The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’ • Hacker News Board

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#151

Post by JasonFruit » Wed, Mar 07, 2018, 10:22 PM UTC

jerf wrote: post #82

There's another interesting angle in this, which is a demonstration of how important memory and emotion is in food. The restaurateur who had created Michelin Star-winning restaurants thought the standard Hellman's potato salad recipe was very good. Now, I'm not that much of a chef, and I'm not going to say it's a bad recipe, but a chef of that caliber ought to taste even a very-well prepared instance of that recipe a…

I'm not convinced by this idea of "more interesting" ingredients. Sesame oil is interesting, but that it's certainly not a better choice for this purpose than a neutral oil of some sort. Sometimes plain white vinegar is the right flavor, even if others may have more personality. This is the attitude that gets us constant Romaine lettuce and microgreens, when the freshness of iceberg lettuce is one of life's great pleasures.

(I'll give you fresh-made mayonnaise — I can't think of a time I regretted that, except when it came time to do dishes.)

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#152

Post by blahedo » Wed, Mar 07, 2018, 10:25 PM UTC

DoofusOfDeath wrote: post #59

blahedo wrote: post #17

I can do them one better: my family has a meta -secret recipe. It didn't used to be secret, but it became secret through no effort or intent of our own. For a long time, decades at this point, my mom has been known for the brownies she brings to events (and, by extension, that my sister and I bring to events). People would rave about them and demand the secret, which my mom, my sister, and I would all freely give out…

So, mind sharing a formula for getting it right, irrespective of which version of the box one has? E.g., what the ideal quantity of mix is?

Sorry, should have included this!

    3¾c. of brownie mix (again, Betty Crocker Original Supreme)
    2 eggs
    ¼c. water
    ⅓c. vegetable oil
    and the included packet of Hershey's syrup

The baking times on the old box were: for 13x9 pan, 28-30m at 350°, for 9x9 pan, 35-40m at 350°, and for 8x8 pan, 50-55m at 325°. (We usually use the 13x9, can't speak as much to the other sizes.)

As of the original redesign mentioned in the story, the amount of brownie mix in a box was cut back to 3 cups, the recipe involved 1 egg instead of 2, and I don't remember how the water and oil were affected but they were different.

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#153

Post by IgorPartola » Thu, Mar 08, 2018, 12:43 AM UTC

tonyarkles wrote: post #147

IgorPartola wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's very clever. Reminds me of doing plumbing with copper piping and using bread to stuff the pipes before soldering them in order to not have the leftover water flowing to where you are soldering, making it impossible.

You're a genius. Absolutely. That's such a good solution! I had considered using a rag or something, but I was concerned about it getting stuck around a bend, as well as the awkwardness of rolling it up just right . If you overheat the pipe, the bread will just burn off harmlessly, and if it gets stuck, you could just turn the water on and it'll dissolve it or pop it out. Thank you. There's an awkward pipe in my bath…

Oh I’m no genius. This was a trick someone told me after I spent 6 hours on a single horizontal joint. (Fortunately?) I haven’t had a chance to try it. I also don’t know what would happen if the bread headed straight for your water heater. But aside from that, I do think this is a valuable trick. Hope it works for you!

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#154

Post by DiabloD3 » Thu, Mar 08, 2018, 4:14 AM UTC

BlackLotus89 wrote: post #93

caf wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, in cooking you can fairly freely adjust ingredients and quantities to taste, but baking is science for hungry people.

From when qc was still readable http://www.questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=1679

We're getting into Reddit levels of off-topicness here, but I actually kinda like where QC went: robot-sexuality is now a valid subject, as are light-hearted probes into the personhood of AIs, in a slice of life-esque drama.

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#155

Post by mathattack » Thu, Mar 08, 2018, 6:09 AM UTC

I got a secret salmon recipe from my aunt only to see it on the salmon wrapper.

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#156

Post by 8_hours_ago » Thu, Mar 08, 2018, 7:37 AM UTC

Infernal wrote: post #61

8_hours_ago wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My family’s “famous” chocolate cake recipe is from the side of the Hershey’s Cocoa container. It is way better than any other chocolate cake, even from baking cookbooks. I should write it down in case they ever change it...

Is this the one with the cup of boiling water that you pour into the batter right before it goes into the oven? I don't know why more people don't make that, it is my mom's (and of course mine now) go-to chocolate cake, and it is truly excellent.

Yes, that's the one! (I just checked the back of my cocoa powder to make sure)

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#157

Post by beat » Thu, Mar 08, 2018, 2:45 PM UTC

JasonFruit wrote: post #149

beat wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Certainly, The Cooking Gene is not just a straight cookbook - it's barely a cookbook at all. Instead, it's a history book more than anything, using the evolution of a cuisine to trace the cultural history of the African diaspora in America, and its broader impact on American culture. The appearance of certain foods, of ingredients and techniques, is a map of history. Fascinating stuff! (I got it on recommendation of…

So I'm making weird, postmodernist curries, pho, and tacos? Fun!

One could argue that the ready global availability of ingredients, plus YouTube and blog recipes, has itself created a new cuisine. But without a coherent form, it's hard to say what that actually is. So yeah, postmodernism...

I wonder how this ties in with the observations about Green Revolution agriculture and its impact on obesity and other modern dietary diseases? Like Michael Pollam's research?

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#158

Post by tonyarkles » Thu, Mar 08, 2018, 3:51 PM UTC

IgorPartola wrote: post #153

tonyarkles wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're a genius. Absolutely. That's such a good solution! I had considered using a rag or something, but I was concerned about it getting stuck around a bend, as well as the awkwardness of rolling it up just right . If you overheat the pipe, the bread will just burn off harmlessly, and if it gets stuck, you could just turn the water on and it'll dissolve it or pop it out. Thank you. There's an awkward pipe in my bath…

Oh I’m no genius. This was a trick someone told me after I spent 6 hours on a single horizontal joint. (Fortunately?) I haven’t had a chance to try it. I also don’t know what would happen if the bread headed straight for your water heater. But aside from that, I do think this is a valuable trick. Hope it works for you!

Luckily, the joint I've got to deal with, the worst case is that the bread would end up inside the faucet and might require a bit of cleaning. Seems like just running some water through it aught to dissolve the bread and let things carry on. I'll use crappy white bread to make sure it's easily dissolvable :)

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#159

Post by robotsonic » Thu, Mar 08, 2018, 3:54 PM UTC

graphitezepp wrote: post #119

robotsonic wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the first class of failure, sometimes people take it a bit too far. I've watched people stress about how they level off their 1/4 tsp because if it's too heaped, it will be too much, or if there is a divot, it will be too little. As a percent error, there really isn't a real difference. Just the differences in brands and batches of ingredients will cause more error in your recipes than a slight miss-measure. There…

I find it amusing you downplay the importance (not that I disagree) of precision, and than advocate for measuring by weight for entirely different reasons. Precision is the typical argument people make for scales.

I see the similar behaviour with measurement on scales though. There is this need to make it EXACTLY 2.50 pounds. If it is 2.52, well that just unacceptable, and the seesaw of removing and adding begins. I'll admit, I occasionally fall into this trap until I consider what the consequences are (pretty much nothing in terms of what I'm baking, but a decent waste of time).

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#160

Post by aidenn0 » Thu, Mar 08, 2018, 6:21 PM UTC

DoreenMichele wrote: post #140

aidenn0 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is why most of the recipes were desserts (which are typically baked goods). Baking is much more about getting the proportions right, and often uses refined ingredients and you usually don't make changes after it starts cooking. When you cook something in a pan and are using fresh ingredients that don't come in standard sizes and strengths then a feedback loop becomes much more important

The smell reliant cooks I know apply it equally to baked goods. They crab at me for opening the oven to check by eye. They can smell that it isn't done yet. This would include my mother and oldest son. I have many years more experience cooking than my son and I still help him with understanding recipes because I have a better skill base than he has. I cannot cook like him. He is a much better cook than I am. I am hap…

I will admit that "when is it done" is a big judgment call in baking, so that's a good point.

Also opening the oven changes how it cooks, so I can see them being crabby :)