"Jenn Ridley" wrote in message
...
Jane Lumley wrote:

In article , Vox Humana
writes


I guess I just don't understand why people buy mixes. How hard or time
consuming is it to measure some flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder?
That's about all you get with a cake mix, aside from preservatives,
emulsifiers, artificial flavoring, and other additives.

Oh, I am soo sooooo glad you said this. I thought mixes were for people
who hated baking. Why post about them on a baking newsgroup?

There are people who don't usually bake. They may be quite capable of
doing so, they just don't do it often enough to justify having the
ingredients in the pantry all the time.

F'rex -- my aunt. She used to bake a lot, and is quite good at it.
However, she now lives alone, and only has occasion to bake a couple
of times a year. When she does bake, she uses a mix, as it's much
more convenient and *less expensive* than buying flour/sugar/baking
powder/baking soda *every time* she wants to bake.

I use Jiffy mix for pancakes on school mornings. I don't have the
time or energy to fuss with 'proper' pancake batter while I'm getting
two kids off to the bus, and my husband is in the kitchen getting
*his* breakfast and lunch. Does that make me a failure?
--
Jenn Ridley :

I remain unconvinced. You need flour for a lot of non-baking endeavors. It
is used to dredge meat and vegetable before frying and to thicken sauces.
Sugar goes into drink and over cereal. Salt - who doesn't use salt at the
table? Sugar and salt don't go bad. Flour will keep for an extended time
in the refrigerator or freezer. Salt costs about 40 cents for a container.
Sugar sells for about 30 cents a pound around here - less on sale. Baking
power is also very inexpensive and while it does go bad after a year, that
is in incentive to use it. The cost of mixes will far exceed the price of
the raw ingredients you would have to buy, even taking into consideration
that you will toss the tin of baking power each year and start over. That
bag of flour for $1.70, the sugar for $1.50, the salt for $.049., and the
baking powder for $1.89 all adds up to less than $6.

Convenience is the only reason that I can see for using a mix.