Brain Teasers
Cooking Quickly
After climbing to the top of a mountain, Phil is hungry and gets out his cookpot for a good spaghetti meal. Unfortunately, as it's not a pressure cooker it will take longer to cook. What can Phil do to cook the spaghetti more quickly?
(He's already turned the fuel on max, and he doesn't have to stay with the pot)
(He's already turned the fuel on max, and he doesn't have to stay with the pot)
Hint
He can add something other than water and spaghetti to the pot.Answer
He adds a lot of salt to the water to increase the boiling point (actually, anything that would dissolve would do that, but he prefers salt). In theory he could also round the bottom edge of his pot by grinding it (which would also increase the surface area exposed to hot air because of roughness), but he'd probably spend more time doing that than he'd save on cooking time.Hide Hint Show Hint Hide Answer Show Answer
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Comments
Wouldn't he want to decrease the boiling point so that it would boil more quickly?
You wouldn't want to lower the boiling point, because once a liquid reaches its boiling point, it can't get any hotter without turning into a gas (in this case, steam). The problem with adding a lot of salt to the water is that the spaghetti is going to absorb the salt (I always put in about a tablespoon of salt for every gallon of water when making pasta). If you put too much salt in the water, you're going to end up with completely salty, inedible pasta. I think you would be better off putting a tight-fitting lid on the pot- you'll raise the boiling point a little since the lid would increase the pressure in the pot.
I add salt to water whenever I make mac and cheese, so this was easy for me.
Increasing the surface area won't change anything. Once it reaches the boiling point, little heat is required to keep it boiling.
Maybe the salt will work, but one problem. Where will he get the salt???
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