- 1/2 cup butter
- 1/2 cup shortening
- 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
How a cook reads the recipe:
- 1 stick of butter
- A couple large dollops of shortening
- 3/4 cup packed brown sugar (or to taste)
- 1/2 cup white sugar (or to taste)
- 1 egg
- a splash of vanilla extract
- a dash of baking soda
- a pinch of salt (or to taste)
- half a bag of semisweet chocolate chips (or to taste)
- 2 cups all-purpose flour (not to taste, this one's important)
How an engineer reads the recipe:
- 1/2 cup butter (+/- 10%)
- 1/2 cup shortening (+/- 10%)
- 3/4 cup packed brown sugar (+/- 10%)
- 1/2 cup white sugar (+/- 10%)
- 1 egg (+/- 10%....wait...)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract (+/- 10%)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda (+/- 10%)
- 1/4 teaspoon salt (+/- 10%)
- 1 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips (+/- 10%)
- 2 cups all-purpose flour (+/- 10%)
How a physicist reads the recipe:
- 0.50000000 cups of butter
- 0.50000000 cups shortening
- 0.75000000 cups packed brown sugar
- 0.50000000 cups white sugar
- 1.00000000 eggs
- 1.00000000 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1.00000000 teaspoons baking soda
- 0.25000000 teaspoons salt
- 1.50000000 cups semisweet chocolate chips
- 2.00000000 cups all-purpose flour
(....why in the world aren't these in metric units?!)
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So I might be exaggerating this a little bit but having been the engineer in a cooking endeavor with someone that knew how to cook and a physicist, I'd say this isn't too far off from the truth.