Word Problem Wednesday: Pour Some Sugar on Math

Do you like to bake? I enjoy it - especially when you get to share everything you make (or keep it and eat it all...) But did you know that baking involves MATH? What if you need to double a recipe? Or half it? If a recipe calls for 3/4 cups of flour, and you double the recipe, how many cups do you need altogether? And what if your 1 cup measuring cup is missing (or your dog chewed it up)? Can you measure it with 1/2 cup increments?

Check out this week's problem of the week and see if you can help Angus make these macarons!

Question: Angus is making macarons. His recipe uses 13/4cups of powdered sugar to make a batch of a dozen macarons. If Angus has 31/2 quarts of sugar, how many total macarons can he make?

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

Answer: 96 macarons
Solution: A quart is equal to 2 pints, or 4 cups. Angus has 3¹/₂ quarts of powdered sugar, which is the same as (3¹/₂ × 4) = (3 × 4) + (¹/₂ × 4) = 12 + 2 = 14 cups. There are 8 groups of 1³/₄ inside of 14, so Angus can make 8 batches with 14 cups of sugar. That would make 8 batches × 12 macarons = 96 macarons.

You can check out more of our Word Problem Wednesdays blog posts! Come on back to our blog every week - stretch your mind and test your word problem comprehension skills!

Word Problem Wednesday: Do You Wanna Build Some Math Skills

Word Problem Wednesday: Cookie, Cookie, Cookie Starts With 'C'

Word Problem Wednesday: 12 Parsecs and a Scoundrel

Word Problem Wednesday: 12 Parsecs and a Scoundrel

Word Problem Wednesday: You've Got a Friend in Me

Word Problem Wednesday: A Mad Man With A Box

Word Problem Wednesday: Math Just Keeps On Slaying

Word Problem Wednesday: Fly, My Pretties, Fly!

Word Problem Wednesday: Who You Gonna Call?

Word Problem Wednesday: When Harry Potter Met Math

Looking for some more math fun? Call us at Mathnasium of Cave Creek!