Outside the Beltway

News You Can Use

James Joyner
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Butterscotch Pudding Megan McArdle observes that, “When I tuned into the morning news yesterday, the BBC was covering the Gaza strip. Fox News was teaching people how to make homemade butterscotch pudding.”

I gather that she disapproves of Fox’ choice. But, really, learning about the latest bizarre chapter in Palestine will have precisely zero practical consequence. By contrast, butterscotch pudding is delicious. And homemade butterscotch pudding would almost have to be even better.

Of course, pudding is made from eggs, a/k/a “chicken abortions,” and milk, a/k/a “cow pus,” so said recipe might be less useful to a vegan.

Image source: Something So Clever via Google

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7 responses to “News You Can Use”

  1. Michael Avatar
    Michael

    I don’t see a “Humor” tag, so I’ll go ahead an point this out. What is happening in Gaza is “news”, how to make pudding is “instruction”. Is instruction more useful than news? Usually. Should a channel supposedly dedicated to news be telling you how to make pudding? I don’t think so.

    We have the Food Network for pudding recipes, we have Fox News for…well…I’m not really sure why we have Fox News.

  2. James Joyner Avatar
    James Joyner

    I don’t see a “Humor” tag

    This is more flippancy than humor. Obviously, news networks should be covering this. I’d be shocked, in fact, if FOX didn’t cover this, although I don’t know for sure. But it’s hardly shocking that they’re doing “light” news and recipes and such during the morning shows; that’s what all the 24/7 news networks do.

  3. Tlaloc Avatar
    Tlaloc

    And homemade butterscotch pudding would almost have to be even better.

    You haven’t had my cooking.

    Seriously, its bad.

    That’s not entirely my fault though, if cooks would learn to write actual ^%$#ing instructions I’m sure I could cook just fine.

    (Hint- “Medium” is not a temperature. 300 degrees F is a temperature. Tell me what temperature for how many seconds. In fact you could even give it to me in Joules and I’ll calibrate my stove appropriately. What I will not do is “simmer lightly.” WTF does that mean?)

  4. rodney dill Avatar
    rodney dill

    Mmmmmm…. pudding

  5. John Burgess Avatar
    John Burgess

    Tlaloc: Cooking is an art/technique. It has very precise vocabulary, but you have to learn it.

    ‘Simmer lightly’ means that the water should be at a boil–that is, tiny bubbles are coming up from the bottom of the pan–but not a ‘rolling boil’ in which large bubbles are constantly coming up. In temperature, ‘simmer’ is probably around 200 F while ‘boil’ is around 212 F. I say ‘around’, because you have not specified the air pressure you’re operating under.

    The visual cues are more accurate than a time/temp equation because of variations in the composition of water (cooks don’t use distilled water), ambient temperatures and pressures.

    And anyway, a recipe is not a formula. No cook–other than a total geek–makes the same dish exactly the same way twice. Once you get an idea of how it’s supposed to look/smell/taste, then the doors to variability open.

    And yes, that means that first attempts don’t always work out to perfection. That’s why cooks have to practice.

  6. Grewgills Avatar
    Grewgills

    made from eggs, a/k/a “chicken abortions,”

    They are not generally chicken abortions. Almost all are chicken periods. I’m not sure if that makes them sound more or less apetizing.

  7. Tlaloc Avatar
    Tlaloc

    Tlaloc: Cooking is an art/technique. It has very precise vocabulary, but you have to learn it.

    John, I’m a scientist- that vocabulary is anything but precise.

    The visual cues are more accurate than a time/temp equation because of variations in the composition of water (cooks don’t use distilled water), ambient temperatures and pressures.

    And anyway, a recipe is not a formula. No cook–other than a total geek–makes the same dish exactly the same way twice. Once you get an idea of how it’s supposed to look/smell/taste, then the doors to variability open.

    All of which is basically bs. It’s like the car companies before they started using statistical process control. The dish *can* come out exactly the same every time if we are precise about it. The reason it *doesn’t* is because we are sloppy. Sloopy termoinology, sloppy measurements, sloppy technique. Calling it an art is a dodge.

    (Above said only half tongue in cheek, yes some people see cooking as an art and that’s fine, but it’d be nice if just one cookbook took the actual preparation seriously enough to define it well, because yes the current methods really are sloppy. It is an art because it has no other choice- no one is apparently willing to do the work to make it more rigorous)

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