100 Tablespoons to Teaspoons

One hundred tablespoons is 300 teaspoons, 6 1/4 cups and 50 fluid ounces

Start with the teaspoons. A US tablespoon holds 3 teaspoons, so 100 x 3 = 300 teaspoons. In metric the same count is 100 x 14.78676478125 = 1478.676478125 mL. A tablespoon is exactly half a US fluid ounce, so 100 tablespoons is 50 fluid ounces, and 100 / 16 = 6.25 cups, which is 6 1/4 cups.

Those numbers are not a coincidence in a cookbook. NIST Handbook 44, Appendix C lists 1 tablespoon as 3 teaspoons exactly and 1/2 fluid ounce exactly, and 1 cup as 8 fluid ounces exactly. NIST Special Publication 811, Appendix B.8 carries the metric side: tablespoon 1.478 676 E-05 cubic meter, teaspoon 4.928 922 mL, cup 236.5882 mL and fluid ounce 29.573 53 mL. The Handbook 44 table prints 15 mL for a tablespoon because it rounds the imprecise spoon units to the nearest milliliter. The longer decimal is the one that matches 1/2 fl oz.

The quart is the next landmark. A US quart is 64 tablespoons, so 100 / 64 = 1.5625 quarts. That is one quart plus 36 tablespoons, and 36 tablespoons is 2 1/4 cups. A gallon is 256 tablespoons, so the batch is 0.390625 gallon, a bit under four tenths of a gallon. The table below puts one hundred spoons next to the measures a kitchen owns.

Measuring one hundred spoons with cups, a quart jar and a scale

Six cups plus four tablespoons is the fastest route. Six cups is 6 x 16 = 96 tablespoons, and 96 + 4 = 100. Use a 1 cup measure six times, then add four level spoons. If you own a 4 cup measure, fill it once (64 tablespoons), fill it a second time to the 2 cup line (32 tablespoons), and add the last four spoons. That is two pours and four spoons instead of one hundred counts.

The quart route works from the other end. One quart is 64 tablespoons. One hundred spoons is 36 tablespoons more, and 36 / 16 = 2.25 cups. So a quart jar plus 2 1/4 cups gives the same volume. In a 2 quart pitcher, one hundred tablespoons reaches the 1.5625 quart mark, which sits between the 1 1/2 quart and 1 3/4 quart lines.

For thin liquids, skip the spoons and use a scale. Water, milk, stock, vinegar and juice weigh close to 1478.7 g at this volume, because a milliliter of each is about a gram. Tare the bowl, pour to 1478.7, stop. Olive oil is lighter at 13.5 g per tablespoon, so the same 100 spoons weighs 1350 g. Trust the volume mark for oil, not the gram target, unless your recipe was written on a scale.

Dry goods swing the other way. A cup of all purpose flour scooped straight from the bag can weigh 140 g, while the same cup spooned and leveled weighs 125 g. Across 100 tablespoons, or 6.25 cups, that gap is 6.25 x 15 = 93.75 g. It is enough to turn a batter stiff. Spoon dry ingredients into the cup and level with a knife for any batch past two dozen spoons.

What one hundred tablespoons weigh: butter, flour, sugar and honey

Butter is the easy case, because a US stick is 8 tablespoons and 113.3980925 g. One hundred spoons is 100 / 8 = 12.5 sticks, and 100 x 14.1747615625 = 1417.47615625 g. That is 3.125 lb, or 3 1/8 lb. Three 1 lb boxes hold 3 x 453.59237 = 1360.77711 g, so they fall 56.69904625 g short. Add half a stick, which is 4 tablespoons and 56.69904625 g, and the count lands on the nose.

Dry goods split by density rather than by count. Level all purpose flour spooned into a cup is about 125 g, which is 7.8125 g per tablespoon, so one hundred spoons is 100 x 7.8125 = 781.25 g. Granulated sugar runs 12.5 g per tablespoon, so 100 x 12.5 = 1250 g. Honey is the heavy one. USDA FoodData Central lists honey at 339 g per cup, which is 21.1875 g per tablespoon, so one hundred spoons is 2118.75 g. That is over two kilograms from a jar that looks like a normal jar.

Water sits in the middle at 1478.7 g, since its density is close to 1 g per mL. Honey is denser still at about 1.43 g per mL, which is why the same 1478.7 mL of honey weighs 2118.75 g. Weight and volume only agree for thin liquids, and at one hundred spoons the gap between two identical looking jars is 640 g.

Halving, doubling and thirding a 100 tablespoon batch

Half of one hundred spoons is 50 tablespoons. That is 150 teaspoons, 3 1/8 cups and 739.3382390625 mL. It is also 14 tablespoons under a quart, which is why a half batch fits a 1 quart container with room to stir.

Double the batch and you have 200 tablespoons. That is 600 teaspoons, 12.5 cups, 3.125 quarts, 2957.35295625 mL and 0.78125 gallon. Two hundred spoons is 8 tablespoons over 3 quarts, so a 1 gallon jug takes it with about a fifth of the jug left empty.

A third is the awkward one. One hundred divided by three is 33 1/3 tablespoons, which is 100 teaspoons or 2.083 cups. No spoon set marks a third of a tablespoon, so weigh the third: 1478.676478125 / 3 = 492.892159375 mL. For a third of a butter batch, 1417.47615625 / 3 = 472.492052083 g, which is 4 sticks plus 1 1/3 tablespoons.

Scaling spices needs its own count. If a marinade uses 1 teaspoon of salt per 10 tablespoons of oil, one hundred spoons takes 10 teaspoons, which is 3 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon. Halving the batch drops that to 5 teaspoons. Do not scale salt by the same percentage as liquid if the batch is reducing on the stove, because the water leaves and the salt stays.

US, metric and Australian tablespoons at one hundred

The spoon in your drawer is not a universal unit. A US tablespoon is 14.78676478125 mL. A metric tablespoon is 15 mL, which is what most of the world means by a tablespoon on a nutrition label. An Australian tablespoon is 20 mL, because Australia uses a 20 mL spoon and a 5 mL teaspoon. At one hundred spoons those differences stop being academic.

One hundred US spoons is 1478.676478125 mL. One hundred metric spoons is 1500 mL, which is 21.323521875 mL more, about 1.44 percent. One hundred Australian spoons is 2000 mL, which is 521.323521875 mL more, about 35.3 percent. A recipe from Sydney scaled with a US spoon lands a full 500 mL light, and a sauce that should be thick will stay thin.

The old UK tablespoon sits just under the US one. The imperial pint is 0.56826125 L, so an imperial fluid ounce is 28.4130625 mL and half of that is 14.20653125 mL. One hundred UK spoons is 1420.653125 mL, 58.023353125 mL under the US count. Older British cookbooks often mean that spoon, while modern British recipes usually print milliliters.

A 100 tablespoon batch in jars, trays and a punch bowl

One hundred tablespoons is 50 fluid ounces, and that number decides how many glasses a punch bowl fills. At 4 fl oz per cup, 50 / 4 = 12.5 servings. Add ice and the count rises to about 15 cups, because the melt water stretches the batch. At 6 fl oz per glass, the same batch serves 8.3 people, so a party of 12 needs a double batch.

In jars, one hundred spoons fills one quart jar (64 tablespoons) and leaves 36 tablespoons for a second jar, which is a little over half of a second quart. A half gallon jar holds 128 tablespoons, so the batch reaches 100 / 128 = 78.125 percent of it. That is the fill line to watch when you shake a dressing: too full and the oil has no room to move.

Ice cube trays are a useful unit for stock, pesto and coffee. A standard tray of 16 cubes at 1 tablespoon per cube takes 100 / 16 = 6.25 trays. If you fill each cube with 2 tablespoons, the same batch takes 3.125 trays, or 50 cubes. Freeze in 1 tablespoon cubes when a recipe calls for a spoon of this or that, and in 2 tablespoon cubes when it calls for a quarter cup.

For meat, a marinade at 4 tablespoons per pound covers 100 / 4 = 25 lb. A spice rub at 2 tablespoons per pound covers 50 lb. A dressing at 2 tablespoons per serving dresses 50 servings. Those three numbers are the ones to write on the fridge note, because they turn a volume into a shopping decision.

Four places the 100 tablespoon count goes wrong

The first is the spoon itself. A coffee spoon or a soup spoon is not a measuring tablespoon. A soup spoon can hold 18 to 20 mL, so one hundred of them is 1800 to 2000 mL instead of 1478.7 mL. Use a set that says tablespoon, or weigh the liquid.

The second is a heaping dry spoon. A heaping tablespoon of flour can weigh 12 g instead of 7.8125 g. One hundred heaping spoons is 1200 g, which is 418.75 g over the level count. That is more than three extra cups of flour, and no amount of stirring will fix the dough.

The third is the metric spoon. One hundred 15 mL spoons is 1500 mL, 21.323521875 mL over the US count. That error is small enough for soup and large enough for a cake. The fourth is rounding the cups. Six cups is 96 tablespoons, so calling 6 1/4 cups "6 cups" drops 4 tablespoons, which is 59.147059125 mL.

One more trap sits between fluid ounces and weight ounces. Fifty fluid ounces of water is 1478.676478125 g. Fifty weight ounces is 50 x 28.349523125 = 1417.47615625 g, which is 61.200321875 g lighter. A recipe that says 50 oz almost always means weight, and a recipe that says 50 fl oz means volume. Read the letters.