Live data from Hacker News

The Last Egg

brr.fyi

131–140 of 204 posts

Re: The Last Egg

#131

Weird they don't stock UHT milk. I buy milk for 6 months and keep it in my pantry. I honestly can't tell the difference between modern UHT milk and mass-produced "fresh" milk (at 2% anyway). They could in theory ship in UHT milk instead of fresh, and stock enough extra to last a few more months in winter. It would be fun to make your own cheese down there as a hobby! Eating by the seasons is also pretty interesting,…

Anchor Full Cream Milk Powder. Powdered, but some of the best milk we've ever tasted. Great for lattes and mochas. IMHO much, much better than UHT. From New Zealand, so wouldn't even have to ship it very far. Expensive, though, ordering it in the U.S.--equivalent of 22 liters is over $50. Popular in Dominican Republic and think other parts of Lat. Am., so can probably get it cheaper.

Re: The Last Egg

#132

Always love when this blog is posted. Seeing the day-to-day in one of the least mundane places humans exist is a special kind of interesting.

I see these and I say "oh yeah, that Antarctica blog that I tell everyone about."

I have always loved reading about people who live in extreme environments. It's also a great topic in science fiction.

Not sure how to explain my attraction to these stories, but as someone who lived for many years in the San Luis Valley ( https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/149599/san-luis-val... ) it's easy to relate.

Re: The Last Egg

#133
post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plastic litres jug milk sold in Ireland and the UK is what both commenters were comparing to the bland UHT milk. Generally everything is available in the USA, but there are some surprising cases where the default product is of noticeable lower quality than the default in Europe.

Yeah, I’d say that the default in the US is generally cheaper and lower quality than the default in France, at least (no experience with Ireland).

If you spend the same amount in US as France (milk _is_ more expensive in France), is the quality the same? This comment only seems to confirm that cheaper milk will be worse.

Re: The Last Egg

#134

There was a Googler who spent some time at the South Pole station and gave a talk about it. I won't name him here, but maybe he's reading this? What I recall was him walking around and over the actual Pole and trying to get his GPS to register 90.0 degrees. It wouldn't go beyond 89.999.

Hackers would probably also love to consider that a lot of hardware that has code that depends on lat/lon for internal calculations can have all sorts of weird problems. When you are exactly at the pole longitude can switch from +180 to -180 rapidly and that can be a catastrophic edge case for anything that needs to do positioning. I had the pleasure of watching an expensive drone crash into hull of a ship and sink i…

Since all the longitude lines converge there, that's expected behavior, right?

Re: The Last Egg

#135

Weird they don't stock UHT milk. I buy milk for 6 months and keep it in my pantry. I honestly can't tell the difference between modern UHT milk and mass-produced "fresh" milk (at 2% anyway). They could in theory ship in UHT milk instead of fresh, and stock enough extra to last a few more months in winter. It would be fun to make your own cheese down there as a hobby! Eating by the seasons is also pretty interesting,…

> Eating by the seasons is also pretty interesting Eating by the seasons is mundane and normal almost everywhere in the world.

For certain definitions of "almost everywhere", I suppose? Care to define that more rigorously?

Most American city-dwellers I know wouldn't be aware of in-season food items, and wouldn't care either, because grocery stores stock almost everything year-round, so if you're meal planning based on what's in season it's nearly an afterthought, or superfluous. Growing food in the desert and importing it from the Southern Hemisphere really works to blur those lines for us. When I was preparing fresh meals at home, I considered eating what's in-season and paying attention, but that turned out to be a lot of pointless work.

Re: The Last Egg

#136
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coming from drinking Irish milk, American milk already tastes like water. I can understand UHT being interchangeable if the baseline product is already bland.

American milk is very varied, sounds like you’re describing plastic gallon jug skim milk. If you want something a bit heartier, you can probably find creamline milk from a local farm.

I have been reliably informed that homogenized dairy products increase inflammation, and so I've made efforts to purchase creamline products instead. It's been revelatory, the difference and enjoyment I derive from it. I've found Straus Creamery makes amazing milk and yogurt products. Sometimes the milk comes in a glass half-gallon with a $2 deposit and I return them to the store. It's kind of a game to scoop out a big plug of cream from the narrow-mouth bottle! I guess you're supposed to mix it into coffee or tea, but I just kind of eat it. Yummy. Also, this kind of milk seems to keep for a good bit of time and it goes sour very, very slowly. The fresh scent is very delicate.

The yogurt is likewise amazing. You can get European or you can get Greek, if you don't want to pay for water. I get the plain stuff and again, it's got delicate flavors and odor, not the real tang of plain mass-produced yogurt. It's great to mix with my Muesli or just have a few medicinal tablespoons every day. In fact, it's difficult to stop once I've started spooning it out.

Re: The Last Egg

#137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm surprised you can't tell the difference between UHT and regular milk. I've tried a few brands in the UK, and there's a clear difference in tea / coffee, and it's particularly marked if you're drinking milk on its own. Maybe the UK is lagging behind on UHT? Or I'm just buying the wrong brand.

Coming from drinking Irish milk, American milk already tastes like water. I can understand UHT being interchangeable if the baseline product is already bland.

I think mikk is disgusting, but even the few times I've tried it in the USA it's obvious there's something wrong, lower quality, with it.

Perhaps it's the homogenization. Too aggressive perhaps?

Or maybe the comparatively poorer diet/aggressive production schedule?

Not that Im surprised though. The one thing I throughly dislike about the US (otherwise I love it) is the low foods standards. My local WF doesn't hold a candle to the quality of any grocery story in any country Ive lived in.

Re: The Last Egg

#138
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

American milk is very varied, sounds like you’re describing plastic gallon jug skim milk. If you want something a bit heartier, you can probably find creamline milk from a local farm.

I have been reliably informed that homogenized dairy products increase inflammation, and so I've made efforts to purchase creamline products instead. It's been revelatory, the difference and enjoyment I derive from it. I've found Straus Creamery makes amazing milk and yogurt products. Sometimes the milk comes in a glass half-gallon with a $2 deposit and I return them to the store. It's kind of a game to scoop out a b…

So i don't like homogenization because it destroys the mouth feel. So i am sympathetic to what you are saying.

However, what would the mechanism be for increased inflammation caused by homogenization? Do you have a source? I'm not saying you're not correct, but I'm more inclined to believe that there is a hidden, highly correlated variable at play.

Re: The Last Egg

#139
post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I was wonder why they don't have chickens somewhere It's probably a bio security thing. If these chickens escape into the wild there's the risk of infecting the local bird life with new diseases or viruses that the local population have no defences against.

If the chickens escaped, wouldn't they be frozen solid in minutes and effectively biologically inert?

You'd be OK at the pole, but somewhere like McMurdo? It's often mild enough for a chicken to survive in the summer for a while, certainly long enough to interact with local wildlife.

Plus, scavengers would still be an issue with dead birds.

Re: The Last Egg

#140
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

American milk is very varied, sounds like you’re describing plastic gallon jug skim milk. If you want something a bit heartier, you can probably find creamline milk from a local farm.

I have been reliably informed that homogenized dairy products increase inflammation, and so I've made efforts to purchase creamline products instead. It's been revelatory, the difference and enjoyment I derive from it. I've found Straus Creamery makes amazing milk and yogurt products. Sometimes the milk comes in a glass half-gallon with a $2 deposit and I return them to the store. It's kind of a game to scoop out a b…

Can you point to any documentation for the inflammation claim? A quick search didn't come up with much besides a study explicitly concluding the contrary: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S09586...
Post reply on HN