Question

Jeremiah volunteered to bring a smoked brisket to the family reunion. During cooking in a smoker, a brisket loses 35%
of its uncooked weight.

If Jeremiah wants to have 12 1/2 ibs



of cooked brisket, then what should the weight of the uncooked brisket be that he starts with?

Round the answer to the nearest tenth of a pound.

Answer 1

To determine the weight of the uncooked brisket that Jeremiah needs, we start by noting that the brisket loses 35% of its weight during cooking. This means that he retains 65% of the uncooked weight after cooking.

Let's denote the weight of the uncooked brisket as \( x \). After cooking, he will have:

\[
0.65x
\]

We want this cooked weight to equal 12.5 pounds, so we set up the equation:

\[
0.65x = 12.5
\]

Now, we can solve for \( x \):

\[
x = \frac{12.5}{0.65}
\]

Calculating that gives:

\[
x \approx \frac{12.5}{0.65} \approx 19.23076923076923
\]

Rounding this to the nearest tenth, we get:

\[
x \approx 19.2
\]

Therefore, the weight of the uncooked brisket that Jeremiah should start with is approximately **19.2 pounds**.