h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Over on the Peer Review discussion to Dr Anthea's excellent recipe for chocolate and cherry cupcakes, we've run into problems with the metric system versus the US system, aka the Babylonian cuneiform method of weights and measures. On behalf of my countrypeople, I apologise.

I thought I might explain to anyone who's interested why no matter what anybody says, and no matter what international agreements may or may not have been signed by our ambassadors, metrification of US daily life is NOT going to happen anytime soon.

American humorist Russell Baker wrote correctly that most US people are members of a disorganised group called WAM - We Ain't Metric.

No matter what they put on the packaging, we go on measuring the old-fashioned way.

It might make sense to weigh stuff in the kitchen. I guess it's 'scientific' and all. But our method of cooking requires very little equipment. And no scales. A cup, a tablespoon, and a teaspoon will do it. It's the poor person's approach to cuisine, perhaps stemming from the not-so-distant past when we all cooked on open fires and used utensils that could be carried in saddlebags. Can you imagine Pecos Bill packing a set of kitchen scales on his pony?

Or a California 49er running into the Assay Office?

'Quick, move all that gold dust off'n that-air scale. I need to weigh some sugar for my cake. It's Sourdough Sam's birthday.'

Now, nobody's helping at an official level, either. They make the metric system look too complicated. How?

By labelling the packaging in a metric-unfriendly manner.

Let's do an inventory of the Gheorgheni kitchen.

1 tin evaporated milk. The label says: 12 fluid ounces - 354 ml.

1 large container of coffee; 2 lb 1.9 oz (go figure), 961 grams.

I packet raisinets (chocolate-covered raisins, and they're gluten-free, so hush): 11 oz, 311.8 grams.

1 block of Extra Sharp Cheddar cheese: 16 oz (aka 1 lb), 453 grams.

I tube of Stax potato chips: 5 3/4 ounces (lightweight crisps, standard height container, but could they not spare that extra quarter ounce?), 163 grams.

You get the idea. By making the ounces even, more or less, and the grams uneven, it gives people the impression that Metric Is Complicated. As we all know that the metric system is a Communist Plot started by the French, all is right with the world.

Who is trying to nudge us into metric? The bottled water people:

1 bottle water: 16.9 fl oz, 500 ml.

Aha! A metric conspiracy! Those bottled water people are in league with the Bavarian Illuminati.

It is confusing in the UK too Dmitri but is to some extent a generational thing.

Us people, those who cooked regularly still do tablespoon and teaspoon, or just te judgement brought about by experience.

Younger generations use scales and all manner of things, and even younger ones know only how long it takes to heat in microwave, some of which are controlled by weight, content etf. as I found to my cost yesterday!!

I hadn't the nerve to call my son/daughter in law to ask how to use their microwave, having already sought help to work the DVD/TV on the instructions of my three year old granddaughter.

Over here, a cup is a dodgy measurement - is it a small or large cup, a small or large mug?

Think I am going back under the duvet, this is all too complicated for my brain.

Websailor

You'll like this, then:

In the 1960s, my baby sister was the news bulletin for the neighbourhood. If she didn't know it, it wasn't going on. How an 8-year-old could gather so much information is something the CIA would probably have liked to know.

Anyway, one night at dinner, she announced that Mrs So-and-So had a 'radar stove'.

We all laughed at her. We explained what radar was, etc, and that it wasn't used for cooking food, but for spotting airplanes and such. She was undeterred.

Later, we found out why: the 'Radar Range' was the latest thing on the market.

Oh, Bless

The things children say are such fun.

Websailor

Sorry, but I just saw the large container of coffee and started googling pi mnemonics.


Geggs

Oh, measurements...

Although I mainly use deciliters, the odd 50 gram of butter or fresh yeast, and a tablespoon of this (usually coffee beans, per cup) or a teaspoon or two of that (vanilla sugar, for sponge cake) sneak in. I refuse to use the "spice measure" which equals 1 ml, because it's usually too little (where a teaspoon is better) or too much (where a dash or a pinch seems just right)

Our tins still don't contain even hundreds of milliliters or grams, it's often around a pound of something, or a cup perhaps, so sometimes recipes will say "use two cans of crushed tomatoes". Metric? Basically yes, but far from everything!

Ah. I remember when the cans were standardised. A recipe said, 'take a #2 can of tomatoes', for instance.

"Over here, a cup is a dodgy measurement - is it a small or large cup, a small or large mug? "

As long as it's the same cup throughout the recipe it doesn't matter! That's the beauty of cup measurements.

I'm not but I prefer the imperial system.

Boy, is that true. Cooking is about proportions. When I was about ten, I started learning to bake cakes. I figured out I could make bigger or smaller recipes by multiplying or dividing.

As long as I didn't try to divide one egg...

... but only as long as all the measures are cups! If there is teaspoons vs cups, or number of eggs versus cups, you might need to think twice if you are using a smallish coffee cup, or a large mug, don't you?

Well, we always used the same cups and spoons, and my sister, who raises poultry, insists that adding an extra egg to a cake is the best way to add flavour and nutrition, and use up extra eggs.

Funny you should mention it, Milla, hardly anything in my cooking books are metric. It's all a pinch of this, a teaspoon of that, a tablespoon, a cup, a head of lettuce and a pound of flour - give or take a tablespoon...

apparently ?? in europe, when measuring for food ingredients etcthey STILL use "imperial ounces" as decimalisation don't scale down as good (unsure, so I could be wrong)

I beg your pardon? Imperial ounces? You must be joking! Your mother was a hamster and your father smelled of elderberries!

http://gwydir.demon.co.uk/jo/units/weight.htm

I never thought a simple entry on cupcakes would be such a

"we" aim to please

Hehehe, yes we do

By the way, just to be serious for two seconds: I have never come across ounces and stones in a recipe in Germany or Denmark

Except of course Shel Silversteins soup stone (yep, the two seconds are gone )