Earlier this month the girls and I read A Grain of Rice. In this story set in fifteenth century China, a poor but clever farmer’s son wants to marry the Emperor’s daughter. After he creates a potion that helps cure the Princess, he asks for his reward to be one grain of rice…at doubled each day for 100 days. So on the first day he receives one grain, two on the second, four on the third, eight on the fourth….131,072 on the eighteenth…524,288 on the twentieth…
As an exercise, and to prove the truth of the story, I decided we should count how many grains were in a cup of rice. I ended up counting one quarter of a cup. Abigail helped. Any guesses for how many grains in this bowl of one cup…or how many days it would take the farmer’s son to receive this much rice?
3 responses so far ↓
1 myko // Oct 19, 2004 at 11:57 pm
http://web.ask.com/web?qsrc=6&q=How+Many+Grains+of+Rice+Are+in+a+Pound%3f&o=0&sitesrc=a has as the first link a page that shows one pound of long grain rice as having 29,000 grains.
http://web.ask.com/redir?bpg=http%3a%2f%2fweb.ask.com%2fweb%3fq%3dHow%2bMany%2bcups%2bof%2brice%2bare%2bin%2ba%2bpound%253f%26o%3d0%26page%3d1&q=How+Many+cups+of+rice+are+in+a+pound%3f&u=http%3a%2f%2ftm.wc.ask.com%2fr%3ft%3dan%26s%3da%26uid%3d081964D2D6D806714%26sid%3d11B1C4D2D6D806714%26qid%3d1584DF3286F43A46ABCCA4E5FF84C062%26io%3d0%26sv%3dza5cb0dc2%26o%3d0%26ask%3dHow%2bMany%2bcups%2bof%2brice%2bare%2bin%2ba%2bpound%253f%26uip%3da867a4d5%26en%3dte%26eo%3d-100%26pt%3dFood%2bMeasurements%2band%2bEquivalents%2b-%2bPound%2bto%2bCups%2band%2bDry%2bto%2bCooked%26ac%3d24%26qs%3d1%26pg%3d1%26ep%3d1%26te_par%3d102%26te_id%3d%26u%3dhttp%3a%2f%2fwww.online-cookbook.com%2fgoto%2fcook%2frpage%2f000DDA&s=a&bu=http%3a%2f%2fwww.online-cookbook.com%2fgoto%2fcook%2frpage%2f000DDA&qte=0&o=0&abs=Food+Measurements+and+Equivalents+-+Pound+to+Cups+and+Dry+to+Cooked+…+Site+Links+Front+Page+…+1+lb+(.5+kg).+Uncooked+Rice+is+4+Cups+(950+ml…&tit=Food+Measurements+and+Equivalents+-+Pound+to+Cups+and+Dry+to+Cooked&bin=&cat=wp&purl=http%3a%2f%2ftm.wc.ask.com%2fi%2fb.html%3ft%3dan%26s%3da%26uid%3d081964D2D6D806714%26sid%3d11B1C4D2D6D806714%26qid%3d1584DF3286F43A46ABCCA4E5FF84C062%26io%3d%26sv%3dza5cb0dc2%26o%3d0%26ask%3dHow%2bMany%2bcups%2bof%2brice%2bare%2bin%2ba%2bpound%253f%26uip%3da867a4d5%26en%3dbm%26eo%3d-100%26pt%3d%26ac%3d24%26qs%3d1%26pg%3d1%26u%3dhttp%3a%2f%2fmyjeeves.ask.com%2faction%2fsnip&Complete=1 shows one pound of rice to be equal to 4 cups.
Therfore, one cup of rice (long grain) has about 7250 grains.
The peasant should get this many grains somewhere between the 12th and the 13th days (on the 12th day the peasant would have a total of 4095 grains, and on the 13th day, the peasant would have a totoal of 8191 grains)
2 myko // Oct 19, 2004 at 11:59 pm
Oops, the farmer’s son, not a peasant. The story I heard when I was younger was about a peasant…
3 Julie // Oct 20, 2004 at 8:38 am
Wow, Myk, you are right! When I counted by hand, I found around 2,000 grains of rice in a quarter of a cup. I didn’t realize it was so many! But I would have been wiser to have used the Web as you did…I’m impressed! Thanks.