Things that annoy you beyond reason...(Vol. 6)
Discussion
Perfectly cromulent and correctly spelt words that the smell chucker doesn't recognise calling into question if you've _actually_ misspelt the word or not.
Particularly annoying when you have one that is stuck in US English and refuses to allow a British dictionary or even add words (I'm looking at you Microsoft Teams).
Incidentally, the Chrome spell checker believes there are three incorrect words in this post. It is wrong.
Particularly annoying when you have one that is stuck in US English and refuses to allow a British dictionary or even add words (I'm looking at you Microsoft Teams).
Incidentally, the Chrome spell checker believes there are three incorrect words in this post. It is wrong.
Clockwork Cupcake said:
When freemium apps move features that you regularly used in the free version into the Premium version. Or, to put it another way, when people ask you to pay for stuff you used to get for free.
Added annoyance for the fact that I did actually buy the premium version a while back but this is no longer recognised and has been downgraded to a 'donation'.
Surely this is just adopting the Murdoch Method?.Added annoyance for the fact that I did actually buy the premium version a while back but this is no longer recognised and has been downgraded to a 'donation'.
I used to watch live Formula One motor racing, live League Division One football, Test Cricket, Boxing and numerous other sports. All for free ( Well, except for the cost of a TV Licence )
Then along comes Murdoch with his Sky Corporation, and he decides that anybody who wants to carry on watching such stuff, they now have to pay him a monthly subscription.
No thanks, you can f
k off. I refuse to pay him a single penny if I can help it.
I would rather go without.
What a Twunt.
Oh, and this which really got me wound up yesterday:
It's just the name of his dog, FFS!
GRRRRRRRR!!!!
I suppose the next thing will be the banning of black pudding and hash browns with your breakfast?
And all traces of the book and film "Black Beauty" being eradicated..
It's just the name of his dog, FFS!
GRRRRRRRR!!!!
I suppose the next thing will be the banning of black pudding and hash browns with your breakfast?
And all traces of the book and film "Black Beauty" being eradicated..
Edited by glenrobbo on Monday 20th July 17:23
glenrobbo said:
Oh, and this which really got me wound up yesterday:
It's just the name of his dog, FFS!
GRRRRRRRR!!!!
I suppose the next thing will be the banning of black pudding and hash browns with your breakfast?
And all traces of the book and film "Black Beauty" being eradicated..
Oh, there's a whole thread on that. Enjoy it.It's just the name of his dog, FFS!
GRRRRRRRR!!!!
I suppose the next thing will be the banning of black pudding and hash browns with your breakfast?
And all traces of the book and film "Black Beauty" being eradicated..
Edited by glenrobbo on Monday 20th July 17:23
Fastdruid said:
Perfectly cromulent and correctly spelt words that the smell chucker doesn't recognise calling into question if you've _actually_ misspelt the word or not.
Particularly annoying when you have one that is stuck in US English and refuses to allow a British dictionary or even add words (I'm looking at you Microsoft Teams).
Incidentally, the Chrome spell checker believes there are three incorrect words in this post. It is wrong.
Cromulent. Invented by Lisa Simpson Particularly annoying when you have one that is stuck in US English and refuses to allow a British dictionary or even add words (I'm looking at you Microsoft Teams).
Incidentally, the Chrome spell checker believes there are three incorrect words in this post. It is wrong.
Misspelt, ok in U.K. English, not US English.
Nearly as irritating as IOS randomly capitalising letters.
eldar said:
Cromulent. Invented by Lisa Simpson
Well, by the writers of the Simpsons rather than a fictional character... but yes. Admittedly it might have a point there with that one. 
eldar said:
Misspelt, ok in U.K. English, not US English.
Indeed. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/englis...Now admittedly I was being awkward on purpose here but the annoyance still stands on a daily basis that Teams has a US spell checker that cannot be swapped with a British one and highlights contractions and the many, many UK spellings that aren't the same as the US.
Fastdruid said:
eldar said:
Cromulent. Invented by Lisa Simpson
Well, by the writers of the Simpsons rather than a fictional character... but yes. Admittedly it might have a point there with that one. eldar said:
Misspelt, ok in U.K. English, not US English.
Indeed. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/englis...Now admittedly I was being awkward on purpose here but the annoyance still stands on a daily basis that Teams has a US spell checker that cannot be swapped with a British one and highlights contractions and the many, many UK spellings that aren't the same as the US.
Ponpiman said:
Airfare refunds. It always amazes me that even if you buy from an airline directly, they take the $$ from your account within one minute. Cancel and ask for a refund - takes weeks. Is there a legitimate reason for the slowness of the refund or is it just their unethical business model?
Cash flow, especially at the moment.MartG said:
Cooking frozen pizza
10 mins - uncooked
10 mins 1s - burnt
Pre-heat the oven, middle (not top) shelf, 10-20 degrees lower temperature than recommended on the box, and leave it to cook for 5-10 mins longer than it says on the box, keeping an eye on it.10 mins - uncooked
10 mins 1s - burnt
Annoying though I agree.
Gary29 said:
MartG said:
Cooking frozen pizza
10 mins - uncooked
10 mins 1s - burnt
Pre-heat the oven, middle (not top) shelf, 10-20 degrees lower temperature than recommended on the box, and leave it to cook for 5-10 mins longer than it says on the box, keeping an eye on it.10 mins - uncooked
10 mins 1s - burnt
Annoying though I agree.
Don't extend cooking times for pizza. All you'll be doing is drying out the crust which will make them more prone to stripping the inner layer off the inside of your mouth, 1980s frozen pizza style.
Frozen food these days is so much better and, for pizzas certainly, is within a very small margin of fresh product.
If someone is having issues, I'd be checking the accuracy of the oven first. The OP's complaint is a throwback to the 80s/90s.
Clockwork Cupcake said:
DoubleD said:
Wasnt NASA boosted by taking Nazis over to America? Nazis who apparently knew about concentration camps?
Yup. That too. 
Wernher von Braun was the lead designer on the Apollo programme and had previously designed the V2 rockets used by the Nazis. The Americans poached him, and a large team of Nazi scientists (something like 70 people from memory?), at the end of WW2.
Folks moaning / complaining that their favourite pub, cafe, shop, establishment, outlet is not open, has changed its hours of opening, is now a takeaway, does not sell what it used to sell, or has closed permanently.
Having been through a national / worldwide emergency I'm surprised that anything has survived. The lack of empathy and understanding is beyond reason.
Having been through a national / worldwide emergency I'm surprised that anything has survived. The lack of empathy and understanding is beyond reason.
V8mate said:
Gary29 said:
MartG said:
Cooking frozen pizza
10 mins - uncooked
10 mins 1s - burnt
Pre-heat the oven, middle (not top) shelf, 10-20 degrees lower temperature than recommended on the box, and leave it to cook for 5-10 mins longer than it says on the box, keeping an eye on it.10 mins - uncooked
10 mins 1s - burnt
Annoying though I agree.
Don't extend cooking times for pizza. All you'll be doing is drying out the crust which will make them more prone to stripping the inner layer off the inside of your mouth, 1980s frozen pizza style.
Frozen food these days is so much better and, for pizzas certainly, is within a very small margin of fresh product.
If someone is having issues, I'd be checking the accuracy of the oven first. The OP's complaint is a throwback to the 80s/90s.
DoubleD said:
Agreed. Follow the instructions on the packet as they have been tested and proven to give the best results. If its not right after that then its something wrong with what you are doing.
No, they've been tested and proven to give the best results most of the time for most people.Every oven I've had I've known how to adjust times and temperatures to get the best results on that particular oven. Whether it was adding time on my parents' old gas oven or reducing the temperature on my current electric one.
jamei303 said:
DoubleD said:
Agreed. Follow the instructions on the packet as they have been tested and proven to give the best results. If its not right after that then its something wrong with what you are doing.
No, they've been tested and proven to give the best results most of the time for most people.Every oven I've had I've known how to adjust times and temperatures to get the best results on that particular oven. Whether it was adding time on my parents' old gas oven or reducing the temperature on my current electric one.
DoubleD said:
No. They are proven to work when your oven is working like it should do. Not all oven work correctly so times/temps have to be changed by the user.
No, there's no universal standard for ovens covering for example the operation of the fan, location of the thermostat in the oven and position of the shelving. There are so many factors beyond the temperature and time dial settings.Also there will be a not insignificant number of people with significantly under-performing ovens. The manufacturers of food therefore tend to overdo the cooking conditions so that the proportion risking food poisoning by undercooking food despite following the instructions is negligible
jamei303 said:
DoubleD said:
No. They are proven to work when your oven is working like it should do. Not all oven work correctly so times/temps have to be changed by the user.
No, there's no universal standard for ovens covering for example the operation of the fan, location of the thermostat in the oven and position of the shelving. There are so many factors beyond the temperature and time dial settings.Also there will be a not insignificant number of people with significantly under-performing ovens. The manufacturers of food therefore tend to overdo the cooking conditions so that the proportion risking food poisoning by undercooking food despite following the instructions is negligible
DoubleD said:
jamei303 said:
DoubleD said:
No. They are proven to work when your oven is working like it should do. Not all oven work correctly so times/temps have to be changed by the user.
No, there's no universal standard for ovens covering for example the operation of the fan, location of the thermostat in the oven and position of the shelving. There are so many factors beyond the temperature and time dial settings.Also there will be a not insignificant number of people with significantly under-performing ovens. The manufacturers of food therefore tend to overdo the cooking conditions so that the proportion risking food poisoning by undercooking food despite following the instructions is negligible
As DoubleD says, for an idealised perfectly calibrated and accurately controlled oven, the stated cooking time should be spot on.
However, as jamei303 observes, it is fair to say that not all ovens will be so, and there will be variance across ovens that may require adjustment.
I don't see these two stances as being mutually exclusive with one another.
Also, modern electronically controlled combi ovens are probably going to be more accurate and consistent than older thermostat-controlled* ones. So, your mileage may vary.
(* - as in a simple mechanical thermostat like a bimetallic strip that operates a simple on-off switch for the heating element)
Edited by Clockwork Cupcake on Tuesday 21st July 10:40
Having spent several year working in the frozen pizza industry, here's what actually happens:
Recipes are created in the development kitchen and test cooked using fairly standard domestic ovens (both fan and conventional electric, not usually gas though). The next stage is line trials in which the new recipes are made in small batches on the actual production lines and go though the freezer (usually either a spiral freezer or a blast freezer) just as they would when going into retail.
These samples also go through cooking validation in the test kitchen. On branded products that's generally the last stop for cooking validation but samples are quite often sent off to independent sensory panels for focus group sampling and at this point they will be cooked exactly as per on pack instructions in domestic ovens.
For own label products, all the major retailers have their own test/development kitchens at their head offices so a further round of cooking validation takes place, again using domestic ovens with products cooked in line with the instructions. At this point the retailers' technical and compliance teams will be involved in sampling and give feedback. I would say around 50% of recipes are signed off at this stage with others sent back for further tweaks. Whenever this happens, the cooking trial process starts again and they go back through another round of testing both at the manufacturer and in the retailers' kitchens.
Before I worked in frozen pizza I would never have considered buying one as I remember them being pretty poor back in the 80s/early 90s but nowadays if I'm buying a readymade pizza from retail I would probably choose frozen over fresh as the quality is no different but the price is significantly lower. Also a lot of "fresh" or "chilled" pizzas and/or bases are frozen on manufacture and thawed when needed for distribution to enable manufacturers to better manage supply and demand fluctuations with minimised waste.
TL/DR: Frozen pizza cooking instructions are demonstrably accurate if you follow them.
ETA: I have moved onto a different grocery supplier now so I have no skin in the game. Just sharing info.
Recipes are created in the development kitchen and test cooked using fairly standard domestic ovens (both fan and conventional electric, not usually gas though). The next stage is line trials in which the new recipes are made in small batches on the actual production lines and go though the freezer (usually either a spiral freezer or a blast freezer) just as they would when going into retail.
These samples also go through cooking validation in the test kitchen. On branded products that's generally the last stop for cooking validation but samples are quite often sent off to independent sensory panels for focus group sampling and at this point they will be cooked exactly as per on pack instructions in domestic ovens.
For own label products, all the major retailers have their own test/development kitchens at their head offices so a further round of cooking validation takes place, again using domestic ovens with products cooked in line with the instructions. At this point the retailers' technical and compliance teams will be involved in sampling and give feedback. I would say around 50% of recipes are signed off at this stage with others sent back for further tweaks. Whenever this happens, the cooking trial process starts again and they go back through another round of testing both at the manufacturer and in the retailers' kitchens.
Before I worked in frozen pizza I would never have considered buying one as I remember them being pretty poor back in the 80s/early 90s but nowadays if I'm buying a readymade pizza from retail I would probably choose frozen over fresh as the quality is no different but the price is significantly lower. Also a lot of "fresh" or "chilled" pizzas and/or bases are frozen on manufacture and thawed when needed for distribution to enable manufacturers to better manage supply and demand fluctuations with minimised waste.
TL/DR: Frozen pizza cooking instructions are demonstrably accurate if you follow them.
ETA: I have moved onto a different grocery supplier now so I have no skin in the game. Just sharing info.
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