Question re: Whole Wheat Spaghetti

Does anyone know off-hand how many strands of whole wheat spaghetti are in 2 ounces (a serving)?

MOLLY

okay, this is really depressing, but i think i read somewhere that a serving is eight strands.  i've tried to repress that memory.

8 strands!? no way! =) i just googled it and came up with a half-inch diameter worth of dry strands.

I weighed 2 ounces of whole wheat spaghetti last week and it was  more than 8 strands.  Even the half-inch diameter seems a little small, but it could have been.  I would say it was somewhere between 1/2" and 1" diameter.

You don't have a scale?  Even a postage scale will do.  That's how I did it. 

I have a scale ... I don't have spaghetti ... LOL!  A friend called me and asked and I told her I'd try to find out for her!!!

MOLLY

Lol.   Well, that is a dilemma.

I'd say the 1/2" diameter is be fairly close.  If she got about that much it would probably be close enough, I would think. 

Oh my god! I just counted it the other day! I don't remember why, but I measured out 2 ounces and then counted that it was about 75 strands of spaghetti. My scale isn't really accurate but it should be around there with average sized spaghetti strands. Haha I thought I was insane to do that but I guess I'm just as sane as your friend! lol :)

oh wait am i reading it wrong? how could it be 8 strands?

wow.  that's good news, because i just had spaghetti, and you can bet it was more than eight strands.

maybe it was a nightmare....

I don't know about strands, but I know that 2 oz dry yields 1 cup cooked.  It's definitely way more than 8 strands.  That's a myth.  I usually start out with a bundle the size of a nickle in diameter (dry) and cooked it comes just about to one cup.

The serving size in grams is 56, and each strand is about 1g give or take. At some point, I was actually counting instead of weighing and I'd count 58 strands per serving.

We have a digital scale (and I  set it to ounces)  so.... I just now weighed our whole wheat spaghetti, and once it arrived at 2 oz, it was 89 strands. However, I continued adding strands and could get 5 more on while still at 2 oz, so a TOTAL of 94 STRANDS is 2 ounces according to our scale, for average ww spaghetti.

And I agree, it is about the size of a nickle (maybe a teeny bit smaller) when you look at it, but I didn't actually get a nickle out, lol. 

Though Molly,  I imagine that your friend has probably either long eaten the spaghetti or given up, LOL 

I usually estimate based on the box.  If it is a 100 gram pkg and a serving is 20g it would be 1/5th the box.  The scale is better I guess.

My whole-wheat spaghetti package gives the calories PER OUNCE.  Figure the calories you need to adhere to, and then refer to the TOTAL PACKAGE weight.  If it's SIX OUNCES, and ONE OUNCE is what you need to follow, then it's 1/6 of the package - easy to lay out the strands, and once measured, stand up on the head of a quarter, or nickel, and now you've got the proper 'coin' to measure it out again.  Diane