CAKES, CUSTARD AND CATEGORY THEORY

Most people imagine maths is something like a slow cooker: very useful, but pretty limited in what it can do. Maths, though, isn't just a tool for solving a specific problem - and it's definitely not something to be afraid of. Whether you're a maths glutton or have forgotten how long division works (or never really knew in the first place), the chances are you've missed what really makes maths exciting. Calling on a baker's dozen of entertaining, puzzling examples and mathematically illuminating culinary analogies - including chocolate brownies, iterated Battenberg cakes, sandwich sandwiches, Yorkshire puddings and Möbius bagels - brilliant young academic and mathematical crusader Eugenia Cheng is here to tell us why we should all love maths. From simple numeracy to category theory ('the mathematics of mathematics'), Cheng takes us through the joys of the mathematical world. Packed with recipes, puzzles to surprise and delight even the innumerate, Cake, Custard & Category Theory will whet the appetite of maths whizzes and arithmophobes alike. (Not to mention aspiring cooks: did you know you can use that slow cooker to make clotted cream?) This is maths at its absolute tastiest.

About the author
Eugenia Cheng is Senior Lecturer in Pure Mathematics at the University of Sheffield. She was educated at the University of Cambridge and has done post-doctoral work at the Universities of Cambridge, Chicago and Nice. Since 2007 her YouTube lectures and videos have been viewed around 700,000 times to date. A concert pianist, she also speaks French, English and Cantonese, and her mission in life is to rid the world of maths phobia.

Reviews
From clotted cream to category theory, neither cookery nor math are what you thought they were. But deep down they're remarkably similar. A brilliant gourmet feast of what math is really about
- Ian Stewart, author of Professor Stewart’s Incredible Numbers
Eugenia Cheng's charming new book embeds maths in a casing of wry, homespun metaphors: maths is like vegan brownies, maths is like a subway map, maths is like a messy desk. Cheng is at home with maths the way you're at home with brownies, maps, and desks, and by the end of Cakes, Custard & Category Theory, you might be, too.
- Jordan Ellenberg, author of How Not to Be Wrong
What a charming and original book! The central analogy - maths is like cooking - turns out to be surprisingly apt and often funny. Light and tasty, yet so, so good for you, Cakes, Custard & Category Theory is a real treat.
- Steven Strogatz, author of The Joy of x
With this delightfully surprising book, Eugenia Cheng reveals the hidden beauty of mathematics with passion and simplicity. After reading Cakes, Custard & Category Theory, you won't look at maths (nor porridge!) in the same way ever again.
- Roberto Trotta, author of The Edge of the Sky
One of the most frustrating parts about teaching or conveying mathematics concepts is that they don't just seem abstract, they are abstract. Dr Cheng does an amazing job of making these abstract concepts tangible, guiding the reader to stretch our brains just a little past the comfortable zone to help us comprehend complex mathematical concepts. This book puts the fun back in maths, the fun that I always saw in it ... I whole-heartedly recommend this book to anyone with a casual interest in, or deep love of, logic, or mathematics, or baking.
- Melissa A. Wilson Sayres, Assistant Professor in the School of Life Sciences and the Biodesign Institute, Arizona State University and writer of the mathbionerd.blogspot.com blog