They took aim at a childhood treasure.

Someone reeeeally put their foot in it with this one.

Eater: Are Rice Krispie Treats Overrated?

First of all? No!

 

Second of all? What manner of imbecile in food media management tells someone whose whole shtick is Jewish food to give their opinion on something that uses gelatin? You, know, that thing they usually make out of pig's feet?

Immediate facepalm.

Now, a casual reader wouldn't have twigged to that so it's potentially forgivable. And the article starts with A fairly robust bit of background to give a viable shape to the tale. The author is, like myself, a product of the 80s and 90s, when the Rice Krispie Treat was as omnipresent as the Jell-O Jiggler (A different fad which, mercifully, passed), and makes a distinct mention of 1995, when Kellogg's first released the individually packaged version I personally abhor- far too expensive for what you get, even there at the start.

Similarly, when the first recipe showed up on the box in 1941 it was both different and objectively better tasting. The author correctly surmises that the (regrettable and immature) shift in dietary concerns has led to a lower-fat incarnation becoming the standard, which in turn aggressively and adversely affects the quality of the dessert.

But... so? Who actually follows the recipe on today's box? They don't even scale to the measurements of the packaging any more! Marshmallows are now sold in smaller bags, cereal in smaller boxes, and neither of them ratio properly. The first version of that recipe I remember- one I cut off the cereal box and put in my grandma's box of recipe cards when she wasn't looking- called for one bag of marshmallows (at the time 12 oz, now they're 10), half a box of Rice Krispies (you measure one time and then you just know), a third of a cup of melted butter (round it up to 6 tablespoons), and a splash of vanilla. Grandma, in a prescient move, added a pinch of salt. Delicious!

The "recipe" now? Half the butter, no vanilla, more cereal. Of course it doesn't taste as good! They want you to buy the packaged ones!

"So perhaps there’s nothing inherently wrong with Rice Krispies Treats after all. Maybe our moral panic over weight gain and heart disease simply ruined a good thing." she says. Way to walk back the clickbait, lady. You earned your ad revenue, have a cookie.

The article finishes with additional deflection, this time to something valid that I've spoken about in the past- adjustments. The humble Rice Krispie Treat is one of the desserts that I sometimes call Baselines. Perfectly good on its own, but also neutral enough to be highly flexible in terms of flavor combinations. Mentioned are some pedestrian tweaks (Browning the butter? Adding salt? How remarkably innovative...) as well as a more interesting one (a dash of sesame oil and some toasted black sesame seeds) all of which serve to make clear that making impactful changes doesn't require making the recipe any more difficult. 

For a dessert where everything about making it is designed to be simple, what higher compliment could there be?

It's never fair, but sometimes it's reasonable.

 Pursue a life of reckless and irresponsible enjoyment with no regard for your physical, mental, and emotional well-being?
Do not be surprised when your body betrays you.

Sympathy comes hard when you took all the easy ways out.

This is why I still get up early in the morning. I stretch. I exercise. I read and learn new things. I do my part to make the world a better place. 

My life is terrible, but I am not- and provably so.

Knowing there are endless obligations to me that will never be fulfilled, though? Tiring. 

Didn't want to, but...

Apparently I have to. 

I've been reading so many things in food publications lately that I want to throw rocks at. Quite deliberately, I am sure- the relentless trend of sensationalist media continues to fabricate conflict.

Underneath though, all it's doing is endorsing ignorance.

Rule one of writing on a subject: Be well informed.

The audacity of some of these people to put pen to paper, and of other, even worse people, to publish them!

I have to go back a little ways to get a proper head of steam going, but there are exhausting unacceptables aplenty for me to do something about.

I look back and sigh in disgust

I don't want to talk about AI. But as an educator, I have to. It's one of those Great Old One concepts, where the more you talk about it the more power it has to adversely affect its surroundings. Conceptually it's a bunch of gibberish, built by people who think in hours instead of centuries and powered by the ever-shrinking rainforests. It's an objectively unacceptable misuse of resources. Yet it's the Trendy Bullshit of the moment, picking up the slack left by fading or hiding crypto.

So. Consider one of my degrees: a B.Sci in Foodservice Management from Johnson & Wales University. It wasn't hard to get. The technical skills are largely a matter of repetition, but somehow the majority of the student body had trouble with the academics, something I found as astonishing then as I do now. Nobody who comfortably got through middle school in my hometown would have had any trouble with them. 

It was difficult to imagine how some (most) of the students in my classes were ever admitted to university in the first place. Often, as I proofread and (desperately) edited my classmates' work, it really just felt like "Can/will they sign the loan documents?" was the only real requirement, and that soured me on "higher education" quite profoundly. 

My distaste for industry-wide deceptive advertising and predatory loansharking aside, there was very little recourse for the students once enrolled. Either graduate and leverage the degree to try to get a job, or leave and hope for a wealthy benefactor or other miracle that lets them pay the bill. To that end, many instructors understood the limitations of the student body and resigned themselves to making the best of a bad situation. Now, though, things are very different.

The massive upsurge in AI-generated plagiarism and fabrication has left principled staff and faculty grasping at straws for keeping the learning process going and curricula moving forward. Grading has become an obligatory verification process before it gets to become what it's actually for- an improvement process. Instead of being spent improving the students' understanding of a given subject matter, that time is wasted making sure there's any hint of understanding to start with rather than fabricated and parroted bullshit artistry.

What, then, does one do about trade-centric schools, where academic classes are already unlikely to be paid beyond lip-service? I can almost guarantee that current JWU students are taking judicious advantage of AI to fake their way through academics even more desperately and empty-headedly than before, and graduating with even less understanding of / utility to the world they're being inflicted upon.

If they'd hired me like they ought to have, I could fix the problem. 

But they didn't- and there's no way they can. 

Bit of a shame though. If they'd learned how to do research properly they'd have made better choices. Irony.

On the Validity of References

Someone I am vaguely acquainted with tried to make a point about the misuse of the media to create a 'both sides' narrative, rather than directly creating a path to a positive and comfortable future.

He went with Dante Alighieri. 

"The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality."

A fine phrase, and one that makes the point perfectly. Yet it's also one that exemplifies a robust quandary for me, as it should for many.

So much perfectly sensible philosophy, even laudable rational thought, springs up in the most absurd of places. The Divine Comedy is, at its core, no different from something like 50 Shades of Grey. It's self-insert fanfiction based in the universe of a story that was never worthy to be told in the first place- proven over and over again by the thoughts, words, and deeds of some of its staunchest advocates. 

But does the poisonous origin invalidate the impact of the works that follow? Where does one draw the line for where you draw the core tenets of your way of life? How profound a turn of phrase can come from the last place you might ever think to look?

"Do you think God stays in heaven because He, too, lives in fear of what He's created here on Earth?"

If you don't know where that quote is from, take some time to think and then make your best guess. 

Look it up afterward.

A moment of exasperated philosophy.

Lately I've been seeing lots of variations of the "I'm starting to realize that the 'what would people think' barrier is holding 99% of people back from their dreams." bit. How disappointed such notions make me is hard even to quantify, let alone express. But not for the reason most would expect.

Whether you do something or not should only have one qualifier: That you earned the privilege. Doing something because you want to? Fine- if you're finished. If you're worthy of autonomy and choice.
And if not? Doing what you want is simply wrong. Your existence does not have intrinsic value. It does not automatically make the world a better place. Assuming otherwise is a dangerous and terrible but unforgivably common habit.

Do the work to validate your existence before inflicting it upon others and wasting resources that might otherwise be better served.

Don't poison the world for those who put in the time and effort- those that can prove we deserve to be here.

Vegas is Not For Me

My endeavours in Las Vegas were successful! I made some new contacts, spent lots of time exploring, and relished the experience, taking a lot of time to wander and see what it's really like, on-strip, off-strip, and yet further hidden away.

I gave my physical security talk to a couple groups of people, and it went over quite well. Didn't get a lot of questions, but I did get a lot of thanks from the lawyerly-looking types. Seeing my expertise be suitably acknowledged feels good, even if it's on a small scale and a couple of decades late. 

Still. I don't think I like Vegas. 

Somehow, the casinos manage to feel both organized and organic while the general miscellany comes across as hopelessly dissonant and artificial. Further still, the noise and spectacle outside had me feeling like I was at a riot that used to be a house party. 

There's no cohesion to anything outside of the casinos when it comes to entertainment, just endless effort through visuals, audio, and advertisement to get attention- whether the attention is positive or not. 

Shock value seems to translate quite well to cash value, in Vegas, and I do not like such notions at all. It speaks quite strongly of the educational and ethical deficiency of large numbers.

The street theatre was a mix of astonishingly impressive and poisonously unpleasant. Some of it was truly incredible, but in equal measure there was dreck best discreetly tossed in front of a train. Likewise for the shops and omnipresent souvenirs, from keychains to clothing, it had the feel of a flea market made by dumpster diving and designed by /b with some /pol thrown in. I have a 'novelty' shirt or two- most people do. But a great deal of what I saw there, I cannot imagine EVER being worn. Even seeing it exist was staggering.

And then there were the dark corners. Vegas turns up the lights and the noise so nobody looks too hard at the many broken fragments and castoffs that hover around the edges of the scene.

Yeah. I don't think I like Vegas much at all.