Cake Wrecks is the blog and book of when professional cakes go hilariously wrong, by Jen Yates. But a cake wreck is also a useful metaphor for how easy it can be to misinterpret instructions—often by simply taking something literally when it was expected to be interpreted. Examples from Jen's collection include a smart-looking cake with "Nothing" written across the front, a graduation cake with "I want sprinkles" next to a graduation cap, or a cake sporting a full "Happy birthday on a gluten-free cake." If you haven't seen them, you could do much worse than look some up now. It's easy to laugh at these examples, but it's also easy to find real examples in day-to-day work.

I learned about cake wrecks from Jeff Patton's excellent book User Story Mapping. He gives cake wrecks as an all too common example of communication in software development. For example, a user story or specification for a feature is written and passed on to developers who, in the absence of other communication and with perhaps cultural or status barriers, may carefully build exactly what is written rather than what the writer intended. Cake wrecks are funny and silly—except if it was for your special occasion—but mistakes in projects are expensive in time, money and relationships and are worth avoiding.

The recipe for avoiding a cake wreck is, in principle, simple:

Don't assume that what you see is what someone else will see

Use stories and specifications as tools for talking about what's needed and not as equivalents of it

Create a safe space for everyone to question what they don't understand or don't agree with

Give everyone the 'why' behind a project and autonomy and flexibility to suggest other ways to meet the goal

Check in during a project and adjust as needed

Cake wreck

The tomato test, or tomato slicing test, is a handy way to see if your knives could do with sharpening. The idea is that a properly sharpened blade should slice through the taut skin of a tomato with minimal pressure.

Somewhat counterintuitively, most cooks seem to agree that sharp knives reduce the risk of accidents as you don't have to push down as hard as with blunt knives.

To do the tomato slicing test: Place a tomato on a board and gently run the knife over the top surface. A sharp blade will glide through the tomato skin, cutting it precisely all the way down. You shouldn't need to apply any pressure if the knife has weight. If you need to push down to pierce the skin, it could be time to sharpen.

Cutting the top off the tomato first allows it to sit stably on its end, so you don't have to hold it.

Alternatively, you could use a serrated knife which is handy for foods with a hard outside and a soft inside.

The sharper the knife, the less mess you'll make and the easier you can ghost cook.

The tomato test

Metrics are like an onion: full of layers.

A simple question to ask can often be complicated to answer. Or we may find that we need to ask a different question. While it'd be lovely to have one simple metric to understand our business the reality is usually a lot more nuanced and interesting than it first seems.

Averages will deceive. Vanity metrics may wow —  by, say, quoting a total user count and conveniently ignoring whether those users are actually paid, active, or leaving. Growth overall can hide declines in other areas or product lines and vice versa. The people on monthly subscriptions may be doing great, while revenue from add-ons may be declining. New users may be signing up in droves while existing users are churning. Mobile traffic may be different from desktop, online sales different from store sales... In practice, it's the hard questions we're usually asking even if we don't know how to ask them.

It pays to carefully consider what you're trying to learn and to understand all aspects of a business before putting faith in the numbers. And it may make sense to start with simpler metrics first.

The metrics onion

While I sometimes find myself drinking coffee and reading a book with a little background music, the basic idea of this Zen proverb seems sound. Stay in the moment. Don't try to do things at the same time. Focus on what you're doing. Leave the phone in the other room. Avoid continuous partial attention.

This proverb has stuck with me since I first came across it in a NYT article from Michael Pollan in 2009, no longer available online. He later published a summary of much of his food wisdom in his simple, approachable book: Food Rules. Several of them I realised I'd covered in some form here as sketches:

If it's not good enough for bugs, it's not good enough for you

Sketch in the ligne claire art style of Tintin.

When drinking tea, just drink tea

Traditionally, stocks have the flavour and gelatinous collagen-y thickness that comes from cooking bones. Broth was cooked not with bones but with the meat itself. While a jus is a sauce made from the pan drippings, usually from a roast. This simple distinction I learned from Thomas Keller.

Now, you can also have vegetable stock, so some other useful distinctions between stock and broth include that, generally, stock is intended to be used in the preparation of another dish rather than eaten directly like broth. As such, you would more likely use whole vegetables in stock to impart the flavour, but still scoop them out afterwards, while a broth would have cut vegetables ready to eat in the broth itself.

Stock, Broth, Jus

If you like pomegranate but are put off by the prospect of the effort of pulling out each individual seed and spraying pomegranate juice across the kitchen, then this is a fun and handy tip.

a bowl of water helps stop spraying when pulling them apart and naturally separates the light fluffy pith from the seeds, and 

whacking them on the back with a spoon is a surprisingly effective and fun way of making the seeds shoot out.

Deseed a pomegranate

Before getting started in your kitchen both Thomas Keller and Gordon Ramsay picked out this safety tip to stop your chopping board slipping while cutting. Just lightly wet a piece of kitchen towel or a tea towel and lay it flat between the surface and your chopping board. Hey presto! No slipping while cutting so all your fingers stay intact even with those tricky butternut squash.

Stop chopping board slip

Together, and with the help of a small bowl of water, let’s save millions of perfectly good eggs from being thrown away using the egg float test. Egg shells are very slightly porous. Over time, air seeps into the shell making it lighter than it was, and, when it is old and no longer good to eat, it floats. Hence, the egg float test.

Here's how to test your eggs. Carefully, place an egg into water taking care not to crack it, and watch. If the egg:

…sinks to the bottom and sits on its side, then it’s fresh and good to eat.

…sinks to the bottom but perches on its end, then it’s good to eat, but should be eaten soon — it’s been around long enough to get enough air in it to start lifting it off the bottom.

…floats to the surface, then it’s old and likely no longer good to eat.

Word is that it’s not a good idea to wash eggs well before you plan to use them as it removes a natural membrane coating on them called bloom that protects the eggs from bacteria. So best to only wash them when you’re ready to eat them.

Now, does anyone know of an equivalent test for avocadoes?

The Egg Float Test

That classic thing: tomatoes are really a fruit — well, a whole lot of other vegetables are technically fruit too. I do find this way of thinking of it helpful:

Fruit — ovaries developed from the flowering parts containing seeds. They’re basically what grows where the flower was.

Vegetable — other edible parts of a plant. So basically, anything else, with a handy list being: leaves, roots, stems and flowers.

So this makes tons of other common vegetables actually fruit, including peas, avocadoes, cucumbers, eggplants, bell peppers and more. And corn and raspberries are still rather complicated.

Some other fruit and veg sketchplanations:

what’s the difference between mandarins, clementines, satsumas and tangerines?

Fruit vs vegetable

In the UK and certain temperate latitudes there’s a period where the weather gets warmer and the season late for the winter crops, while the temperatures can still be too low for the Summer crops to get going. This period is known as the Hungry Gap — from late April, through May and a little of early June — as it’s hard to pick enough crops locally at that time of year to live off.

Ellen Warrell at Riverford Organic Farmers explains the Hungry Gap including ways to manage it. For example, did you know that “Trucking tomatoes over from Spain uses just a tenth of the carbon compared with growing them in the UK using heat.”

The Hungry Gap

A cheeseboard is a highlight of the holidays for me. Here are some simple guidelines on how to create a winning one that looks and tastes the part.

I think the key really is the range of textures in the cheese. If you’ve got a hard, semi-hard, and soft cheese you’re onto a good start. If you can add in a crumbly and creamy and make sure you have a range of strengths from mild to mature, stinky or blue you’re onto a winner. Then make it amazing by adding complements from the sweet and salty buckets and don’t forget the crackers and breads.

If you want show off, try to cover a range of cheese shapes, colours and milks such as goats and sheep as well.

Also see, Don’t cut the nose off brie and Compliment, Complement, Freeze stilton.

And because you may find yourself curious about it: origins of Boxing Day.

Compose a cheeseboard

This is the triangle between the most key parts of a kitchen — the sink, the hob and the fridge. The idea is that, when planning the layout of a kitchen, you should consider that you’ll be moving between these three regularly. Ideally, if you can get them just a step or a turn away from each other then your kitchen will be efficient and feel a pleasure to use.

Another handy thought is to allow trips to and from the fridge while someone may be preparing food without getting in their way — so having the fridge not deep at the back of the kitchen can be handy.

Plus, there’s a useful secondary triangle to consider between the sink, the dishwasher and your storage. Think rinse, dishwash and put away without having to trek back and forth across the kitchen all the time.

A more recent concept is to think of zones instead, such as the preparing zone, the cooking zone, the washing zone or the backing zone and make sure each of these has everything you need in them for the activity.

And make sure when the dishwasher is open there’s room to walk around it without it getting totally in the way. Also see: how to load a dishwasher well.

The kitchen working triangle

Crossmodal perception is when senses interact in sometimes surprising ways. Some fun examples:

Coffee tastes better when you don’t have a loud coffee machine near you, and it also tastes more intense and less sweet if the mug is white.

In the atmosphere of a pressurised cabin when flying, with decreased humidity and air pressure and significant background noise, things taste less sweet or salty.

If you can’t hear the crunch of, say, a Pringles potato chip, then it tastes less fresh.

You might enjoy Nicola Twilley’s super New Yorker article, The Illusion of Taste, which has more of the science and plenty more examples.

Crossmodal perception

So, you finish a packet of crisps, or chips, and scrumple the packet up, but in just keeps uncrumpling and tries to blow away. No longer. This handy little bit of origami creates a neat and tidy little triangle that keeps your crisp packet behaving. Give it a try next time.

HT: Dave Barker taught me this about 20 years ago. I still find it useful.

Tame unruly crisp packets

A word from the Sami people of Northern Norway, Finland or Sweden, from ‘coffee’ and ‘boil’, used as a measure of distance for how far you can go before you need a cup of coffee.

Kaffikok

These large bottles are seriously impressive to see. They also have neat names from biblical kings for reasons I don’t know. There are a few more gradations, and some sizes and names are only for sparkling wines like champagne and some not. And there are some that even get significantly larger than the 20 bottles in a nebuchadnezzar, though I’ve never seen one.

Party bottle sizes

I first had a santo libre in Belize and, given how popular cuba libres are, I was surprised I’d never heard of it. Basically, it’s rum + Sprite or lemonade + a little lime juice. I am hereby spreading the word of this excellent drink.

Santo libre, cuba libre

The data vary, but for a medium-sized adult you can probably expect half of the caffeine from that 3pm cup of coffee to still be doing half of its thing about 7pm, 4 hours later. Apparently smokers deal with caffeine quicker and caffeine sticks around in children much longer.

You can expect about 10 minutes before it first kicks-in which, I suppose, is why if you’re feeling tired while driving it’s a decent plan to take a break and drink a coffee, then have a 15 minute nap. See tiredness can kill, take a break. Once it starts to kick-in you might hit peak caffeine any time from 45 minutes to 2 hours later.

Caveat: that chart visualisation is extrapolated from reported data, so the shape is approximate only.

Some references say longer, and some say, from 3-9 hours or so. My source which seemed pretty comprehensive was:

Bertil B. Fredholm, Karl Bättig, Janet Holmén, Astrid Nehlig and Edwin E. Zvartau, Actions of Caffeine in the Brain with Special Reference to Factors That Contribute to Its Widespread Use, Pharmacological Reviews March 1999, 51 (1) 83-133;

The half-life of caffeine.

There always seem to be more than we need in a bag. This is a nice end for them.

Freeze lemons and limes

The classic “use cutlery from the outside-in” still holds, but I realised there’s a little more to it than that. And I learned what a charger is.

Amalgamation of tips from the cookbook I use most, the Joy of Cooking.

Set your table in time-honoured positions.

With just a few deft cuts of a cork, you too can make a nifty pourer perfect for a straight pour while mixing your drink with air.

A speciality to use with sidra from the Asturian region of Spain.

Make a cork pourer.

Essentially it’s the order of adding your water to your espresso — an americano - or adding your espresso to your water — a long black. If you’re making your own at home, you may notice that a long black seems to make a more satisfyingly luxurious looking coffee.

Other coffee-related sketchplanations: Vietnamese coffee, Irish coffee, half-caff coffee, espresso, filter, americano and the redeye.

Perhaps I should speak to someone about this…

An americano and a long black: the difference

The bloody mary (vodka), ruddy mary (gin), virgin mary (alcohol-free) and the bull shot (beef broth instead of tomato). Has the added advantage of almost seeming like it’s something healthy to get. I always seem to end up ordering them on flights. Happy days.

Bloody marys

Sacré bleu! Or camembert for that matter. Share the ripe middle by cutting strips.

Don’t cut the nose off brie

A microlife is thirty minutes of your life expectancy. You can use it up by chilling for 30 minutes or you could start to speed through them by smoking a few cigarettes or having a few drinks.

A simple way to bring difficult-to-grasp long-term, slow-burn risks into a unit that can motivate you and a handy way to compare risks.

Even better, you gain a microlife with 2-3 cups of coffee. Win!

Interesting? See Microlives: A lesson in risk taking, by Cambridge University Professor of risk David Spiegelhalter. Or see his 15 min TED talk: Motorbikes, Terrorism, Heart Attacks, Sausages: Professor David Spiegelhalter at TEDxOxbridge, or the full paper.

Microlife: The unit of life

There’s stiff competition for the original and the most authentic British cream teas between Devon and Cornwall and the Southwest of England. And you may have, like me, wondered if when having scones with clotted cream and jam in what order should you put them. However, you can tell each apart by the preference on your scone to go for jam on top of the clotted cream, or under the cream. Cream on top = Cornwall. Jam on top = Devon. If you haven’t had one on location, I recommend you give it a try.

Cream tea: Cornwall vs Devon

Scoville scale: chile heat via capsaicin content

Turns out a bunch of substances have the power to make you sleepy - tryptophan, vitamin B6, calcium, glycine, lactucarium and carbohydrates are some of the major ones. Some even interact with each other for maximum sleepiness. A few common foods with these compounds in good measure include:

turkey, walnuts - tryptophan
tuna, pistachios - vitamin B6
dairy - calcium
chamomile - glycine
lettuce - lactucarium

So an evening turkey or tuna, walnut, cheese and lettuce sandwich with a glass of milk and a side of pistachios or walnuts and you’ll be set for a good night.

Sleepy foods

I’ll understand if this hasn’t been a burning question for you. But I’ve always struggled to identify correctly when one is put in front of me. Turns out, after sleuthing, they do have separating characteristics along, colour, the tightness of skin and the amount of seeds. I had to go 3D, but I think this should allow you to identify the next small orangey thing that you eat.

Mandarin Has seeds, loose skin and is orange

Clementine Seedless, tight skin and orangey-red in colour

Tangerine Has seeds, loose skin and is orangey-red

PS I promise no more mandarin-related sketchplanations in a hurry

What’s the difference between mandarins, clementines, satsumas and tangerines?

From various sources I have learned that mandarins are the original, from China, and were rather fancy and therefore only suitable for high society, which included mandarins (bureaucrats).

Satsumas are a type of mandarin cultivated in the Japanese district of Satsuma.

Clementines are named after Father Clément Rodier who may have cultivated the variety himself.

And tangerines are so named as being from Tangiers in Morocco, one of the places where mandarins were first imported into Europe.

Origins of mandarins

How to make Irish coffee

Vary significantly depending on context and can tend to zero if you really have a lot of stuff to get through.

Cafe consumption rates

The fluff floats to the top and the seeds will sink to the bottom. And no squirting. HT Alex Maiereanu

De-seed pomegranates in a bowl of water

Cuts of beef

Boiling point of water vs altitude in ft.

Cooking at altitude

Seems so simple now, but I swear I was in my 20s before I figured this out.

Use serrated knives for foods with a hard outside and soft inside

The most fun and satisfying way to prepare a mango. If you haven’t already, try it.

Hedgehog a mango

Open bananas like a monkey

The Betty Crocker effect refers to how, in the world of instant cake mixes, when something is too easy it reduces the value. The legend goes that instant cake mixtures that just needed water didn't sell nearly as well as when you needed to add an egg. Adding the egg yourself gives investment in the process of making the cake so we appreciate it more, and the extra effort demonstrates the act of love that is baking a cake.

Also easy to understand as the IKEA effect. As is so often the case, Dan Ariely explains it well. 20mins well spent watching Dan Ariely's TED talk What makes us feel good about our work?. You can jump straight to it around 12mins 50s.

The Betty Crocker Effect

You will have observed this most times there is shared food you can cut. I observed it with trays of brownies that we used to make. Slices start big and get progressively smaller. No one wants to eat the last slice.

A previous boss had a simple solution to this with a maxim he had: You think of one, you get two. A bit excessive, and I don’t advocate it, but it really did work.

The law of diminishing brownies

Roll limes before squeezing and you’ll get more juice

The art of cooking leaving a sparkling, untouched, kitchen.

Ghost cooking

When food seems indestructible you should be suspicious.

If its not good enough for bugs, it’s not good enough for you

Gelato, sorbet and ice-cream

Vinaigrette, rehydration mixture and Pimms.

Useful mixtures and their proportions

And save a little more time for life. We switched 8 years or so ago and haven’t looked back.

Use crushed garlic and ginger in most of your cooking

Rules of thumb for cooking steak

Trim beans in one cut through the packet

Learned this remarkably reliable technique from our guide Rodolfo in the Corcovado in Costa Rica - appropriately, on a Pacific beach lined with palm trees, the sounds of howler monkeys and scarlet macaws flying by. It works just as well in our London apartment.

Update: if you’re not on a beach and have some minimal tools you can rescue more of the water by drilling or poking through one of the three holes in the top and draining it first. Tip from Jose.

Open a coconut

Part of the reason why bottles should really have their necks to one side instead of in the centre.

Give air a pathway to avoid glugging

Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants

Never rush an onion (from Gordon Ramsay), avoid moving chicken if you can, and don’t stir fry too much - best keep stir fries to 1-2 person portions max.

3 Miscellaneous cooking tips

Espresso: steam forced through coffee grounds

Filter coffee: water dripped through coffee grounds and a filter

Redeye coffee: espresso topped up with filter coffee

Clear the fog with a redeye

Following on from the original, I love the words: Tofurkey, turducken, and cambozola.

Portemanteau food

Wrap cheese in paper towel to reduce mould

Eating cereals is a subtle interaction of milkiness, crunchiness and time spent soaking. Hat tip.

When combining cereals, layer milk-resistant cereals at the bottom

Among many other sensible suggestions, Michael Pollan recommends avoiding the centre supermarket aisles. It’ll generally keep you on the fresh stuff. Sketchplanation hat tip to Ben Merrick.

Shop healthy

Disclaimer: I have not actually drunk this, nor do I recommend anyone to try it, but when I heard about it I thought it sounded pretty fun.

Drink porn fizz

Don’t let the frozen peas escape until you want them to.

Marshal frozen peas and such

Or, buy a rice cooker. You won’t regret it. But still no peeking.

Cook rice like a pro

Buy half-price stilton after Christmas

My technique, for when you really have to get somewhere: Pull over, neck coffee, 15 min shut-eye, cruise on.

I have read that this is called a nappuccino.

There’s some science behind this: the half-life of caffeine.

Tiredness can kill. Take a break

Adopted from Brain Training for Runners. 

Be fanatical about refuelling after exercise

Get it right and it will fall evenly in the pan and slowly twist it’s way into the water on its own.

Twist your spaghetti

These two are as easily mixed up as stationary and stationery.

Compliment and Complement

I regularly make half-caf coffee. I think there’s a gap in the market. Why is coffee so binary?

Adjust your daily caffeine intake

Various informants have since told me that cutting horizontally first helps keep it together better as you’re cutting, and that cutting this way first helps keep the tears away longer. I’d probably vote ease of cutting and reverse the order here.

Sketchplanations tagged with food-and-drink