Convert recipe cups to pints

The cup is the measure an American recipe writes in. It holds 236.5882365 millilitres and comes from dividing the gallon: a gallon holds sixteen cups and a hundred and twenty-eight fluid ounces, so a cup works out at eight ounces[1]. American measuring sets carry exactly those sizes: the full cup, the half, the third and the quarter.

The pint is the next measure up in the same series and holds two cups. The US liquid pint holds 473.176473 millilitres[1]. The imperial pint of the United Kingdom and Ireland holds 568.26125 millilitres[2]. A third measure, the dry pint of 550.6104713575 millilitres, covers dry goods and soft fruit.

There is no culinary measuring cup based on the imperial system[3], and British recipes give grams and millilitres. The figure of 284 millilitres that sometimes appears as a British cup is 10 imperial fluid ounces, half a pint, which an 1894 household book gave as the usual capacity of a tumbler[3].

You choose the pint with the Pint type switcher under the fields. The opposite direction is handled by the pints to cups converter, and the cup itself by the cups to millilitres converter.

Two cups make exactly one US liquid pint. One cup gives half a pint. Four cups give two pints. The split comes out even because the cup was defined as half a liquid pint[1]. Three cups give one and a half pints. Sixteen cups give eight liquid pints, which is a whole US gallon. The same split holds in every American recipe, whatever the ingredient.

With the dry pint the same number of cups gives a smaller figure, because a dry pint holds 550.61 millilitres. Two cups give 0.859 of a dry pint. Eight cups give 3.437 dry pints.

With the imperial pint two cups give 0.833 of a pint and eight cups give 3.331 pints. That measure turns up in recipes and on packaging from the United Kingdom and Ireland.

Divide the number of cups by two and the answer is in liquid pints. Six cups give three pints. Twelve cups give six pints. An odd number ends on a half, so five cups come to two and a half pints.

The other two options carry their own divisors. For the dry pint, multiply the number of cups by 0.4297. For the imperial pint, by 0.4163. Both numbers come from dividing the volume of the cup by the volume of that pint.

The input field takes plain fractions and mixed numbers, so 3/4 or 2 3/4 go in exactly as the recipe writes them. Two and three quarter cups give 1.375 liquid pints.

The measure below the cup is handled by the cups to fluid ounces converter, and the measure above the pint by the pints to quarts converter.

A recipe calling for four cups of blueberries describes 1.719 dry pints, so two baskets cover it. Six cups come to 2.578 dry pints, which is three baskets. Eight cups come to 3.437 dry pints and then you buy four.

Round the answer up, because baskets are sold whole. What is left over keeps in the fridge and goes into the next dish.

American baskets have had a fixed capacity since 1916, when the Standard Container Act set the measures for packages of small fruit, berries and vegetables[4]. A dry pint occupies 33.6 cubic inches, which is 550.61 millilitres[2].

With liquid ingredients the sum runs straight through, because a tub of cream or ice cream is sold by the liquid pint. Four cups then come to exactly two pint tubs.