Time for the annual…or semi-annual…or when I da—d-well feel like it… chance to point out the error of the ways of anybody not me. Such a list I’ve got !
Let’s start with a commercial message…Not!
You know how the prices of things have been going up while the portions have been going down? Well, here’s an example which I ran into while attempting to produce a really spiffy (That’s a technical term, folks) recipe from some long ago Pillsbury Bake-Off. Calls for a roll of Pillsbury (duh, what else would it be?) sugar cookie dough–20 oz-worth…and a bunch of other stuff like pecans, walnuts and almonds–tasty, all of it and you’ll have to ask me for the rest. Not going to give away heirloom secrets in the public prints. Anyway, the dough gets divided in half to make a top and a bottom layer in a springform pan. Easy-peasy, nothin’ to it. Except that
the sugar cookie dough now comes in a 16 oz package and divided up into 24 little nuggets of incipient cookies that have to be mashed together to create a top or a bottom crust. “Tain’t easy, McGee”. With the total amount of dough reduced by 20% and those little nuggets being distinctly unhelpful I had to resort to trickery and low-level cursing to get the recipe to turn out at all. But it did, and quite tasty too, thank you very much.
I am seriously thinking of inquiring of the Pillsbury people whether they are going to publish updates/revisions of all their Bake-Off recipes which have been undercut by their little sneak attack. That should keep them busy for a while, and not in the kitchen either, probably in a courtroom somewhere. That’s what happened to the company which got into trouble advertising “foot-long hot dogs” that were only ten-and-a-half inches-worth of weiner.
And keep an eye out for ingredients: ”chicken-flavored “ soup, for instance.. Or “other natural flavors.” Such as…???
