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Betty Crocker broke recipes by shrinking boxes

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Re: Betty Crocker broke recipes by shrinking boxes

#701

Post by thaumasiotes »

Theodores wrote: post #307
lifeformed wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I am calling snobby is to look down on grandma's cooking because she used processed foods. Normal, everyday families around the world use processed foods in their cooking. In the US Midwest a tradition is to use a box cake mix as a base and add to it flavorful additions, like homemade jams, fruits, whipped cream, etc. If I went to someone's house and their grandma served to me, it would be extremely snobbish to…

I am loving this thread, and how cake is suddenly up there as a controversial, polarising topic. Respect for working in a bakery, just hope you haven't got too many burn scars on your forearms from doing long night shifts. I am in broad agreement with you and I appreciate the difficulties of making a consistent product, particularly when there are variables in temperature, seasonal availability of ingredients, lots o…

> None of these mega-corporations pay any tax. They can avoid doing so by setting up a shell company in a tax haven that owns the rights to the branding, to then create subsidiaries that then license the branding for vast sums, as per the Starbucks business model

What do you think would happen to tax revenues if all the Starbuckses disappeared?

Re: Betty Crocker broke recipes by shrinking boxes

#702

Post by komali2 »

sfn42 wrote: post #666
account42 wrote: post #653

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But then there is even less point in buying the branded mix rather than individual ingredients that you can use for various recipes with ratios that you like.

The point is that I can make brownies, rolls, whatever I please without having a cupboard full of all kinds of crap like flour, sugar, cocoa etc that attracts bugs and expires and so on. I buy one bag that's dirt cheap and has everything I need including instructions. And it just has the same stuff I would be using anyway so there's no downside. No scary ingredients. Just freshly baked goods on demand.

What I'm learning is that some people don't keep a stock of what I would consider "bare minimums" in their cupboard.

First of all, properly stored flour, sugar, and cocoa powder doesn't attract bugs. Glass jars that seal well, done. Hell even plastic tubs. It expires pretty rarely as well, surely you can just bang out a couple of loaves of bread before that happens?

Anyway, yeah, is it not like, a very normal thing to keep flour, sugar, baking soda, cocoa powder, salt, perhaps yeast on hand? Butter, oil, some pasta, maybe some rice? Like, how do you cook otherwise, just buy small batches of these things every time?

Re: Betty Crocker broke recipes by shrinking boxes

#703

Post by nixosbestos »

RandomBacon wrote: post #690
nixosbestos wrote: post #589

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Suuuuure, grocery store consolidation, and the consolidation of farming, and processed food has NOTHING to do with their ability to arbitrarily implement shrinkflation, with consumers having few or no other options. Also, kindly fuck off with the name-calling.

You're drawing the wrong conclusions. Also, your writing is overflowing with emotion which is interpreted as idiological and not serious. Reasonable people are not going to waste their time trying to have a civilized discussion with someone who drops f-bombs and isn't serious. Edit: I wrote the above before looking at the rest of your comments. After looking at the rest of your comments, I rest my case.

And you wrote 4 condescending sentences and still haven't engaged with my point, at all. Next time just write "umadbro" like the troll you are, instead of pretending like you're anything else.

> your writing is overflowing with emotion which is interpreted as idiological and not serious.

no you!!!11. Man, just the absolute cringiest, most embarrassing way of engaging online. You spelled ideological wrong, too.

> I wrote the above before looking at the rest of your comments. After looking at the rest of your comments, I rest my case.

well hot fucking dog, I'm sure embarrassed now! What a joke. Guys, he rested his case!! I'm so owned and devastated!

Re: Betty Crocker broke recipes by shrinking boxes

#704

Post by eesmith »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #700
eesmith wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stephen Jay Gould's "Phyletic Size Decrease in Hershey Bars", in "Hen's teeth and horse's toes" at https://archive.org/details/hensteethhorsest00step/page/314/... shows the size trend from the 2.0 ounces of 1960 to the the 1.2 ounce of 1980, when it was published.

The entire point of my comment is that besides changes in size, there are also changes in ingredients.

Implied by the Devil Dog mentioned later in the essay:

> And I will say this for the good folks in Hershey, Pa. It’s still the same damned good chocolate, what’s left of it. A replacement of whole by broken almonds 1s the only compromise with quality I’ve noticed, while I shudder to think what the “‘creme”’ inside a Devil Dog is made of these days.

Re: Betty Crocker broke recipes by shrinking boxes

#705

Post by account42 »

moolcool wrote: post #676
account42 wrote: post #657

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is that is a self-induced problem or at least one that you can avoid if you take care to not become reliant on some corporation for your "family" recipe.

You're already reliant on corporations for your family recipes. People ITT are so quick to get all Richard Stallman on their grandmothers for having the gall to use a pre-measured can of Cream of Mushroom soup in their casserole recipe.

Yes, we're commenting on an article that would have proven Food Stallman right.

Relying on processed flour and similar staples is hardly the same as relying on a specific unique cake mix.

Re: Betty Crocker broke recipes by shrinking boxes

#706

Post by account42 »

antonyh wrote: post #696
account42 wrote: post #642

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do people here not always have an open pack of butter in their fridge?

We have salted butter for the table, and unsalted for baking. We don't bake often enough to want unopened packs if we can avoid it.

Pre-salted butter is another weird American thing that's completely unnecessary. Butter is also great for cooking and you can keep it for months in the fridge without issues.

Re: Betty Crocker broke recipes by shrinking boxes

#707

Post by rkomorn »

account42 wrote: post #706
antonyh wrote: post #696

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have salted butter for the table, and unsalted for baking. We don't bake often enough to want unopened packs if we can avoid it.

Pre-salted butter is another weird American thing that's completely unnecessary. Butter is also great for cooking and you can keep it for months in the fridge without issues.

Salted butter is a weird American thing?

It's much easier finding unsalted butter in the US than in Portugal.

In fact, unsalted butter has been the default everywhere I've lived in the US.

Edit: not to mention, say, salted butter being a point of pride for Britany.

Re: Betty Crocker broke recipes by shrinking boxes

#708

Post by detaro »

account42 wrote: post #706
antonyh wrote: post #696

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have salted butter for the table, and unsalted for baking. We don't bake often enough to want unopened packs if we can avoid it.

Pre-salted butter is another weird American thing that's completely unnecessary. Butter is also great for cooking and you can keep it for months in the fridge without issues.

It's not really an American thing. It's a pretty wild mix which regions use which how much all across the world (well, across places that commonly use butter obviously)

Re: Betty Crocker broke recipes by shrinking boxes

#709

Post by sersi »

bob1029 wrote: post #449
sersi wrote: post #398

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1 egg, you get exactly one chance to use an egg that's reasonably sized relative to the other ingredients. I've always had the habit of weighing the eggs I use and adjusting the rest of the recipe for baking. Some recipes also includes weight of eggs in grams for exactly that reason. (Tip for converting, if it's a European recipe assume 45g per egg), if it's US assume 60g per egg. > The cost savings has been incred…

> A lot of food don't taste as good after being frozen (especially in a home freezer) How you reheat the food makes a huge difference. Freezer => microwave is noob tier. What you want is something like: freezer => thaw 24-48h in fridge => stir fry for 5 minutes. Make some fresh pasta each time. Start preheating the oven right before your 1130 meeting starts. This stuff doesn't take that long. Adding a bit of extra ce…

Oh I very rarely use the microwave explicitly because I rarely like the result (it's a useful tool in the kitchen but reheating is rarely what it excels at)

Re: Betty Crocker broke recipes by shrinking boxes

#710

Post by RandomBacon »

nixosbestos wrote: post #703
RandomBacon wrote: post #690

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're drawing the wrong conclusions. Also, your writing is overflowing with emotion which is interpreted as idiological and not serious. Reasonable people are not going to waste their time trying to have a civilized discussion with someone who drops f-bombs and isn't serious. Edit: I wrote the above before looking at the rest of your comments. After looking at the rest of your comments, I rest my case.

And you wrote 4 condescending sentences and still haven't engaged with my point, at all. Next time just write "umadbro" like the troll you are, instead of pretending like you're anything else. > your writing is overflowing with emotion which is interpreted as idiological and not serious. no you!!!11. Man, just the absolute cringiest, most embarrassing way of engaging online. You spelled ideological wrong, too. > I wr…

You continue to prove my point...

...

I rest my case.

(Also, I'm sorry about the mispeling earlier.)

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