice cream machines in your account, you can select a machine and scale the recipe to its optimal fill volume. The calculator accounts for overrun to determine the correct mix weight needed to fill the machine to its ideal capacity — so you get a full batch without overfilling.

Evaporation & Cooking Features

Exclude From Evaporation (Cold Additions)

When you add an ingredient after cooking — for example, a cold fruit purée stirred into the mix after pasteurisation, or vanilla extract added at the end — that ingredient should not be affected by evaporation calculations. It was never heated, so it did not lose any water.

The Exclude From Evaporation button (available in the ingredient toolbar) marks an ingredient as a post-cook addition. When enabled:

• The ingredient’s weight is not reduced by the recipe’s evaporation percentage
• The Effective Evaporation is recalculated to apply only to the cooked portion of the mix
• The Evaporation field tooltip updates to show the distinction between base evaporation and effective evaporation

Example: You have a 2000 g recipe with 5 % evaporation. Normally the final weight would be 1900 g. But 200 g of that recipe is a cold fruit purée added after cooking. Only the 1800 g cooked portion loses 5 % (= 90 g), so the actual final weight is 1800 − 90 + 200 = 1910 g. The calculator handles this automatically.

This flag is mutually exclusive with the Inclusion and Infusion flags — an ingredient can only have one of these designations at a time.

Evaporate Ingredient Tool

Also found in the Recipe Tools dialog, the Evaporate Ingredient tool lets you create a concentrated version of a single ingredient by simulating water evaporation from that ingredient alone — before it is added to the recipe.

This is useful when you reduce an ingredient separately on the stove. Common scenarios include reducing cream to make a concentrated base, cooking down a fruit purée to intensify its flavour, or reducing milk to increase solids.

The tool offers three ways to define the concentration:

1. Final weight — set the weight after reduction (e.g. “I started with 500 g and reduced it to 350 g”)
2. Water % remaining — set how much water is left in the reduced ingredient
3. Evaporation % — set the percentage of water removed

The dialog shows the calculated concentration factor and creates a new ingredient with the suffix “_Evap” and adjusted nutritional properties — all sugars, fats, and solids are concentrated proportionally. You can optionally override the PAC/POD values manually using the Brix override if your refractometer reading differs from the calculated value.

Displacement (Volume Estimation)

Each ingredient flagged as an Inclusion can have a custom displacement value (mL per 100 g) that affects ice cream volume estimation. This matters when you scale to an ice cream volume target — the calculator needs to know how much physical space each ingredient takes up in the mix. More info here Volume Estimator

Most liquid ingredients have straightforward displacement values, but solid ingredients like chocolate chips or nut pieces take up more space than their weight alone would suggest. The Displacement Dialog lets you fine-tune this:

• A bulkiness slider (scale of 1–7) with preset examples at each level for quick reference
• A direct mL per 100 g input field for precise control
• A reset option to return to the ingredient’s default value

Cooking Reduction Calculator (Tools Page)

The Cooking Reduction tool on the main Tools page is a standalone calculator for simulating an entire cooking process with multiple ingredients. It is separate from the Recipe Editor’s evaporation features and designed for more complex cooking scenarios.

While the Recipe Editor applies a single evaporation percentage to the whole recipe, the Cooking Reduction tool lets you:

• Add multiple ingredients with individual weights
• Simulate weight loss during cooking and reduction
• Account for straining (removing solids like vanilla pods or tea leaves)
• See how solids and sugars concentrate as water is removed

Use the Cooking Reduction tool when you want to model a complex cooking process in detail — for example, making a crème anglaise base with multiple heating stages, or reducing a fruit coulis. Use the Recipe Editor’s built-in evaporation features for straightforward pasteurisation and simple cooking weight loss.

Quick Reference

What you want to do	Where to find it
Resize the whole recipe by weight	Edit the Mix Weight field in the weight summary bar
Set a specific final weight after cooking	Edit the Final Weight field in the weight summary bar
Set evaporation percentage	Edit the Evaporation % field in the weight summary bar
Change one ingredient’s weight	Edit the Weight field directly in the ingredient row
Change weight with scaling options	Advanced Weight dialog (per ingredient)
Convert a volume to weight	Volume button (flask icon) in ingredient row
Scale recipe to a volume target	Recipe Tools → Mix Volume or Ice Cream Volume
Scale recipe to fit a machine	Recipe Tools → Machine Volume
Mark an ingredient as added after cooking	Exclude From Evaporation button in ingredient toolbar
Set a target final water %	Recipe Tools → Final Water %
Concentrate a single ingredient	Recipe Tools → Evaporate Ingredient
Simulate a full cooking process	Tools page → Cooking Reduction

Related Articles

• Stabilizers and Emulsifiers in Ice Cream
• Freezing Point Depression
• How is PAC and POD Calculated?
• Balancing

Need more help? Visit the Ice Cream Calc Knowledge Base for more guides and tutorials.