Do you seek variety?

[EJMichaels]

Really difficult for me to answer. I seek novelty, but also optimization....

Makes sense. For this thread, I was thinking of variety when there's no functional reason to keep to the same. I've settled on one brand of coffee, and for food there's often one recipe I stick with. Tea, however, is easy to vary without compromise -- most are similar in price, quality, nutritional value (excluding medicinal sorts), and preparation. I also like to change bathroom towel and bed linen colors rather than have a fixed decorative plan.

 

[bankside]

Yes. There’s English Breakfast from Taylor’s. English Breakfast from Harney. English Breakfast from Twinings. English Breakfast from Murchie’s. Hell if I’m summing it or camping in the woods or something, even Tetley makes an English Breakfast.

 

[zoltanspawn]

Really difficult for me to answer. I seek novelty, but also optimization. So, I like different kinds of baked goods for dessert. But I have found the optimal recipe for peanut butter cookies, and eating so-called peanut butter cookies made with some inferior counterfeit recipe is such a disappointing chore that I’d rather not. I have a recipe I like for chocolate cake, and honestly I never want a different type of so-called chocolate cake.

On the other hand I just tried making chicken tajine for the first time because it looked good, I wanted different flavours, and I wanted to try something new. We’re now in a small window of experimentation where I will change this ingredient or that according to the recipes I find and what I want to put to the test. But after a few meals, that will be tajine from now until I die. Spaghetti has changed once since 1978.

I don’t change the things I like but I do add more things to the list of what I like. Not sure that’s “variety” in the same sense.

I am the opposite. I would rather eat a boring experiment if it teaches me what is wrong, and edifies my palate, than indulge my appetite for pleasure. But I like to cook, and so this learning part is just as pleasurable as the eating part. I suppose this goes with being a producer in addition to being a consumer.

I want to know a couple things.

1) What happens when and if you eat a chocolate cake that's better than your own? I mean, it seems possible. Will it motivate you to improve your recipe?

and

2) What is this almost undefeated spaghetti recipe? 40 years? Does Marcella Hazan know about what you're doing?

 

[bankside]

I am the opposite. I would rather eat a boring experiment if it teaches me what is wrong, and edifies my palate, than indulge my appetite for pleasure. But I like to cook, and so this learning part is just as pleasurable as the eating part. I suppose this goes with being a producer in addition to being a consumer.

I want to know a couple things.

1) What happens when and if you eat a chocolate cake that's better than your own? I mean, it seems possible. Will it motivate you to improve your recipe?

and

2) What is this almost undefeated spaghetti recipe? 40 years? Does Marcella Hazan know about what you're doing?

No the trouble is I have the recipe for a Platonic ideal of a chocolate cake, so by definition every other cake is just trying to imitate this one.

 

[zoltanspawn]

No the trouble is I have the recipe for a Platonic ideal of a chocolate cake, so by definition every other cake is just trying to imitate this one.

Well, for once the tables are turned between us concerning the importance of metaphysics.

 

[Vannie]

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The picture you posted reminds me when I go to my brothers house for coffee.They have a cabinet full of assorted coffee mugs they have collected over the years.Some with dirty sayings,some animal shapes,some with I love this or that.But they can be quite the conversation starter,or even cheer you up if you're in a bad mood.