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

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#161

Post by emj » Fri, Mar 09, 2018, 7:50 AM UTC

jcater wrote: post #65

gambiting wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting fact - recipies cannot be copyrighted. Pictures can, but the recipe itself cannot.

The list of ingredients can't. But the instructions/explanation and description might be (in addition to the pictures/illustrations, as you mentioned.) https://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl122.html

There is a fine line you have to thread while copying instructions, usually you can't copy them verbatim. It is a rather strange quirk, if you rewrite a literary works you get slammed by the copyright hammer but not with recipes.

So a selection of tropes can be copyrightable.

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#162

Post by DoofusOfDeath » Fri, Mar 09, 2018, 2:21 PM UTC

blahedo wrote: post #152

DoofusOfDeath wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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,…

Thanks! Bonus points for anyone who posts the quantity of Hershey's syrup in that packet :)

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#163

Post by tropo » Sat, Mar 10, 2018, 6:50 AM UTC

heleph wrote: post #50

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…

Good on your mother for persisting until she got to the bottom of the brownie mystery! It’s a bit of a pity the company tampered with such a successful recipe! My brownie recipe is from a cookbook and I tried a lot of variations on it and then had to concede that the person who wrote the recipe got it just right. I make it with high quality chocolate and butter and then am very careful not to over bake it and they tu…

I suspect the butter is the result of two substitutions. This has happened to many recipes.

First, there was a money-saving switch from lard to commercial shortening or margarine. Either one was made of partially hydrogenated vegetable oil.

Second, due to trans fats or a desire to be less fake, that got switched to butter.

Lard makes wonderful brownies. Compared to butter, the taste comes out far cleaner. The purity of the chocolate really comes through.

Another fine option is coconut oil.

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#164

Post by souprock » Sat, Mar 10, 2018, 7:07 AM UTC

A century ago, my family swiped a recipe by spying on another family. I suppose it could have come from a molasses bottle or even from an 1800s cookbook, but good luck finding such an origin at this point. It makes lovely gingerbread men.

https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cookbook:Molasses_Cookies

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#165

Post by BlackLotus89 » Thu, Mar 15, 2018, 8:22 AM UTC

wink wrote: post #145

BlackLotus89 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

What do you think is wrong these days?

Oh fsck didn't see the answer 7 days ago hopefully you see my reply.

Jeph started without a story and mediocre drawing style but loveable interesting characters. We got our weird relationships of our nerdy main character with many interesting side characters. Over time his artstyle got better and we got to know the main characters with their backstories, quirks and robot sidekicks.

What went wrong (imo) is that jeph wanted to experiment. We now got inconsistent personalities and people acting out of character. There are many people we got to know who now only get occasional cameos, but every week a new sode char (at least it feels like it). In this process marty dates a trans person and had sex with her, faye fell in love with a robot and everything "controversial" what you can think of was tried leaving established characters behind and just showing me an empty shell of a webcomic I once really liked.

There are no indy music references, much less robotic weirdness and every small robot seems to get a humanoid chassis. The comic lost the edge it oncehad tryimg to be edgy.

At least that's what I think and I'm still sad that I'm alienated from the comic.

Re: The Dirty Secret of ‘Secret Family Recipes’

#166

Post by wink » Sat, Mar 17, 2018, 10:40 AM UTC

BlackLotus89 wrote: post #165

wink wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you think is wrong these days?

Oh fsck didn't see the answer 7 days ago hopefully you see my reply. Jeph started without a story and mediocre drawing style but loveable interesting characters. We got our weird relationships of our nerdy main character with many interesting side characters. Over time his artstyle got better and we got to know the main characters with their backstories, quirks and robot sidekicks. What went wrong (imo) is that jeph…

I kind of agree that some things are bit different, and I do miss some of the obscure indie music stuff, but in general I like it a lot more than the very beginning (like the first 1-2 years) with the different art style - I felt it was a bit episodic and mopey. I also only read those first years afterwards, when I was already a fan. Now I'd say it's definitely different, but I don't think it's worse in a noticeable - at least for me. On the other hand I'm glad it's changing, I couldn't continue watching e.g. The Simpsons after 10 years - too similar and no development.

Thanks for elaborating :)