Pi Day of the Century

So today is the big day for all my nerdy friends and readers. It is Pi Day!!! (Please note the date and time I posted this blog…3/14/15 9:26. Am I blowing your beautiful minds right now?)

But why is Pi Day so special? First, because nerds need a reason to have a party!! Due to their poor social skills, they don’t go out much. So this is one time a year when they are the popular and not wallflowers. They can hang out with their friends and play all those popular Pi Day games like “Who can memorize the most digits?” Or maybe play the devil’s game and add up the first 144 digits of pi? (Spoiler alert…the number is 666!)

If your pi party hostess is really fun, he/she will have compasses for parting gifts. This way everyone can draw their own circles to calculate their own ratio of circumference to diameter to calculate pi. (There is always one Bozo in the group who doesn’t measure right and tries to disprove pi. That guy should never get invited back!)

Another reason to enjoy Pi day is that you can eat pie to celebrate. This is how people who don’t understand the mathematical constant celebrate.   Their party game consists of one person typing “314” into a calculator and then they hold it backward. Look it spells PIE! (Odds are this is also the most attractive person at the party.)

And there needs to be one guy who says the infamous joke of what do you get if you divide the circumference of a pumpkin by its diameter? PUMPKIN PI

Finally, don’t forget to end the party right before midnight with a rousing sing along of “Ludolph the Calculating Mathematician.”   No one really knows the words to this song but it is okay because most Pi parties end waaaaaay before midnight. (And if your guests don’t know that the mathematician Ludolph van Ceulen spent his life calculating pi, they are probably still laughing at words they can write on a calculator .)

So go to a party, eat some pie or just be irrational….Pi Day is for everyone!!!

Stromboli Pi

Ingredients (rough amounts)

1 sheet puff pastry (thawed about 30 minutes)

½ pound shaved ham

¼ pound salami

¼ pound peperoni

1 roasted yellow pepper, chopped (you can use a red one)

¾ cup of shredded Italian cheese

1 egg with 1 tbsp water

Salt and pepper

1 cup pizza sauce

Directions

Oven at 400. If you have a pizza stone, put it in the oven. If not, use a LARGE baking sheet. (Or turn a couple over and use them like that.)

Roll the pastry in 3 separate parts. Layer your ingredients except sauce lengthwise on one edge of the pastry. You don’t want to pile it too high because you need to roll it up and seal the ends. Repeat for all 3 pieces.

Brush with egg wash and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Place on parchment paper for easier mobility.

Now you can bake them for 20 minutes separately or you can make them into whatever shape you desire…like Pi!

I just moved the whole thing onto my pizza stone and the parchment made it super easy to remove it from the oven without breaking my design.

Serve with your favorite pizza sauce!

Math holidays aren’t for everyone but luckily for us the holiday only lasts one day and does not go on for infinity. 3.1415926535897932384626433832795028841971693993751058209749445923078164062862089986280348253421170679……………………………