BAN #355: Lime cookie recipe that you very much want, Free scifi app offer

6 September 2021   Issue #355

September 06, 2021

[The planetary nebula M 2-9, winds from a dying star. Credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble Legacy Archive / Judy Schmidt]

GIVEAWAY!

Free stuff! Yay!

Y’all like free stuff, right?

I’m a big science fiction nerd, as you may know (snort). I recently learned of an app called The Companion, which is an entertainment media publisher. It has in-depth articles about a lot of what’s going on in genre these days (with a focus on Stargate, which I adore, but covers a lot of other ground as well, including Star Trek, Star Wars, Marvel, and so on). These aren’t just reviews, but thoughtful essays on theme and meaning and impact. There are daily long reads, podcasts with stars and creators (these are great), invitations to exclusive live events, and the archive of over a hundred articles. I dig it.

They’ve partnered with me to offer you a 3-month membership for free! Normally that’s $21 (paid per month), so this is a cool offer.

Claim your membership at https://bit.ly/Phil3Month.

You can cancel your membership anytime before your three months end and pay nothing.

So sign up! The wormhole’s event horizon awaits.

[Me trying my resting Vulcan/Jaffa face. Credit: Phil Plait]

What’s Cookin’?

It’s a newsletter. Of course there will be recipes.

Last week on Twitter and Instagram I posted a photo of lime sugar cookies my wife made.

I should’ve realized people would want the recipe, and I promised I’d post it in today’s newsletter. So here it is:

Yup. She got it off the internet.

However, going from a recipe to amazing cookies isn’t all that simple; it’s like someone saying all you need to paint beautiful art is an easel, a canvas, brushes, and paints. That’s the recipe, but there may be some artistry involved.

In this case, she made some small changes borne of experience: She used ½ cup of butter and ½ cup of shortening, 3 tsp of lime juice and 3 tsp of zest. Everything else was the same. They were — hurhur — sublime.

But there’s more. For example — and here comes the science — we live in Colorado at an elevation of about 1,700 meters. The lower air pressure means water boils at a noticeably lower temperature, around 94° C (200° F), and that changes a lot about cooking. Some things need to be cooked longer since the water isn’t as hot, but it also means you lose more liquid from a dish at a given temperature and time.

It also means that baked goods behave differently. Cakes are harder to make, because they tend to get bigger air bubbles in them due to lower air pressure. Ironically the cake comes out denser: The bigger bubbles means the bubble walls are thinner and can’t support the sponge as well, so when it cools and the air inside the bubbles compresses, the cake collapses.

Cookies also have issues. It’s also very dry here, and that changes how the cookies interact with air as they bake. A slight change in humidity is obvious when the cookies come out of the oven. It’s weird, but that’s where the artistry comes in: My wife knows how to compensate and correct for these issues, and her baking is almost always incredible.

I’ll note that what I wrote in my tweet is correct, and everyone who ate one agreed: The cookies taste like Froot Loops cereal, except way way better. Make ‘em yourself and tell me I’m wrong.

Blog Jam

What I’ve recently written on the blog, ICYMI

[The light from the distant quasar 2M1310–1714 forms a ring with points along it (and one in the very center) as it’s gravitationally warped by a pair of galaxies on its way to us. From Monday’s article. Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, T. Treu Acknowledgment: Judy Schmidt]

Et alia

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