"Ten and several minutes": Any more natural expression?

Heat the mixture for ten and several minutes.

What is a more natural way to express this “ten and several” wording, which is literally translated from Japanese?

A. for between ten and 20 minutes

B. for 15 minutes or so

C. something else?

In English, there is no short expression for "between 10 and 20" in common use. The closest direct translations are, in fact, "between 10 and 20 minutes" and "10 to 20 minutes".

However, there are some other expressions that may be appropriate:

• A dozen minutes: if you intend to express "approximately twelve". Technically, a dozen is exactly 12, but it might be interpreted with a ± 2 tolerance.
• A quarter hour: Technically, this means exactly 15 minutes, but by shifting to less precise units, some tolerance is implied. An interpretation of ± 5 minutes would not be unreasonable.

Typically, a recipe will state something like "heat for a quarter hour, until the mixture has the consistency of honey" — or some other guideline as to when to stop. It would then be clear that the time expression is a rough estimate.

For "between 20 and 30", you could say "twenty-something". For "between 30 and 40", you could say "thirty-something". However, "ten-something" doesn't sound natural. "Ten-and-something" is not much better. You might as well say "between 10 and 20.'

Actually, there are at least three idiomatic expressions that do the trick:

• "ten minutes and change":

  (idiomatic) and some quantity, but less than the increment to the next round number

• "ten minutes and then some":

  (idiomatic, colloquial) used to confirm preceding utterance, while implying that what was said or asked is an understatement

• "ten-odd minutes"

  somewhat more than the indicated approximate quantity, extent, or degree —usually used in combination <300-odd pages>

However, all these are quite informal, so you are unlikely to find them in an instruction manual or recipe, nor should you use them in such contexts yourself.

On the plus side, when you can use them, you can use them with absolutely any number, not just 10.