to think that Mrs Bear...

[DutchOma]

...spoiled her family by cooking three lots of porridge?

I thought it was more to do with the mass of the porridge?

Big bowl stays hot for longer etc?

She sure did. If they didn't like it one way then they should have gone without

Is that right 'mass'?

Or would it be volume?

I was always crap at maths

porridge keeps, if it's saves her earache and she can be bothered why shouldn't she, it's very sensible.

YABU

I'd like to know who was responsible for the front door being left open.

Hang on - how do you cook different temperatures of porridge?

SWBU to cook porridge anyway

If she'd made them scrambled eggs on toast none of this would have happened.

It was the olden days, everyone left their door open and chips and a trip to the cinema cost half a ha'penny.

I'm crap at maths too, ZigZag, but I think that a larger amount (mass) takes longer to cool because more particles bumping together means more heat (energy). Sumfink like that, anyway.

Jasper Fforde has written a book all about this (well, it covers the condundrum).

I can't remember the answer, but something along the lines of: there was a fourth bear, who ate his porridge and then refilled it. So that's how you get three bowls of varying sizes with different temperatures.

Or something.

Maybe the baby was lactose intolerant, dad wanted his made with cream and mum with skimmed milk.
Then there are the topping options, sugar, salt, golden syrup, seeds, blueberries (my favourite) or chocolate sprinkles

I've just googled it crock, there's a bit of discrepancy because daddy bears porridge is too hot, mummys is too cold, but baby bears is just right, so going on size the bowls must have been made out of different materials for the others to be too hot/cold but the smallest just warm

It's a slow afternoon here

I thought Dad's was too salty, Mum's too lumpy but Baby Bear's was just right. For Goldilocks at least, not sure what BB would have had to say about it. And fancy everybody walking away from the breakfast table just as the porridge was being served. That is one dysfunctional family imvho.
And of course it is Mummy Bear's fault altogether.

CrockoDuck It's simply surface area to mass, so the larger bowl doesn't have a larger surface area so cools slower. If you spread the porridge flat on a plate, they'd all cool at the same rate.

Ah, ZigZag - that does put a different complexion on things. The middle bowl was cooler than the small bowl?

Unless Mummy Bear put extra cream in hers, cooling it down the greedy guts.
Yes, that's it. I have SOLVED it!

for moi.

FredFred Not doubting you (when I say I'm crap at maths, I'm not being modest) but I'm confused? The bigger bowl would have a larger surface area, wouldn't it?

I'm intrigued now.

I thought it was Daddy's chair she broke, Mummy's porridge she ate and baby bear's bed she slept in. If it was Mummy bear's porridge then it's fine as it would be a volume of porridge thing

CrockoDuck depends on the design of bowl :) yes if the bowls were wide and flat the surface (and it's surface to the air that matters most as the bowl itself will insulate the porridge so most of the losses will be to the air above) then a larger bowl could have a larger area and cool quicker - so a bowl where both mummy and daddy bear had 2cm of porridge in but daddy bear had 50% more his would almost certainly cool faster. However as we know his cooled slower they must have bowls which are very upright, more like the shape of honey jars which we know are favoured by other bears.

There's so many solutions really. Mummy bear could also have left the serving spoon in the porridge to conduct more of the heat away to cool hers more, covered baby bears porridge to keep the flies off, used bowls of different types (something badly insulating like porcelain for mummy, and something more robust and insulating for daddy like a heavy stoneware) Added fruit, or cream, or something to hers.

Or she could've just microwaved all of them from leftover porridge from the night before and simply put it in for different lengths. Or ...

I've never heard that version bronze, everything happened to poor little baby bear in the one's I've read.

Goldilocks is just a thieving, housebreaking lout if the truth be told.

Surely they'd have all had honey on it??

OP - Jasper Fforde is your man. Definitely (and anyone daft enough to post on this thread will love the books as well!)

Interesting that she was an old lady in the first recorded version, although may have been a fox before that (not deep research this, just wikipedia)

I do think it probably was a story to tell people to be good and not steal food, break furniture or kip in other peoples beds, lest you get eaten (or forced to flee...)

I thought Mummy Bear cooked one lot of porridge then when she'd ladled it out into bowls, she added salt to daddy's (strange daddy!) and sugar to her's and baby bear's.

When I was young, The Bears chased Goldilocks away and "she was never seen or heard from again". Make of that what you will.

None of this "I wonder why she didn't like my porridge/chair/bed" anxiety felt by Mummy Bear in our recent Ladybird version.

No wonder the country is going to the dogs!