Vegan Meal Prep Math · Chapter 1

One Pot, Four Portions

A portion is the cooked weight divided by the number of boxes. Weigh the pot, divide once, and every box is fair.

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Opens on the book's Freezer Month. Change any number to your own and press Calculate.

Scale the recipe (optional)

Count the dinners (optional)

Enter the scale reading and the portions, then press Calculate.

The formula

  • Food = scale reading − the empty pot (or tare the scale with the pot on it)
  • From the pot, each box = food ÷ portions; add each box's share of a side cooked separately, and anything added whole
  • Fair split: fill every box but the last to the portion rounded down to what your scale reads; the last box takes the rest
  • Scaled batch = every ingredient × the same factor. Batches = people × dinners ÷ portions a batch, rounded up
The book's worked example, Chapter 1. The chili's pot weighs 4,054 g of food once cooked, so each of 8 boxes takes about 507 g (17.9 oz). The dal's 3,641 g gives 455 g a box, plus 148 g of the 1,187 g of brown rice: 604 g. A burrito is 377 g of filling and one 70.9 g tortilla: 448 g. Five recipes × 8 = 40 portions, 20 dinners for two.
Check it. Multiply back: the boxes' weights add up to the food in the pot. If the last box is short, a box above it was overfilled.

Honest limits. Weigh, don't scoop: a cup of the same food varies a lot, and a pot's cooked weight depends on how much steam left it. The book's pot weights are worked examples; weigh your own pot empty, write its weight on tape on the pot, and weigh it full. Prices are illustrative US prices from November 2026, shown without a currency sign; put in your own. Everything stays in your browser: no sign-up, nothing stored.

These calculators go with Vegan Meal Prep Math (Craft & Studio, Book 4), where every number on this page is worked by hand.