four equal weights — a recipe whose name is its ratio
Built as a memo rather than a table: the thing worth hanging it up for reads across the room, with the full reference in smaller type below it.
Three sizes in one archive — from a sheet on the fridge to a poster on the wall.
Earliest known record of the recipe: Hannah Glasse, The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy, London, 1747, p. 272. Egg weights are the USDA size classes. Checked 30 July 2026.
The earliest known record is The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy by Hannah Glasse, 1747. It names three pounds: butter, flour and sugar. The fourth does not appear in the text.
In its place stands "twelve eggs, but half the whites". Weigh them: depending on egg size that comes to between 354 and 507 g, and a pound falls inside that range.
The ratio was equal from the start. One of the four weights was simply counted in eggs rather than put on the scales.
Why the numbers can be trusted. Every countable number here is computed from data rather than typed in, and the sheet must pass 6 independent checks before it is allowed to build — how many items there are, the order they come in, and the claim in the highlighted box itself. If one fails, there is no file.
the ratios of the mince and the five steps that decide the result
grams of natural sugar per 100 g of fresh fruit — and how much water sits beside it
four ingredients in the proportions written into an EU regulation
grams per 100 g · animal and plant · and the state each one was weighed in