And I'm actually a decade younger than that, but I can remember all the commercials in the 70's with Florence Henderson extolling Wesson Oil, and how it seemed like something pure white and scentless like Crisco just had to be good for you. Maybe it's just that I was a kid and wasn't paying attention earlier, but it seems like the really widespread outcry about butter started in the late 70's/early 80's. I mean, that's when the evening news and mianstream women's magazines really started talking about it more, rather than just the professional publications and granola magazines.

I grew up with margarine, and while I can't really remember talking about it, I have a vague memory that my parents' generation "knew" that it was better for them.

This actually makes it an even more remarkable story, though. That we've so completely reversed the "conventional wisdom" twice in three generations. That's simply amazing.

Well, I was about two when the study came out, but it's well-known. The Weston A. Price foundation talks about it in several articles; Dr. Atkins also talked about it. I was mistaken: it was in the late 50's, and the researcher's name was Ancel Keys. http://www.westonaprice.org/knowyourfats/skinny.html

My mom has told me that until WW2 and rationing started, no one wanted margarine if they could afford butter. Napoleon offered incentives for the invention of a butter substitute which could be used by soldiers and the lower classes, and that's pretty much what it was for a long time. http://ww.westonaprice.org/bookreviews/what-to-eat.html

Just one thing: the smearing of animal and saturated fats has only been going on since the late 60's, so only about 40 years, not 100. It was based on the media hyping a poorly-done and poorly-understood study. At the time people thought animal fat was good for you, so that gave the story wings and made it sensational because it really flew in the face of both science and conventional wisdom. That was the start of the whole low-fat fad, too. Same history: a fad because it's only been about 40 years out of the whole flow of human history.

Sir Walter Raleigh asked them to determine the best way to stack cannonballs on ship decks.

Famed astronomer-math guy Johannes Kepler in 1611 conjectured that the pyramid is the best way to stack cannonballs.

Thomas Hales (U of Pittsburgh math guy) & Samuel Ferguson (math guy at the National Security Agency) proved it in 1998 and had their proof verified in 2007.

The proof is about 300 pages long—not counting 40,000 lines of computerese and 3 billion characters of data.

Everybody needs a hobby, I prefer cooking. Thanks for Drew for making it fun & easy.

Huh. Learned something new today.

I actually measured the Kosher salt twice (just to be Kosher, so to speak).

I suspect it has more to do with grain shape and uniformity. The packing density of spheres doesn't change for different sphere diameters. That is, a gallon jar of big marbles will weigh the same as a gallon jar of small ones.

Thanks for letting a retired engineer weigh in.

Just goes to show, in any conflict between theory and reality, reality always wins.

Fine grain (popcorn) salt's difference comes when eaten "directly", as in from a shaker. So when adding as a cooking ingredient, the popcorn and table salt are pretty much the same.

From experience baking, I always measure by weight. I also use kosher salt for purity (to avoid surprises).

One tablespoon (leveled by a spatula) of:
Morton's Table Salt 19.8 grams
Morton's Popcorn Salt 19.2 grams
Diamond Crystal Cooking Salt 21.6 grams
Diamond Crystal Kosher Salt 10.0 grams

The Morton's Table Salt was Food Service, meaning it was not iodized—and may be slightly different that regular table salt.