Pinch, splash, to taste
Recipes on this site give exact amounts wherever the amount matters. A few words are left vague on purpose: the right amount depends on your taste or your ingredients. Other recipes and cookbooks use many more. Here is what they mean.
Dry amounts
| Word | Roughly | What it looks like |
|---|---|---|
| Pinch | 1/16 tsp. Salt: 0.4 g. Pepper: 0.2 g | What you hold between thumb and two fingers |
| Dash | 1/8 tsp | A quick shake from the jar |
| Handful | 25–30 g nuts or cheese; 30 g leafy greens | One loose handful, not packed |
| Knob (of butter) | 1 tbsp, about 15 g | A piece the size of a walnut |
Liquid amounts
| Word | Roughly | What it looks like |
|---|---|---|
| Few drops | Under 1/4 tsp | Hot sauce, sesame oil: shake, don’t pour |
| Splash | 1 tsp to 1 tbsp (5–15 mL) | Tip the bottle, count one, stop |
| Drizzle | 1–2 tsp | A thin line of oil over the finished dish |
| Glug | 1–2 tbsp | One pour from a full bottle |
When a recipe says a splash of something strong (vinegar, soy sauce, lemon juice), start at the small end. You can add more. You can’t take it out.
To taste
“To taste” means: start small, taste, add more. It does not mean “any amount”. Usually it applies to salt, pepper, acid (lemon, vinegar) or heat (chili).
- Add a pinch.
- Stir and taste.
- If it tastes flat, add another pinch. Repeat until it tastes like itself, only more.
Salt covers how to taste in more detail, and how to fix too much.
On this site, “to taste” ingredients still have a starting amount (usually a pinch per serving), and that amount is counted in the nutrition facts. Every extra pinch of salt adds about 150 mg of sodium.
Other words
- Season: add salt and pepper.
- Level spoon: filled, then scraped flat with a knife. Every spoon measure on this site is level.
- Heaped or rounded spoon: as much as the spoon holds without spilling, about 1.5 times a level one.
- Scant: a little under. A scant tablespoon is about 2.5 tsp.
- Generous: a little over.
- To serve / to garnish: optional. The dish works without it.