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Mathematically correct breakfast: How to slice a bagel into two linked halves (2009)

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Re: Mathematically correct breakfast: How to slice a bagel into two linked halves (2009)

#101

Post by samatman »

mauvehaus wrote: post #27
modeless wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? As toasters they're merely serviceable but as ovens I find them actually good. They heat up and cool down faster and are convenient for the things that fit in them. Which is actually a lot of things if you're not cooking for lots of people.

Maybe I look at baking differently, but I don't have a lot of recipes that I bake that would fit in a toaster oven. Even when I've cooked for only myself, I've tended to cook in quantity for plannedovers and freezer meals. I hope you'll pardon my hot take above. I don't consider the way I cook to be the only valid one, but it's genuinely never crossed my mind that I'd bake something small enough that a toaster oven m…

It's a whole different lifestyle.

For example: you can bake a full sheet of chocolate chip cookies, eat one or two while they're warm and delicious, and put the rest into a jar to eat over a week. That's a thing you can do. Or.

You can make a batch of chocolate chip cookie dough, and whenever you're feeling like one or two cookies, bake them in the toaster oven. That way you never have to eat a stale cookie, or even a cool one. Whatever minute out of the oven is your ideal cookie, all the cookies are that one.

Re: Mathematically correct breakfast: How to slice a bagel into two linked halves (2009)

#102

Post by acheron »

kingcharles wrote: post #69
squarefoot wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, at least her name isn't Emacs. (ducks and runs)

Just to be safe I'll call my daughter PINE, aka PINE Is Not Emacs.

My sister had twins last year, I should have suggested Pico and Nano.

Re: Mathematically correct breakfast: How to slice a bagel into two linked halves (2009)

#103

Post by phkahler »

the_mitsuhiko wrote: post #83
arrrg wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure about bagels (could just be tradition), though, for example, the Brezen* shape achieves a contrast between crunchy and soft with its shape. Also makes it quite hard and impractical to spread stuff on it (which leads to some just cutting open the large soft part and spreading stuff there which is horrific and wrong), but it’s worth it. Spreadability of stuff on something isn’t the only relevant factor. * not…

So completely useless fact but "Bagel" comes via Yiddish "beigel" from "Beugel" which means "little horn" (similar etymology to "bend"). In Austria and Germany there are still bread products call "Beugel" and they look like a horn ( https://images.ichkoche.at/data/image/variations/620x434/4/b... ). So I suppose the original form might not have been closed yet into a ring.

>> So completely useless fact but "Bagel" comes via Yiddish "beigel"

Around 2005 one of my coworkers from Germany would bring a large box with assorted beers for us when he came to the US. He would always fill it with bagels before returning. He loves bagels but said they don't really have them back home and he didnt know why. I paused and said "oh... they're a Jewish thing." He paused, lowered he head slightly and said "Oh, oops."

Re: Mathematically correct breakfast: How to slice a bagel into two linked halves (2009)

#104

Post by kevinmchugh »

gjvc wrote: post #73
scbrg wrote: post #70

Having grown up in a non bagel rich country, I've been puzzled ever since I first encountered them. What's the point of the weird shape? What's wrong with a square or even circular piece of bread without an inconvenient hole in the middle? For an outside viewer, it looks like someone went out of their way to create a shape that makes it as difficult to deal with as possible, and then mass psychosis took over and ever…

the uniform shape helps ensure even heat transfer for when they are cooked in boiling water (to which is added baking soda), and baked evenly in an oven. (in case you are wondering why they are boiled, it's to develop a chewy crust)

Malt syrup is more traditional and tastier than baking soda

Re: Mathematically correct breakfast: How to slice a bagel into two linked halves (2009)

#105

Post by [deleted] »

dtgriscom wrote: post #89
sandworm101 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2000 that result in an ER visit. No doubt the vast majority do not require such attention. Few injuries involving cars go unreported.

Then there are the bagel injuries so serious they go straight to the morgue. The bagel and news industries conspire to hide these from public view.

[deleted]

Re: Mathematically correct breakfast: How to slice a bagel into two linked halves (2009)

#106

Post by layer8 »

scbrg wrote: post #70

Having grown up in a non bagel rich country, I've been puzzled ever since I first encountered them. What's the point of the weird shape? What's wrong with a square or even circular piece of bread without an inconvenient hole in the middle? For an outside viewer, it looks like someone went out of their way to create a shape that makes it as difficult to deal with as possible, and then mass psychosis took over and ever…

> it looks like someone went out of their way to create a shape that makes it as difficult to deal with as possible

I’d like to introduce you to pretzels. :)

Re: Mathematically correct breakfast: How to slice a bagel into two linked halves (2009)

#107

Post by bryans »

blindmute wrote: post #99
Cpoll wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't xantham gum just a product of sugar fermentation? I'm all for fewer ingredients, but cheese is still as much a "chemical" product if the stabilizers and mold extractors are removed.

Lots of nasty things are "just products" of simple ingredients, like seed oils. If the ingredient was invented in a lab less than 100 years ago, I try not to eat it.

That's rather disinformative. There is nothing about locust bean gum extraction that is unusual or unsafe, and it certainly wasn't "invented in a lab." It's a seed that gets milled into powder.

Re: Mathematically correct breakfast: How to slice a bagel into two linked halves (2009)

#108

Post by newaccount74 »

divbzero wrote: post #64

> What is the ratio of the surface area of this linked cut to the surface area of the usual planar bagel slice? The surface area of the usual planar bagel slice is straightforward, but what’s the most intuitive way to integrate the surface area of a twisting strip?

I think you need to find a parameterisation of the strip X(phi, r), calculate the cross product of the unit vectors (dX/dphi cross dX/dr), then integrate that (X being a 3D vector while phi, r are scalar parameters).

Re: Mathematically correct breakfast: How to slice a bagel into two linked halves (2009)

#109

Post by blindmute »

bryans wrote: post #107
blindmute wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lots of nasty things are "just products" of simple ingredients, like seed oils. If the ingredient was invented in a lab less than 100 years ago, I try not to eat it.

That's rather disinformative. There is nothing about locust bean gum extraction that is unusual or unsafe, and it certainly wasn't "invented in a lab." It's a seed that gets milled into powder.

> Xanthan gum was discovered by Allene Rosalind Jeanes and her research team at the United States Department of Agriculture, and brought into commercial production by CP Kelco under the trade name Kelzan in the early 1960s.

I don't really care what it is exactly; a food additive that didn't exist until a research team found it 60 years ago, I can do without.

Re: Mathematically correct breakfast: How to slice a bagel into two linked halves (2009)

#110

Post by bryans »

blindmute wrote: post #109
bryans wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's rather disinformative. There is nothing about locust bean gum extraction that is unusual or unsafe, and it certainly wasn't "invented in a lab." It's a seed that gets milled into powder.

> Xanthan gum was discovered by Allene Rosalind Jeanes and her research team at the United States Department of Agriculture, and brought into commercial production by CP Kelco under the trade name Kelzan in the early 1960s. I don't really care what it is exactly; a food additive that didn't exist until a research team found it 60 years ago, I can do without.

> I don't really care what it is exactly;

You've made that perfectly clear, but your personal standards for food safety are entirely arbitrary and not reflective of reality. If you tried applying those same standards to medicine, for example, you'd find that simple injuries all of a sudden become deadly and for no legitimate reason.

Also, gums (particularly locust bean gums) have been used in food for hundreds of years, and in other uses for thousands of years. They're nothing new, and your concerns are imagined.

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