Marinara Sauce: why 264 g per cup is wrong
USDA SR Legacy "Sauce, pasta, spaghetti/marinara, ready-to-serve" (FDC 171192) publishes 264 g (9.3 oz) per US cup of marinara sauce. This site rejects that figure and publishes 250 g (8.8 oz) instead, from Rao's Homemade Marinara Sauce (producer label) (density 1.0567 g/mL, matching the composition of the substance). The reason:
A sauce that is 88% water cannot weigh 1.116 g/mL. USDA's own composition for this record leaves about 12 g of solids per 100 g, mostly sugars, tomato fibre, oil and salt; those predict about 1.04-1.05 g/mL, which is 246-250 g per cup, and even if every gram of solids were as compact as dissolved salt the sauce would stay under 1.09 g/mL. 264 g per cup would make marinara heavier than tomato paste (262 g per cup), which is only about 75% water. The 132 g half cup reads as a serving weight, not a measured volume.
The arithmetic
| Source | 1 cup | Density | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| USDA SR Legacy "Sauce, pasta, spaghetti/marinara, ready-to-serve" (FDC 171192) | 264 g9.3 oz | 1.1159 g/mL | Rejected on physics |
| Rao's Homemade Marinara Sauce (producer label) | 250 g8.8 oz | 1.0567 g/mL | Published here |
The published figure and its sources
The full sourcing for marinara sauce, including every accepted and rejected figure, the state or filling method behind each, and the physics or standards reasoning applied, is on the ingredient page.
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