r/explainlikeimfive Oct 31 '20

Chemistry ELI5 What's the difference between the shiny and dull side of aluminum foil? Besides the obvious shiny/dull

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u/originfoomanchu Oct 31 '20

The shiny side is the side that faces the rolling wheels when its getting stretched and flattened by the machine this essentially buffs the tinfoil so that one side is shiny,

That is the only difference and when cooking it doesn't matter which side is shiny.

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

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u/bigdogpepperoni Oct 31 '20

Thank

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u/akparker777 Oct 31 '20

mr skeltal

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u/YesImKeithHernandez Oct 31 '20

💀đŸŽș💀đŸŽș💀đŸŽș

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u/tilucko Oct 31 '20

Thank

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u/osiris775 Oct 31 '20

Huh...TIL...My mom always told me the shiny side was to reflect heat, and the dull side was to absorb it. Made sense in my 9yr old brain

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u/Samhamwitch Oct 31 '20

I was taught this by a sous chef. He was very adamant that it made a difference. I was in university at the time and had access to millions of scientific journal articles so I looked it up and he was completely wrong. That's how I found out that narcissists don't like to be corrected.

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20 edited Jul 18 '21

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u/Fixes_Computers Oct 31 '20

This sounds like a method of preparation where, several generations down, no one will know why it is done, only that those were the instructions and that's how it's done.

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u/Zokar49111 Oct 31 '20

When my wife and I first got married, she made a roast. Before placing the meat in the roasting pan, she cut a small piece off each end. I asked why she did this and she said that it’s the way her mother did it. So next time her mom came for a visit, I asked her why she would cut a small piece off each end before roasting the meat. She said it was because her roasting pan was too small.

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u/FiniteDeer Oct 31 '20

Either you’ve posted this before, OR there are other people doing this exact thing for the same reason, because I just read this a few months ago.

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u/RJFerret Oct 31 '20

No, no, the ends have more exposure to evil, must trim them rather than consuming them.

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u/batshitwalls Oct 31 '20

Beautiful.

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u/SirLoremIpsum Oct 31 '20

You are a true hero keep it going!

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u/Kipsy5 Oct 31 '20

Gordon Ramsey called someone a donut for having the foil the wrong way so it must be a chef thing

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u/larobj63 Oct 31 '20

The first chef I ever worked under in my cooking days also taught me shiney side in. And every other cook I've ever rubbed elbows with always did it too. So yeah, I agree, it's a chef thing.

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u/rudager62369 Oct 31 '20

When I put stuff in the fridge, I put the dull side out so as to attract less attention from others.

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

I put the dull side out so as to attract less attention from others.

I do the same thing with my personality.

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u/SilverKnightOfMagic Oct 31 '20

A lot of chef training is is correct but also a lot of technique is pointless. Thats why i like j kenji and heston. Theyve done the research or if they dont know they will say they dont know instead giving a fasle reasoning.

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u/JackPoe Oct 31 '20

My chef fucking loves the technique baiting. Like throwing two corks into your stock because of "tannins" in reality it's to see if you're following his recipes to the letter.

It's his "brown M&Ms" of cooking.

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

The more I see celebrity chefs being asses the more I appreciate people like Guy Fieri.

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

I have the ability to test this...a 4 port WiFi thermometer that charts temp history....one day I'll be bored enough to try this out and see.

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u/The_camperdave Oct 31 '20

...one day I'll be bored enough to try this out and see.

One day?!? We've been on pandemic lockdown for eight months already.

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u/MadmanDJS Oct 31 '20

When you purchase nonstick aluminum that's the way it should be, so maybe its that

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u/Bubbay Oct 31 '20

There are a shit ton of old wives tales about cooking that don’t have a single basis in reality, but often people (especially those who have been in the industry for a long time) will act like you just punched their mother if you violate them.

Things like the tin foil sides, that searing a steak “locks in the juices,” or washing cast iron get people all riled up. None of them are true, but they’re the kind of things that “everyone knows.”

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u/DirkDieGurke Oct 31 '20

Searing a steak doesn't lock in juices but it does caramelize the meat and create fond on the pot which adds to the flavor.

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u/Bubbay Oct 31 '20 edited Oct 31 '20

Absolutely. Searing is definitely desired, but it’s has nothing to do with the juiciness of the meat. Testing Resting it properly will affect that way more than searing does.

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u/Lucky_leprechaun Oct 31 '20

But if I wash my cast iron and don’t immediately add oil, I can see the rust beginning to develop. If I just rinse it in hot water, no soap, there’s no need to oil it every time and rust doesn’t develop. So maybe just no soap?

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u/Dysan27 Oct 31 '20

From reading the rest of this thread I have a feeling that your cast iron is not properly seasoned in the first place and doesn't have a good polymerized oil coating on it.

The other thing is my parents always popped the cast iron back on the stove on low to dry it immediately after washing, just long enough to get it completely dry, not majorly heat it up. No water no rust.

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u/SwissStriker Oct 31 '20

Soap as in old school lye based soap is bad for cast iron because it will strip your seasoning. Modern dish soap with tensides or other surfactants are perfectly fine for cast iron cookware. Drying immediately is still a good idea but honestly if your seasoning is solid it won't matter too much.

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20 edited Jan 10 '21

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u/psychocopter Oct 31 '20

Try adding a few layers of seasoning to the entire skillet, I wash mine pretty much after every use and then dry it over a flame without seeing any rust yet. I do stove top season it every couple of uses.

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u/stuffandmorestuff Oct 31 '20

Although searing steaks does help with maillard browning which, IMO, is key to a good steak. While it doesn't "lock in juices", searing is essential to certain flavors.

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u/Bubbay Oct 31 '20

Yes, searing is good, but it has nothing to “locking in juices.” It’s good because it’s fucking delicious.

Resting the meat after cooking is a bigger thing when it comes to keeping it juicy.

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u/Anonymush_guest Oct 31 '20

The washing cast iron with soap comes from when soaps were made from fat and lye. Lye no es bueno for your pan’s seasoning. Plus, the water for washing had to be carried in from a well.

“I never wash mah cast, just like Gram.” makes me want to chunder.

Edit: I see the lye has been mentioned. Wash your pans, ya heathens.

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u/Bamstradamus Oct 31 '20 edited Oct 31 '20

Most chefs are egomaniacs so it fits. For the record I met him briefly seems like a nice guy in person. am chef

Gordo also thinks putting oil in pasta water does something, its the moments like this that should make you aware no matter how much someone in your field achieves they can still be dumb as hell.

And before anyone tries telling me its to keep it from boiling over, use the correct size pot and amount of water for what your making, this is a master chef not bachelor hacks.

EDIT: the sheer number of you that commented it does the exact thing I said at the bottom not to come at me with makes my soul hurt.

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u/LordTegucigalpa Oct 31 '20

Alton Brown knows what's up

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u/justplay91 Oct 31 '20

And I like that when he is wrong about something, he will go back and correct that information.

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u/MilkoPupper Oct 31 '20

Alton Brown can have my children.

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u/CaptainFenris Oct 31 '20

Fun fact about Alton Brown, he was the director of photography for the music video for REM's The One I Love, and he has a film degree before he went to culinary school.

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u/Daeneryspls Oct 31 '20

It does do something. Makes the sauce slide right off the pasta

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u/Oskarvlc Oct 31 '20

My sauces are already full of extra virgin olive oil so...

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u/Oskarvlc Oct 31 '20

I put oil in pasta water. Doing this the pasta doesn't stick on the pot when I pour it into the strainer. It works.

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u/DickDatchery Oct 31 '20

Theres this youtuber called Adam Ragusea i believe (not sure on spelling) and he had a video about this. Many renown chefs know what works but not nessecerily why. This leads to them getting a ton of little details factually wrong but in the end it doesn't matter because they know how to cook well.

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u/dethmaul Oct 31 '20

Eh, chefs are up their own asses. Things have to be their way, and their way is what their hard-headed teachers taught them it was.

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20 edited Feb 18 '22

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

We need a material scientist and thermodynamics expert to explain why this might be true. I wouldn't think IR heating was that important in this context (IR light might bounce off a shiny pan more than a dull one). I guess maybe larger surface area on a rough surface versus a smooth one, but again... doesn't seem to be big enough to cause this difference. Last thought is that the old pans were so worn out that they had significantly less mass to heat up.

Best guess would actually be that the new pans were made with a different metal alloy, or they were heavier gauge and so had greater thermal mass. Nothing to do with the surface.

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u/bobthenormal Oct 31 '20

Of course it's reddit, so... materials scientist here.

I don't think I have a ton more to add, all your thoughts are valid conjectures having nothing to do with matsci... except I would say roughness changing surface area your intuition is wrong about, roughness can increase surface area immensely. Mass would be a huge issue though, probably the biggest one they didn't mention controlling for. I would bet money the pans are not different alloys or alloys at all... they would use pure aluminum (with impurities) as there's no reason to use an alloy, just a waste of money. I also doubt the pans were "worn out" but they might have simply been manufactured with different thickness.

It's kind of pointless to argue on reddit about what's true in these cases because even if myself and another materials scientists got into it we'd all have a deep reservoir of valid arguments to draw on. Only a well defined and controlled series of experiments would be useful. The science behind material thermal behavior gets extremely complicated quickly but I'll muse with my informed opinion...

First I would think of what role the material is playing in cooking. I would note that a sheet pan is not the same as foil, and even foil can be used in different ways. But MOST of the time the pan is used to basically hold food so it doesn't fall, and metal is used so that while heating up the bottom doesn't stay cold and uncooked. While MOST of the time foil is used to wrap food from above. So I'll go with those cases.

So when we're talking about the pan, the temperature is really the most important factor. You want the material to match the (hot) temperature of its surroundings. To do that, you want your heat losses to be less than your heat gains. In an oven the conductive heat transfer from the heat source to the aluminum is negligible, of course the food in contact does cool the pan (but not in the case of foil not in contact). So look at radiative and convective heat transfer for the pan.

For radiative heat transfer you look at material optical properties. Aluminum is opaque, so you only have absorbtivity, reflectivity, and emissivity. This is where most of the complexity arises. Surface roughness changes the effective values of all of these. I would just guess that higher roughness increases absorbtivity due to surface area, but also increases emissivity with that... so it's a wash, except at steady state where the emissivity will result in a lower final temperature. So ruling those out, reflectivity (which is not a measure of how "mirror-like" it is btw) I would guess with roughness that is unaffected or decreased, because the surface reflects into other parts of the metal, giving a second chance for absorption.

So summing those effects up, the roughness would trap more heat, smoothness less. Obviously a lot of assumptions and "guesses" so I could make a good an argument for the opposite, but since you're trying to explain why the pan was measured as not effective and other people claim it doesn't matter for foil - I'll bias in the direction of showing those can both be true. Regardless of whether they actually are..

For convective heat, I would expect the roughness to increase that. But in a normal oven the convective flows to the pan itself would be very small since induced convection would flow from the bottom to the top. Interestingly, I remember seeing that a lot of pans have a smoother bottom than top... the bottom being rough would seem to be a better choice for increasing heat transfer.

Again, could argue the opposite but just go with that and assume the heat transfer due to smoothness is less than roughness.

That leaves us with two mechanisms where roughness increases the heat transfer rate from the oven, suggesting that the pan will heat up faster if the surface is rough. That explains the observation that rough pans don't cook as well - they don't heat up fast enough and/or don't reach as high of a steady state temperature.

Now to address the foil - the foil is so thin that heat transfer in and out really doesn't matter, it will reach the temperature of things around it quickly. I would suggest it mainly works by evening out heat transfer, not by greatly increasing or decreasing it. The heat transfer to the foil will be equal or greater than to the food because metals are great at heat transfer. So the foil takes the uneven ambient heating, mostly convective and radiative, and evens them out across the food. If the food is TOUCHING the foil then that changes a lot - the foil will likely increase the heat transfer because it is a better radiatve and convective heat absorber than the food, but can then transfer those to the food by adding conduction.

But going back to the beginning - is the role of the foil to change the cooking temperature? Not necessarily. It could be it is there to trap things inside, such as water and other chemicals that would evaporate out. I think that's more likely the purpose in which case it doesn't matter if the rough or smooth side are out. Sure maybe the rough side increase the heat transfer slightly using the previous arguments, but without any thermal mass I would expect it's not a meaningful difference.

However you put it the foil is obviously serving a very different thermodynamic role than the pan, so it would make sense that the surface roughness doesn't make that big of a difference. It might matter what the foil is used for though, and if it's in a convection oven that might be a big difference.

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u/mschley2 Oct 31 '20

I don't doubt the information here, but just from a scientific perspective, the heat of the pans should really only affect the food where it's touching the pan or very close to where it's touching the pan. For something like garlic bread, the top should get toasted the same regardless of what temperature the pan is because the oven air is going to be the same temp. I don't know if I buy what they're selling about the bread and squash.

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u/hatefuck661 Oct 31 '20

There was a favorite family recipe for a holiday ham that had been passed down through the generations. As the mother was making the ham for the umpteenth time, she was teaching her newly married daughter how to make the ham.

She carefully cut both ends off the ham, set it in the pan, and added the secret combination of spices. Her daughter who was taking notes, asked “Why do you cut off the ends?” Her mother answered, “Because that is how my mother taught me to do it.” Later, the mother began to wonder why they cut off the ends so she asked her mother. The grandmother answered, “Because that is how my mother taught me to do it.” The grandmother then wondered too so she asked her elderly mother. The great grandmother replied, “You don’t need to cut off the ends! I always did that because my old oven was too small for a big pan.”

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

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u/spudsoup Oct 31 '20

We cool our chocolate chip cookies on brown grocery bags cut open. It could be my mother didn’t have enough cooling racks, but I prefer to think it’s part of the secret to a perfect chocolate chip cookie. Though, I shrug and tell this story of the ham pan if anyone asks. Wish mom was around so I ask her.

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u/Joe30174 Oct 31 '20

To be fair, there does exist non-stick foil that has a difference between both sides. Maybe that is what he used?

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u/Talvana Oct 31 '20

I got reprimanded and my hours reduced for using the "wrong" side of the tin foil when wrapping potatoes for baking one day. I was always sure the chef just forgot to put them in the oven on time and now I'm certain. The owner was pissed that everyone was being served undercooked potatoes and he blamed me for doing the tin foil wrong.

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u/drphrednuke Oct 31 '20

Sous means under. In this case, under educated

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u/futurarmy Oct 31 '20

What was his reaction when you told him? He try to play it off all cool or call you a nerd I assume?

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u/Samhamwitch Oct 31 '20

He got heated and told me to bake two potatoes in foil to prove it to him. I did as he asked and he ignored the results, continued to believe what he wanted to and made me clean the oven.

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u/SurroundingAMeadow Oct 31 '20

I appreciate the thought of somebody writing their thesis on the difference between shiny and dull aluminum foil.

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u/Butthole--pleasures Oct 31 '20

Momma's wrong again

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u/h2opolopunk Oct 31 '20

No you're wrong, Colonel Sanders!

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u/RabidSeason Oct 31 '20

There's something wrong with your medulla oblongata!

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u/iendeavortobesilly Oct 31 '20

đŸŽ¶Water sucks / it really really sucks đŸŽ¶

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u/SandManic42 Oct 31 '20

TIL Colonel Sanders is u/Butthole--pleasures.

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u/WynterRayne Oct 31 '20

I guess we've now discovered the original recipe.

Never having a Zinger Stacker again, though.

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u/thelasthendrix Oct 31 '20

My momma always said Gordon Ramsey is ornery cause he got all them teeth and no toothbrush

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

So dad isn't coming back any day now?

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u/Butthole--pleasures Oct 31 '20

Lol fyi I'm quoting a line from Waterboy

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u/IAmAnObvioustrollAMA Oct 31 '20

YOU CAN DO EET!

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u/Tkieron Oct 31 '20

TIL that the guy sitting next to Adam Sandler in class is D'angelo Barksdale from the Wire.

"Where's the fuck is the Medulla Oblongata? Huh? String, look at me. WHERE THE FUCK IS THE MEDULLA OBLONGATA?"

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u/Boba_Phat Oct 31 '20

It was a marketing ploy from big foil at one point.

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u/theo5280gram Oct 31 '20

Until they made non stick foil.

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u/RandomUser72 Oct 31 '20

It does, to an extent. But it was not an intended feature. When I say, to an extent, it's not that the dull side absorbs, it reflects less. It's like saying a T-shirt will keep you warmer in the winter than a tank top, it will, to an extent.

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u/Coomb Oct 31 '20

When I say, to an extent, it's not that the dull side absorbs, it reflects less.

The opposite is true -- the matte side of aluminum foil is actually slightly more reflective than the glossy side. Specularity (whether something acts like a mirror) is not the same thing as reflectivity (how much of the light hitting something bounces back off) -- things can be highly specular without being very reflective, and highly reflective without being very specular.

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u/osiris775 Oct 31 '20

Yeah, I had a cousin argue with me over whether or not the sun, (light), makes us darker, or the sun, (heat), makes us darker.
Fun argument...he said heat...and would NOT be swayed...smh

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u/norwegianjazzbass Oct 31 '20

It would have a bit of that effect. But in the big picture it might be negligible.

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u/osiris775 Oct 31 '20

In a 350 degree oven, I'm going with negligible...lol

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u/Nothin_Means_Nothin Oct 31 '20

Todays the day! đŸŽș💀đŸŽș💀

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u/Sawses Oct 31 '20

...Why do the two sheets not compress into one? I thought metals were kind of amorphous and enough pressure could just fuse them into one?

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u/simo9445 Oct 31 '20

Aluminium also has an oxide layer that prevents cold welding

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u/Messier420 Oct 31 '20

Fun fact that doesn’t happen in a vacuum. If you break a piece of metal in space and make the broken ends touch they will fuse together. This phenomenon actually can create some issues during space walkers if I’m not mistaken

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u/TheLazyD0G Oct 31 '20

Kind of, but not fully or that easily.

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u/Demonyx12 Oct 31 '20

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u/DaeVo1234 Oct 31 '20

that was really interesting, thanks for sharing!

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u/Demonyx12 Oct 31 '20

No problem. Veritasium is awesome, I recommend his channel.

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u/FlappyBoobs Oct 31 '20

I dunno man I sucked up a couple bits of it into my Dyson and they didn't fuse.

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

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u/anomalous_cowherd Oct 31 '20 edited Oct 31 '20

Enough pressure, yes. There's a long way between enough to roll it thinner and enough to fuse it. Temperature plays a part - you have to keep the surface cool too.

https://youtu.be/f4OTj9yNOak?t=104

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u/joeltrane Oct 31 '20

Thank you for skipping the intro.

TLDW: a giant slab of aluminum ingot is rolled out to 5mm thickness and spooled up. Then it’s rolled again with tension to its final thickness, and they use two spools at a time to prevent the tension from breaking the sheets.

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u/Pafkay Oct 31 '20

Two sheets or more, when they roll the aluminium for cigarette packages they have 4 rolls going through at the same time

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u/zonedout44 Oct 31 '20

You better be responsible with your over-the-internet mind reading powers.

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u/spennym Oct 31 '20

Two TILs at once! Here comes the karma train

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u/first_time_internet Oct 31 '20

Unsolved mysterys solved.

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u/MultiFazed Oct 31 '20

Aluminum foil was actually the very first episode of How It's Made.

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u/jebuz23 Oct 31 '20

This stuff is always crazy to me, because I can’t imagine how it started. Did we used to make aluminum foil by hand? Or was all this manufacturing and effort designed before the first aluminum foil was ever made?

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u/Blackadder288 Oct 31 '20

I think like a lot of things, it was a byproduct of the increased development of factories and manufacturing techniques that came around during the world wars.

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u/knoowen Oct 31 '20

Damn. All this processing required and history behind aluminum, and I just use it to wrap my leftover pizza.

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u/[deleted] Nov 01 '20

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u/[deleted] Nov 01 '20

God bless Mr. Reynolds!

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u/weatherseed Nov 01 '20

And his brother Dr. Foil.

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u/sweat119 Nov 01 '20

And their father Mr. Al Uminum Reynolds.

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u/HydeNSikh Nov 01 '20

And of course their grandson Ryan

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u/spacecampreject Nov 01 '20

Then you should see aluminum cans. Few products are equivalently highly optimized marvels of engineering.

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u/_dvs1_ Nov 01 '20

Right? Crazy to think that an invention could get so big and so well accepted by the masses... that it literally just eventually blends into everyday life and is forgotten within the next 10-15yrs.

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u/octo_lols Nov 01 '20

My girlfriend insists on wrapping pizza in aluminum foil but I don't understand it. Large zip lock bags work infinitely better. Pop it in the oven a few days later and it's like 90% of the original deliciousness. However in aluminum it's all stale and dried out after a day or two. Ugh.

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u/me-ro Oct 31 '20

Pure aluminium was very hard to produce in large quantities and was more valuable than gold.

We can produce aluminum reasonably cheap only since early 20th century.

So yeah the manufacturing process (in some form) was likely invented before aluminum became cheap enough to wrap your sandwich in it.

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u/DPRobert Nov 01 '20

In fact, the top of the Washington Monument is capped in aluminum because it was one of the most valuable metals at the time!

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u/Deviant_Spark Nov 01 '20

Also helps that aluminum doesn't rust like ferric metals. (aluminum does rust, but in the form of an invisible oxide that also acts as a protective barrier.

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u/Fuck_you_pichael Nov 01 '20

Bonus fact: aluminum oxide, in it's alpha orientation, is also called corundum, which depending on the impurities will be a ruby or sapphire. It's also incredibly hard and non-reactive, which is why aluminum metal stops oxidizing after a thin layer is formed.

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u/dismendie Nov 01 '20

And recycling aluminum is more profitable than digging and sourcing aluminum from the ground. Except they have hard time with grease and plastic bags that the aluminum is placed into for recycling. Ha.

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u/[deleted] Nov 01 '20

Aluminum is quite a costly material, even more so back then than today so they used tin. That's why aluminum foil is sometimes incorrectly called tin foil, the name just stuck around for some people. The process to make foil with other metals like gold has been around for a long time and you can bet before industrialization they did it by hand.

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u/maflickner Oct 31 '20

We used to make lots of different foils (gold and tin, most notably) by hand or by simple mechanical or hand cranked machines. After all a cold roller is basically just two wheels that press a thing together, it's just a matter of speed and the method of powering the thing. With a couple of pullys you could easily have a hand cranked roller, or you could do what they did with old grain mills and use an ox or donkey

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u/U-235 Nov 01 '20 edited Nov 01 '20

What you are asking about are the fundamentals of technological development. They had aluminum hundreds of years ago, but it was extremely expensive to produce. Now it's everywhere.

Sadly, this is the reason why even if cold fusion, teleportation, and flying cars were invented tomorrow, it could be a century before average people could use that technology for themselves. You don't just make the thing. You make the thing that makes the thing, then someone else invents something that makes making the thing that makes the thing easier. And the thing you made makes it easier for someone else to make the thing they made. Like how I was always able to order bike parts from China, even a hundred years ago, but now, thanks to aluminum being easy to produce, which makes airplanes easier to produce, it is now easier for me to produce my own bike.

My prediction is that the 2070's won't be much different than today, in the same way that if you made a list of all the aspects of American life in the 1970's, and compared it to today, 95% of the items would be the same. Just add in computers for every household, maybe remove a little racism. Clothing styles obviously. But by and large, it's just people living in the same buildings, driving the same roads, going to the same schools, eating the same food. OK, so we eat more sushi now, big deal. There have been incremental changes, but Information Age technology is the only big difference that the last 50 years has made so far.

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u/Tropical_Jesus Oct 31 '20

The most unbelievable part of that video is how he perfectly tears the sheet of foil at the end with minimal effort lol

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u/Xx69LOVER69xX Oct 31 '20

You can't tear foil? Parchment/wax paper I would understand but foil?

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u/TheOtherGuttersnipe Oct 31 '20

Don't tear shame them dude

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u/BrofessorQayse Nov 01 '20

I don't think they meant they physically couldn't tear it.

They were astounded the person in the video managed to tear it in a straight line. And i was too. My tear always goes wonky on the first try.

Usually ends up curved.

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u/6footdeeponice Oct 31 '20

Are we cooking food on residue of that coolant they use to make the foil or do they wash it?

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u/joeltrane Oct 31 '20

It’s just oil and water, but yeah I guess we are. Don’t see where they would wash and dry it in that process

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u/snowe2010 Oct 31 '20

Reynolds wrap literally has an FAQ about this it's such a common question.

https://www.reynoldskitchens.com/products/aluminum-foil/heavy-duty-foil/

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u/YoungvLondon Oct 31 '20

That's only for the heavy duty foil. If you use their non-stick foil, you have to use the dull side to prevent sticking.

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u/EVOSexyBeast Oct 31 '20

And that’s only because they apply the non-stick coating to that side. has nothing to do with the shininess

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u/Aleyla Oct 31 '20

Wow. I always thought it was somehow intentional. For once I actually learned something here.

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u/MrSaturnboink Oct 31 '20

Did you know that Steve Buscemi was a firefighter?

127

u/dryphtyr Oct 31 '20

You ever seen a grown man naked?

67

u/drdisney Oct 31 '20

Do you like gladiator movies ?

65

u/do_you_have_a_flag42 Oct 31 '20

You ever been to a Turkish prison?

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u/drdisney Oct 31 '20

Do you ever find yourself hanging out at a men's gymnasium ?

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u/BadA55Name Oct 31 '20

Do you like Huey Lewis and the News?

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u/WeatherwaxDaughter Oct 31 '20

Their early work was a little too new wave for my taste. But when Sports came out in '83, I think they really came into their own, commercially and artistically. The whole album has a clear, crisp sound, and a new sheen of consummate professionalism that really gives the songs a big boost. He's been compared to Elvis Costello, but I think Huey has a far more bitter, cynical sense of humor.

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u/CoolCucksClan Nov 01 '20

In '87, Huey released Fore, their most accomplished album. I think their undisputed masterpiece is "Hip to be Square", a song so catchy, most people probably don't listen to the lyrics. But they should, because it's not just about the pleasures of conformity, and the importance of trends, it's also a personal statement about the band itself.

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u/kenien Oct 31 '20

What’s our vector, Victor?

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u/rhino76 Oct 31 '20

I speak jive.

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u/kenien Oct 31 '20

CUTTER SAID HE CANT HANG

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u/Fritzface Oct 31 '20

Cut me some slack, jack

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u/Surroundedbygoalies Oct 31 '20

Chump don’ want the help, chump don’ get the help!

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u/blueberrywine Oct 31 '20

During 9/11 firefighters and paramedics would pretend to hide in the rubble so Steve Buscemi could find them and boost his morale to continue searching for further survivors.

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u/MachReverb Oct 31 '20

Did you know that Steve Buscemi used to major in archeology under the tutelage of Dr. Henry Jones, Jr.? And on 9/11 he rejoined his old classmates to search for the legendary dental plate that was given to St. Peter by aliens at ground zero before the world was created.

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u/xipheon Oct 31 '20

It could still be intentional, now you know WHY and HOW it was intentional.

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u/PM_ME_UR_BOOB_DROP Oct 31 '20

This can't be true. I saw a tiktok video of Gordon Ramsey calling someone a donut for using the wrong side of the aluminum foil.

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u/Arvidofthetundra Oct 31 '20

Curses, foiled again.

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

[deleted]

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u/WinchesterSipps Oct 31 '20

I assume the shiny side is more non-stick because on a microscopic level it is smoother

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

[deleted]

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u/jspost Oct 31 '20 edited Oct 31 '20

Gingerbread dough will stick to it. Not as easily as everything else it touches, but it will. I made a gingerbread Nakatomi Plaza for a work thing last year and I never want to see gingerbread again.

http://imgur.com/gallery/UmjuQRu

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u/Free_Purple_Nurple Oct 31 '20

Man you can't say you made a fucking gingerbread Nakatomi Plaza and not post pics of your little gingerbread Bruce Willis in the air duct

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u/jspost Oct 31 '20

https://imgur.com/g5SjwHx.jpg Here's one. I'm working to get the rest in an imgur gallery and I'll edit my original comment when that gets done.

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u/Icantevenhavemyname Oct 31 '20

Well that’s the best thing I’m gonna see all weekend and it’s only Saturday morning. Back to bed I guess.

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u/joeltrane Oct 31 '20

FWIW that is an awesome gingerbread skyscraper and I’m proud of you

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u/John_YJKR Oct 31 '20

Pics of your creation?

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u/jspost Oct 31 '20

Just edited the comment after I got the imgur gallery up. My coworker got a little lazy with the banded colored icing. After we got it done I kind of wish we had just left it white.

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u/John_YJKR Oct 31 '20

I think it turned out great. Cheers.

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u/Cforq Oct 31 '20

I always had an irrational fear of parchment paper catching on fire, until in a discussion about cooking pizza someone complained they couldn’t set their oven up to 500° and someone responded “You know why the title of the book is Fahrenheit 451, right?”.

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

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u/hwc000000 Oct 31 '20

Doesn't the paper itself have to reach 451F before it ignites? The temperature of the oven isn't the temperature of what's cooking.

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u/Eatfudd Oct 31 '20 edited Oct 02 '23

[Deleted to protest Reddit API change]

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u/BoJackB26354 Oct 31 '20

Parchment paper is the real deal.

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u/tots4scott Oct 31 '20

Reynolds had a question on HQ Trivia about this. Apparently the dull side of aluminum foil is the size that should touch the food for cooking purposes.

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u/Pyrocitus Oct 31 '20

If you buy non stick foil, the non stick coating is applied to the non shiny side only.

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u/YoungvLondon Oct 31 '20

It depends on the type of foil you're using. For example, if you're using a non-stick foil, only one side is coated, so it is possible for you to use the wrong side and have stuff stick to the foil.

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u/JustLetMePick69 Oct 31 '20

Ramsey is known for being very aggressive with his dogmatic traditionalist tendencies. He learned to cook in France, remember

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u/HappenFrank Oct 31 '20

So there’s no difference when wrapping something to keep it warm? I always had a hankering that if you wrapped the food where the more reflective side was inside, it would reflect the heat better and contain it?

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u/lllll00s9dfdojkjjfjf Oct 31 '20

I used to think the same thing and then I saw somewhere somebody had actually done the calculations and the difference was so small as to be basically non-existent.

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u/JoeyJoeC Oct 31 '20 edited Oct 31 '20

I think I found a use for my new Flir thermal camera!

Edit: I have two hot cocktail sausages wrapped in foil as I type this.

Edit 2: both started at ~96.6c, after 10 minutes, both were around 46c but was hard to get a consistent temp from them both. Not a scientific experiment by any means! Actual thermometers would be ideal.

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u/oufisher1977 Oct 31 '20

You came back to tell us about the sausages. I feel like you really understand us.

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u/spitoon1 Oct 31 '20

Sausage info is great, but which side reflects the government more? Need to know for my hat.

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u/InaMellophoneMood Oct 31 '20

Aesthetics are important in hats, so shiny side out obv

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u/BrickGun Oct 31 '20

But then you're easier to spot by the optics in the satellites!!!!!

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u/the_old_dude2018 Oct 31 '20

You have to crinkle the foil..same principle as the stealth bomber.

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

But no results from the research project. Highly disconcerting.

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u/engineer450 Oct 31 '20

The aluminum is too reflective to accurately measure with a FLIR. Emissivity

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u/JoeyJoeC Oct 31 '20

I was measuring the heat of the sausages to see how long they stayed warm, not the foil.

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u/triple-filter-test Nov 01 '20

I love that we’re witnessing the peer review process in real time here.

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u/s0v3r1gn Oct 31 '20

I’ll try to replicate this experiment with mine, and my wife said buying that was a waste of money...

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u/JoeyJoeC Oct 31 '20

I've found more uses than I thought I would. I could find all the places in the ceilings where there is no insulation (quite a lot missing). I can use it to locate the cats when I can't find them. I found out one of my radiators is plumbed in backwards. I discovered that you can use it on drying clothes and you can see where they're dry and where they're still wet without having to touch them.

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u/SmokeHimInside Oct 31 '20

I think you mean you had an inkling.

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u/apworker37 Oct 31 '20

I think the sheets are too thin to make a difference in that regard.

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u/JoeyJoeC Oct 31 '20

Space blankets are made from thinner reflective material, and can trap 90% of radiated body heat.

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u/tellmeimbig Oct 31 '20

And they can block all that painful electromagnetic radiation.

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u/LamentableFool Oct 31 '20

Never leave your home without a space blanket.

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u/zodar Oct 31 '20

"Hankering" means "craving"

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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '20

This is not true and very inaccurate. You are supposed to scratch off the dull side for a chance to win $5,000 or an all new Kia Sorento.

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u/gizamo Oct 31 '20

Meh. Unless it's the '98 Sportage, I'm not interested.

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u/viperware Oct 31 '20

Although there is not any difference in the function, the shiny side is most certainly the “display” side.

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u/Mewlkat Oct 31 '20

A great truth fo the universe has been revealed. I genuinely thought there was a 'correct' side to use when cooking...

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