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Why Is There a Bucatini Shortage in America?

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Re: Why Is There a Bucatini Shortage in America?

#271

Post by TheDong »

jiofih wrote: post #250
pksebben wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's this strange cultural divide in the US, and it's not a republican-Democrat thing or a gender thing or a race thing. People from certain cliques are more comfortable with snark, self deprecation, and the sort of hyperbolic lampooning that this article engaged in (I'm in this camp), whereas others read snobbery and cruelty and such from identical sources (and I'm fairly certain the author is not implying they a…

> I'm fairly certain the author is not implying they are better than anyone because of their love for 'the best pasta' That’s the thing - I am sure they (and the readers) do feel superior for their choice of pasta - or something equally pedestrian, it is what makes the whole “hyperbolic lampooning” work - it wouldn’t be funny if didn’t have a vein of truth. That’s off-putting, maybe because we cant identify with that…

> That’s off-putting, maybe because we cant identify with that attitude anymore. Different life stages (I’d be surprised if the author is over 26).

Maybe that style of dry humor is off-putting and associated with a specific age to you, but I find it to be timeless.

The author's in her mid 30s, and there are numerous other older people who use a similar sardonic wry sense of humor well, from David Sedaris to the kindhearted kvetching of old jewish grandmothers.

What you're doing with this comment is both similar and different. You're effectively saying "Well, I don't like it because I'm more mature; I can recognize that there's a grain of truth in her self-depreciation, and by recognizing that, I'm better than her". Effectively, you're aggrandizing yourself in the same way you accuse her of doing so, but without any of the humor.

Re: Why Is There a Bucatini Shortage in America?

#272

Post by dan_hawkins »

foton1981 wrote: post #12

I am afraid this article will resurrect shortage even if it ended lately: I never cared about pasta shapes, but now I want bucatini. With 52 hacker news points there goes national stock of bucatini.

You can begin with that recipe: [0] :)

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8t6ddIzPy0k

Re: Why Is There a Bucatini Shortage in America?

#273

Post by danso »

sam_goody wrote: post #97

The writing style is awesome, I literally laughed out loud. Beyond that, the article reminds us that in every industry there are powerful actors that protect their monopoly, and will coerce the government into helping them. I read an article about import taxes on sugar that were created to keep out competition, and as a result everything uses corn syrup. Other examples abound. Unfortunately, the solution of governmen…

That's really funny to me. I saw this article yesterday being raved about on foodie Twitter, but didn't try submitting to HN because I figured many users might be a little annoyed by not only a food story, but one that takes 1,200 words (i.e. the length of "Part 1: The Mystery") before getting to the chase. A 1,200 word scene-setting intro is a lot for any kind of reader so it's a testament to the author's skill that it's entertaining enough to keep readers' attention.

Re: Why Is There a Bucatini Shortage in America?

#274

Post by legerdemain »

ajuc wrote: post #122
bamboleo wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And awkward as hell too. Maccheroni is a shape of pasta, but apparently all pasta is "enriched macaroni" in the US?

Kiełbasa and Pierogi are whole classes of products but in US kiełbasa is a particular kind of Polish sousage and pierogi basically means ruskie pierogi. That's how foreign languages work. In Polish "rower" means "a bicycle" because british company Rover sold them here first :) In Russian and Ukrainian vogzal means "train station" because there was a famous train station in Vauxhal :)

Another fun one: the word for "marker" (i.e., a felt-tipped pen for drawing) is "фломастер," from the brand Flo-Master.

Although, given the way things are going, it wouldn't surprise me if the word was now "шарпи."

Surprisingly, the art supply brand Caran d'Ache is from the Russian "карандаш" and not vice versa.

The Ukrainian for "pencil" simply comes from the word for the metal tin, which, like lead metal, was in use for styluses used in drawing before the discovery of graphite.

Re: Why Is There a Bucatini Shortage in America?

#275

Post by [deleted] »

jiofih wrote: post #179
sam_goody wrote: post #97

The writing style is awesome, I literally laughed out loud. Beyond that, the article reminds us that in every industry there are powerful actors that protect their monopoly, and will coerce the government into helping them. I read an article about import taxes on sugar that were created to keep out competition, and as a result everything uses corn syrup. Other examples abound. Unfortunately, the solution of governmen…

I had the very opposite reaction. The snobbery of “the only pasta worth eating”, which is an insult to the diversity of Italian cuisine, deflated me right at the start. I know it’s supposed to be funny, but also that there is a hint of self-deprecating truth to it... think I’m getting old.

[deleted]

Re: Why Is There a Bucatini Shortage in America?

#276

Post by [deleted] »

jiofih wrote: post #249
alsetmusic wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t find it snobbish at all. The author is making high stakes out of an obviously low stakes situation. It’s absurdist. I don’t find it particularly funny, but it is a comedy piece through and through. This is not a person who is taking themselves seriously: > I felt more determined than ever to solve this mystery, not just for myself but for the cast of Saturday Night Live and also the rest of the people of the…

That becomes clear as the article progresses, but you need to get through the first few paragraphs.

[deleted]

Re: Why Is There a Bucatini Shortage in America?

#277

Post by gambiting »

gambiting wrote: post #185
jiofih wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had the very opposite reaction. The snobbery of “the only pasta worth eating”, which is an insult to the diversity of Italian cuisine, deflated me right at the start. I know it’s supposed to be funny, but also that there is a hint of self-deprecating truth to it... think I’m getting old.

I also hugely disliked the style and tone of the article. I finished it thinking "well, I guess anyone can call themselves a journalist nowadays". The humor was out of place too, just coming across as snobbish most of the time, even though I can tell what the author is doing. It's just....too much. But hey, other people like it so who am I too judge ;-)

I don't normally comment on points count, but I've never had a comment go from +12 to 0 before, what a polarising opinion ;-)

Re: Why Is There a Bucatini Shortage in America?

#278

Post by pstuart »

imajoredinecon wrote: post #259
rat87 wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They can't just call up their lobbyist who's already scheduled to golf with a congressman every other weekend and tell them to bring it up on their next trip. I think you're vastly underestimating the impact of lobbying and overestimating the cost https://www.npr.org/transcripts/708195702 Tax Professor wants to try to get a policy (automatically filled out tax returns for CA state taxes)he thinks will be good for t…

Reading that transcript actually left me thinking the system worked okay in this particular case, even though it led to a bad (in my opinion) policy outcome. The money bought access, not results: in the end, the legislators who voted against largely it did so because of personal belief the policy was bad or because of political pressure from an important campaign group (+), not because of money from Intuit (and it di…

Nobody likes taxes, and Norquist just makes it more painful. Ideologues are jerks.

Re: Why Is There a Bucatini Shortage in America?

#279

Post by asveikau »

sunpar wrote: post #129
sam_goody wrote: post #97

The writing style is awesome, I literally laughed out loud. Beyond that, the article reminds us that in every industry there are powerful actors that protect their monopoly, and will coerce the government into helping them. I read an article about import taxes on sugar that were created to keep out competition, and as a result everything uses corn syrup. Other examples abound. Unfortunately, the solution of governmen…

I actually think most of the governmental functions in this article worked quite well. Told another way, a firm in the marketplace for pasta found that a competitor was out of regulation with their product, and they found a person in congress who could press a slow-moving and ineffective agency to do better at doing their job: enforcing said regulations. That's exactly what you want your elected representatives to do…

I am generally a pro regulation type of person, but the article suggests the regulation was meant to block Asian noodles and favor European ones. So whether or not De Cecco bucatini needs the extra few milligrams of iron, while still satisfying EU health requirements, is a relevant question.

Re: Why Is There a Bucatini Shortage in America?

#280

Post by dcolkitt »

sunpar wrote: post #129
sam_goody wrote: post #97

The writing style is awesome, I literally laughed out loud. Beyond that, the article reminds us that in every industry there are powerful actors that protect their monopoly, and will coerce the government into helping them. I read an article about import taxes on sugar that were created to keep out competition, and as a result everything uses corn syrup. Other examples abound. Unfortunately, the solution of governmen…

I actually think most of the governmental functions in this article worked quite well. Told another way, a firm in the marketplace for pasta found that a competitor was out of regulation with their product, and they found a person in congress who could press a slow-moving and ineffective agency to do better at doing their job: enforcing said regulations. That's exactly what you want your elected representatives to do…

> I find that a law specifying in exact numbers what a product should contain in order to qualify for a label to be a very good law.

Good in theory. But it's also likely to slow down innovation or even kill it in its tracks. Maybe a producer wants to mix up the ingredients because they're making a substandard product. But maybe they discovered a way to deliver higher quality or lower price with an iteration on the original. In the long run, consumers will mostly discover the shitty products and stop buying them anyway.

For example if such a law was in place for desktop computers, it almost assuredly would have required x86-compatible CPUs. It's highly unlikely that Apple would made the investment to produce the incredible gains in the M1, if it was forced to market the MacBook Air as "not legally a laptop"

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