In today's XKCD What If?, Randall Monroe answers the question, "From what height would you need to drop a steak for it to be cooked when it hit the ground?" posed by Alex Lahey:

At supersonic and hypersonic speeds, a shockwave forms around the steak which helps protect it from the faster and faster winds. The exact characteristics of this shock front—and thus the mechanical stress on the steak—depend on how an uncooked 8 oz. filet tumbles at hypersonic speeds. I searched the literature, but was unable to find anything to help me estimate this.

For the sake of this simulation, I assume that at lower speeds some type of vortex shedding creates a flipping tumble, while at hypersonic speeds it’s squished into a semi-stable spheroid shape. However, this is little more than a wild guess. If anyone puts a steak in a hypersonic wind tunnel to get better data on this, please, send me the video.

If you drop the steak from 250 kilometers, things start to heat up. 250 kilometers puts us in the range of low earth orbit. However, the steak, since it’s dropped from a standstill, isn’t moving nearly as fast as an object re-entering from orbit.

Steak Drop

Take a survey to help scientists improve indoor air quality —

Researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory are studying how the seemingly innocuous things we do in our homes and offices can have big impacts on our health. One of those things is cooking, because the way we cook can affect the air we breathe. Scientists are trying to figure out how to make houses safer, but to do that, they need to understand how people use houses — what we cook in them and how we cook it. You can help by taking this quick, anonymous survey. — Maggie •

J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, the chief creative officer at the Serious Eats Blog, is a mad kitchen-science genius. Here at BoingBoing, we've posted about his past experiments demonstrating that there's no reason to waste money on expensive cleavers; that foie gras isn't necessarily evil; and that McDonald's hamburgers will, in fact, rot (under the right conditions).

Now, just in time for your Thanksgiving planning, Lopez-Alt puts turkey brining to the test, running a series of trials comparing the meat-moistening results of various brining solutions, dry salt rub, tap water, and a plain control turkey breast. His conclusion: Don't bother with the brine. Not because it doesn't work — brined turkey does produce nice, moist meat. But because it also produces meat that's kind of soggy. You'll get nearly as good results, without the texture problems, out of dry salt.

I particularly enjoyed this part, where Lopez-Alt explains why the results of brining with water aren't any different from the results of brining with broth.

There are two principles at work here. The first is that to the naked eye, broth is a pure liquid, in reality, broth consists of water with a vast array of dissolved solids in it that contribute to its flavor. Most of these flavorful molecules are organic compounds that are relatively large in size—on a molecular scale, that is—while salt molecules are quite small. So while salt can easily pass across the semi-permeable membranes that make up the cells in animal tissue, larger molecules cannot.

Additionally, there's an effect called salting out, which occurs in water-based solutions containing both proteins and salt. Think of a cup of broth as a college dance party populated with cheerleaders (the water, let's call them the Pi Delta Pis), nerds (the proteins, we'll refer to them as the Lamba Lambda Lambdas), and jocks (the salt, obviously the Alpha Betas). Now, at a completely jock-free party, the nerds actually have a shot at the cheerleaders, and end up co-mingling, forming a homogenous mix. Open up the gymnasium doors, and a few of those cheerleaders will leave the party, taking a few nerds along for the ride. Unfortunately, those gymnasium doors are locked shut, and the only folks strong enough to open them are the jocks. So what happens when you let some jocks into that party?

Learn the answer by reading Lopez-Alt's full article at SeriousEats

At Acculturated blog, Abby W. Schachter writes about "bobos," short for bourgeois bohemians, and evidence that big consumer brands are now marketing to them with highly mockable DIY gear that re-creates artisanal (or, depending on your point of view, obsolete) food production methods.

Case in point: William Sonoma's new upscale DIY kitchenware collection, called the Agrarian Guide, where one can purchase "a reclaimed rustic chicken coop for $759.95... a Warre beehive made from “untreated Western Red Cedar” that retails for $399.95, a vinegar pot for $90, an $80 fermentation pot to make “your own sauerkraut,” and a hand crank Burr grinder grain mill retailing for $675.95. The accompanying grain mill clamp will set you back another $105.95."

Read the rest here.

I vacillate between coveting everything in the catalog, and wanting to mock everything in the catalog. Either way, I cannot wait for the Portlandia sketch.

(via Virginia Postrel)

Mark and I are both big fans of Timothy Ferriss, author of The 4-Hour Workweek and The 4-Hour Body. Many things that Tim says about fitness, diet, work, and life-hacking have really resonated with me over the years. But beyond the subjects Tim writes about, it's his approach to learning that truly inspires me whenever we see each other or I read his stuff. Like many people I know (including me), Tim is a novelty addict. He's curious about most everything and when he wants to know something, or know how to do something -- like cook, salsa dance, kick-box, speak Japanese, or hold your breath for crazy lengths of time -- he seeks out the experts and immerses himself utterly and completely in the subject matter. That's why I'm excited to read Tim's new book The 4-Hour Chef, due out in a few weeks. I'm sure it has lots of great information about how to cook, but according to Tim it's really a book about how to learn anything. That's perfect because there's a lot I've got to learn. Listen for Tim on a coming episode of our Gweek podcast. Congrats, Tim!

"The 4-Hour Chef: The Simple Path to Cooking Like a Pro, Learning Anything, and Living the Good Life" (Amazon)

Things that almost make you want to go back to school —

A new trend: Colleges offering chemistry cooking classes as an undergraduate science course. — Maggie •

The Leidenfrost Effect is a lovely sounding name for some very strange and nifty physics.

When you heat up a liquid, it will, eventually, boil away into a gas. Different liquids have different boiling points. But here's the weird catch: When you suddenly put a liquid in contact with something much, much hotter than its boiling point, the liquid doesn't instantly evaporate. Instead, it forms a little cushion of vapor between itself and the heat source. You can imagine it like a hovercraft moving over the surface of a lake. The cushion doesn't prevent evaporation—and it doesn't last long—but it does slow down evaporation enough that you can see the liquid moving around on the hot surface for little bit like everything is just fine and dandy.

This video was made as a promotional piece for Modernist Cuisine. The Leidenfrost Effect matters for cooking because it allows you to tell when you have successfully heated up a pan. If the temperature of the pan is above the Leidenfrost point, then you can sprinkle it with water and watch the droplets bandy about on the hot metal. In this case, though, they used liquid nitrogen.

Via Geeksaresexy and cafonso

Just look at it. Contributed to the Boing Boing Flickr Pool by BB reader Laser Bread, who explains:.

My kids were grumpy at breakfast this morning, so I had this idea to make a quick banana peel trucker hat for the banana to wear using the peel of the banana. This cheered them up and it made the banana look relatively hip.

How to make:

1 or 2 bananas. One to make the hat, one to model the hat. This could also be made using one banana. Carve the shape of the hat using an x-acto knife. Leave one of the banana peel sides longer, to make the rim of the hat. Most bananas come with a little sticker. Use this sticker to serve as the logo on the hat, if you want your hat to have a logo.

Simple project, takes about 5 minutes yet the memories will last a lifetime.

Chow rounds up some delicious alternative uses for waffle-irons, ice-cream makers, and slow cookers. The criteria are: "(1) the food should taste as good or better than when made in the conventional manner, (2) the cooking time should be equal to or shorter than normal, and (3) the method should use the appliance in a way that’s totally different from what it’s known for." They were a lot more thorough with the waffle-iron than the other two (muffins, brownies, and hash browns), though slow-cooker souffle sounds lovely.

Soufflé
To make this Smoked Cheddar Soufflé in a slow cooker, start by filling a small saucepan with water and bringing it to a boil over high heat. Once the water is boiling, reduce the heat to low, cover the pan, and let the water simmer while you prepare the soufflé. Follow steps 1 through 5 of the recipe, without preheating the baking sheet.

Once the soufflé is ready, pour about 2 cups of the simmering water into the slow cooker and place the soufflé dish in the water (the water should come a third to halfway up the sides of the dish). Cover the slow cooker and cook the soufflé on high until it has puffed and is set in the middle, about one hour and forty-five minutes.

Common Appliances, Uncommon Uses - Feature - Food News - CHOW (via Neatorama)