Soylent halts sales of its powder as customers keep getting sick

Sure.

One of the hardest things when reducing a sauce is to not stop to soon and to not go too far. If you stop too soon you can use a roux or more crudely use flour or starch to thicken the sauce. If you go to far you end up with a glaze. You could add stock or water to thin, however.

A well timed reduction, in my opinion, you end up with a sauce that is "nappe". But the trick is knowing when you're there. An interesting thing about reducing a liquid is that as it reduces further it reduces faster as there is less liquid but the same amount of heat. So there is the critical moment where you go "just far enough" and your sauce is perfect. Too far and you have a glaze or a burned sauce. Not far enough and and the flavors are not blended and concentrated.

I've found in cooking that stopping just before you think something is done is a good heuristic. IT keeps cooking for a bit longer. Timing this can be hard has there is a small window between not reduced enough and too much. It goes fast near the end. A classic "happens slowly, then all at once".

I really wish they didn't name their company 'Soylent'. Soylent Green was a gross concept for a movie, and, unrelated, I really can't stand the sound of the word.

> I don't judge anyone for making food and drink a footnote in their life.

I believe you that you're trying not to be judgemental, but FWIW, your statement equating eating soylent to making food and drink a footnote in life sounds at least presumptuous if not judgemental. I love cooked meals too, but I can easily see the value in a quick, controlled meal with a proper balance of macros, it's not a stretch to understand at all.

If you can't understand trading any experience for convenience, then do I assume you cook 3 meals a day and never eat fast food? Running a startup, I'm jealous if you have time for that, I simply don't. I cook once in a while, but no way every meal. (And I hope you're not drinking wine with every meal you eat, morning noon and night! ;) )

I can extra understand people controlling for calories by having a soylent or something like it for lunch. Controlling for calories is really hard to do, and products like soylent help with self-control on multiple levels by making it easy to measure macros, as well as having a meal with no peer pressure to overeat or snarf on fries or beer. If you're controlling for calories or for macros, the lack of a butter cream reduction wine dinner texture experience for lunch is a distinct advantage that leaves room in the budget to splurge on a well cooked dinner in the evenings or weekends.

It's not clear why they're getting sick or what percentage of people are getting sick. It's good they're taking it seriously and being cautious.

"Our tests all came back negative for food pathogens, toxins or outside contamination,” so it's possible that it affects just a few people but they're still be being careful.

And frankly in this case refunds are implied, I would imagine that they would be sued into oblivion otherwise.

I just think it's good to see a company take things seriously and act rather than engage in PR. E.g. Theranos, Samsung etc.

Two people in my family also experienced it, but I think it's likely related to your particular gastrointestinal system genetics, really. Doesn't happen to everyone, but those it does happen to it's pretty horrific; that said, my family has a huge history of Crohn's, et al. so there's probably a bit of cross-pollination between the two, so to speak.