A cake recipe calls for 1 cups of milk and 3 cups of flour. Seth made a mistake and used 4.5 cups of flour. How many cups of milk should he use to keep the proportions correct?
A. 1.5 cups milk
B. 1.75 cups milk
C. 2 cups flour
D. 2.5 cups milk
1 / 3 * 4.5 = ? cups of milk
To answer this question, we need to keep the proportion of milk to flour the same as the original recipe.
In the original recipe, there is 1 cup of milk for every 3 cups of flour. This can be expressed as a ratio: 1:3.
Since Seth used 4.5 cups of flour, we can set up a proportion to find out how much milk he should use.
1 cup milk / 3 cups flour = x cups milk / 4.5 cups flour
To solve for x, we can cross-multiply and divide:
(1 cup milk) * (4.5 cups flour) = (3 cups flour) * (x cups milk)
4.5 cups milk = 3x
x = 4.5 cups milk / 3
x = 1.5 cups milk
Therefore, Seth should use 1.5 cups of milk to keep the proportions correct.
The answer is A. 1.5 cups milk.