Differences between meal size, serving size, base quantity

[FunctionDJ]

Hi, can someone explain the differences to me? I have skipped them for custom meals until now and just use the "per 100g/ml" and then specify how much i consumed and it works.

[XavierRolex]

Hey @FunctionDJ ! Just wanted to share what I’ve learned after finally looking into the difference between meal size, serving size, and base quantity.
Serving Size
This is just a standard or typical amount of food that’s used for reference on nutrition labels. Like:

• 1 slice of bread

• 1 cup of rice

• 40g of cereal

You don’t have to follow it—it’s just a way to show nutrition info in a way people are used to seeing.

Meal Size
This refers to the total amount of food you actually ate in a meal. So if you create a custom meal, you could say:

• 150g of pasta + 100g of chicken + 50g of sauce
  That would make the meal size 300g.

It’s useful if you want to log the whole meal in one go.

Base Quantity
This one matters when you’re entering nutrition info manually. It’s the amount the nutrition facts are based on—most commonly per 100g/ml, but sometimes per 1 piece, 1 bar, etc.
So if the calories, protein, etc. are listed per 100g, and you eat 250g, then the app just multiplies the values by 2.5.

I've just been using "per 100g/ml" as the base and then logging the amount I ate—and it works perfectly. But knowing this makes custom meals easier to understand!
Hope that helps you too :)

[FunctionDJ]

@XavierRolex Thanks a lot!

Here in Germany all food items i've seen with nutrition info have per 100g/ml, so i guess i don't need the base quantity that often since that's the default.