Measuring Cup

From Atkinspedia

A measuring cup is a kitchen utensil used to measure liquid or dry substances when cooking. They are also used for the measurement of bulk foods like chopped vegetables or shredded cheese. Around the house they are frequently used to measure cleaning products such as granulated cleaning powders, liquid detergents or bleach. These may be termed gross or approximate measurements as these applications have no great need of precision. They may be made of glass, metal, or plastic. They commonly range in size from a half cup to sixteen cups (4 fl oz — 128 fl oz, though larger sizes are difficult to find in the average retailer.

The term is also used for smaller devices, normally equipped with a handle which range from an ounce to a full two cups in size. These are of great precision and are widely used in baking, where the recipe calls for a level measure.

Measuring cups are ruled (scaled) to the society's common measuring units, though frequently will have both (local) customary units, and metric system units, the latter being multiples of the litre and its ubiquitous submultiple, the millilitre (a.k.a. cubic centimetre – abbreviated as 'cc').

In the United States and most of the Commonwealth, the customary unit is the fluid ounce, its multiple the cup (unit) which is 8 fl. oz., and multiples of cups commonly including pints (2 cups or 2cp or 2c) and quarts. Most of the Commonwealth nations also use the gill (unit), which is simply called a half-cup in the United States (4 fl oz).

However, the British cup and the American cup are not the same size, as the fluid ounce used in the Imperial system is only 96% of the size of USA ounce, as is their respective cup (unit)s. This does not matter for their employment is in measuring household products and for kitchen chemistry. Bulk goods are not sold using a cup as the measure, as trade is typically conducted in statute units, as one fundamental purpose of government is to regulate trade and commerce.

However, the fluid ounce in the United States is slightly larger being than that found in the former empire as the imperial gallon was rationalized to the metric system much earlier, and there are 128 fl oz to each type of gallon. Thus the fluid ounce had to be adjusted as well.

A US fluid ounce measures 29.573 529 562 5 mL and in the United Kingdom the law requires exactly 28.413 062 5 mL.