I would like to apologize to all of you for missing National Peanut Butter & Jelly Day yesterday. Do know that in honor of the glorious day, I made myself a PB&J sandwich for breakfast and savored it thoroughly. Next year, if someone can send me a quick reminder the day before, I promise a post about the best PB&J memories I have throughout my life. It might not sound exciting right now, but trust me, a significant chunk of my life has revolved around this simple yet delicious sandwich.

All that being said, Serious Eats was much more astute and observant than I was, so they had a full range of coverage regarding National PB&J Day. In fact, I think they covered the day better than most major news networks cover Election Day, so kudos to Serious Eats. One of the best reports they had was their scientific analysis of how to craft the perfect PB&J sandwich, a method I then used to craft my sandwich this morning. Here’s a quick excerpt:

Armed with measuring spoons and a knife, I discovered, much to my surprise, that the suggested servings printed on the peanut butter (2 tablespoons) and jelly (1 tablespoon) jars were perfect when spread on two slices of the Pepperidge Farm white bread. As you can see here, we were using classic scientific techniques in our serious PBJ experiment.

Adam and Meg pointed out that the Pepperidge Farm bread we had purchased was sliced thinner than many other brands. If thicker slices of bread were used instead, they cautioned, the same volumes of PB and J would not produce comparable results. They advised me to measure the relative thickness of all components with a ruler to determine a ratio that could be used with any bread thickness. That ratio is 1 : 0.6 : 0.3 : 1, as seen in the illustration here.

And there you go. The secret to the perfect PB&J sandwich is revealed. Needless to say, I had a wonderful breakfast.

(Infographic taken from Serious Eats, without permission. If you guys want me to take it down, let me know, but hey, I really do love your site.)