Dick Adams wrote:
"Kenneth" wrote in message ...
On Thu, 20 Dec 2007 06:35:39 -0800 (PST), TG
"TG" wrote:

[ ... ]

Killfiling "TG" and Mike Romain really cleans this group up. If you, Kenneth,
insist on coddling and encouraging these bumblebrains, you'll need to go, as well.

Well, probably you won't see this, as you have had me killfiled for years.

--
Dicky

Wow, you old farts are something else.

You have such a little 'click' going here that you 'have' to kill file
folks with 'new' ideas or folks that don't understand your 'fake' FAQ. LOL!

It must be sad to live in such fear.

Or was it that I just answered your earlier challenge correct and you
are afraid to back up your offer?

Mike (not an old far just yet eh)

On 20 Dec, 17:19, Mike Romain wrote:
...
Wow, you old farts are something else.

You have such a little 'click' going here that you 'have' to kill file
folks with 'new' ideas or folks that don't understand your 'fake' FAQ. *LOL!

It must be sad to live in such fear.

Or was it that I just answered your earlier challenge correct and you
are afraid to back up your offer?

Mike (not an old far just yet eh)


Mike, he doesn't really have a kill file, that would spoil all his fun
wouldn't it? If he thought Kenneth really had a kill file then why
bother righting other than to just wind you up in Dick style. Dick
isn't all bad but you got to catch him when the meds have kicked in.

But getting back to what you said. You haven't got new ideas Mike, you
just quote old ones.

Jim

TG wrote:
But getting back to what you said. You haven't got new ideas Mike, you
just quote old ones.

Given that people have been making sourdough bread for somewhere between
6 and 10 thousand years, it's unlikely that any of us will come up with
new ideas in this area.

As to the other Mike's crusade against the FAQ, I am coming to like the
FAQ more than I had. It is a very rich document, and it is better as a
reference work than as a tutorial. It contains many different
viewpoints and it takes a bit of experience to understand the viewpoints
of the many different authors. Some of the authors do things that we,
today, do not. Does that mean they are wrong? No. It means they are
doing something different.

I truly believe that the contributors are sharing techniques and
information that worked for them. However, there are few things that
need to be understood about the FAQ and Sourdough.

Sourdough almost became a lost art. With the advent of reliable bakers
yeast in the mid to late 1800's, people moved away from sourdough.
Yeast was easier. As a result, a lot of the art was lost. Grandma
might have wanted to teach the kids, but the kids weren't even
interested in baking, much less baking with sourdough. Commercial
bakeries also moved away from sourdough as yeasted bread was easier to
make. Much of what people did with sourdough wasn't documented.
Mothers taught their kids who in turn taught their kids. Master bakers
taught their apprentices, who in turn taught their apprentices when they
became master bakers. Once yeast hit, there seemed to be no real reason
to pass on the arcane knowledge. How many people reading this remember
how to create a DOS boot diskette with memory management and network
drivers? How many people think there is any real need for such knowledge?

Next, the FAQ is a document put together by amateurs for amateurs.
There are places where technical terms are misused. As time has gone by
more correct usage of technical terms has filtered from the professional
to the serious amateur community. However, for better or worse, in
English we do not have a rigorously defined baking language. Most of
our technical terms are borrowed from other languages, mostly French,
and the terms are not used consistently in English. Respected authors
speak of making a poolish, or a "battery poolish", or a biga with
sourdough. However, poolish and biga are both yeasted techniques that
were developed to boost the flavor of yeasted bread, not sourdough
techniques. It is easier to correct a web page or a FAQ than to correct
a book that has already been printed.

The FAQ is a valuable reference, and I would be opposed to removing
historical material from it. Yes, we know that most starters are
started from micro-organisms already on the flour, not by
micro-organisms from the air. However, there is a lot of tradition that
states the opposite, and I would be reluctant to remove it It may not
be technically accurate, but it is historically important. Some people
use bakers yeast with sourdough. While I don't do that, I think it can
be a valuable technique and removing all mention of it from the FAQ
would be a bit revisionistic and might deprive future bakers of
knowledge they might need.

As we told the other Mike several times, the FAQ is not authoritative.
That doesn't mean it isn't valuable. Or that it's frequently posted
bullshit. It is a good resource as it stands.

Mike Avery

--
Mike Avery mavery at mail dot otherwhen dot com
part time baker ICQ 16241692
networking guru AIM, yahoo and skype mavery81230
wordsmith

A Randomly Selected Thought For The Day From
'The Code of The West, A Cowboy's Guide to Life' by Texas Bix Bender
Talk low, talk slow, and don't say too much.

I wasn't criticising him for not posting new ideas Mike, though I'm
sure you knew that. Mike R's just one of those guys that has to have
everything dried, labeled and pinned in it's own little box. It's a
sad way to live, the product of a tight, insecure mind. Hopefully
he'll relax a little and just let it be what it is as his
understanding kicks in. He's a prime example of someone who only sees
the moon-pointing-finger; I'm not so sure that he even cares about the
moon.

Anyway at the risk of sounding patronising to you, which I sincerely
do not want to do. That's a fantastic introduction to the FAQ Mike
(A).

Jim.

On 21 Dec, 14:03, Mike Avery wrote:
TG wrote:
But getting back to what you said. You haven't got new ideas Mike, you
just quote old ones.

Given that people have been making sourdough bread for somewhere between
6 and 10 thousand years, it's unlikely that any of us will come up with
new ideas in this area.

....

TG wrote:

But getting back to what you said. You haven't got new ideas Mike, you
just quote old ones.

Jim

Bud, you have proven 'once again' beyond any doubt in my mind that you
are nothing but a drunk fool that likes to rant incoherently when he has
had one or two too many. I said on your last drunken rant set I was
going to ignore you. I should have taken my own advise.

Bye now.

Mike Avery wrote:
snip good explanation

As we told the other Mike several times, the FAQ is not authoritative.
That doesn't mean it isn't valuable. Or that it's frequently posted
bullshit. It is a good resource as it stands.

Mike Avery


Good writeup Mike, it explains a lot.

The FAQ, when posted needs that 'not authoritative' caveat added to it
though, right at the start. That would explain the inconsistencies.

Mike
Oh, I also remember how to set up a boot disk quite well thanks.

On Fri, 21 Dec 2007 12:36:43 -0500, Mike Romain
wrote:

Mike Avery wrote:
snip good explanation

As we told the other Mike several times, the FAQ is not authoritative.
That doesn't mean it isn't valuable. Or that it's frequently posted
bullshit. It is a good resource as it stands.

Mike Avery


Good writeup Mike, it explains a lot.

The FAQ, when posted needs that 'not authoritative' caveat added to it
though, right at the start. That would explain the inconsistencies.

Sorry to disagree with you Mike A, but the FAQ doesn't really need to
be changed. Everyone should already regard it as a work-in-progress,
not the be-all, end-all to sourdough. You don't regard a recipe book
as the final word in cooking so why should you think of this FAQ as
the final word in sourdough?

Me thinks you just like to bitch!

Jack

Retired VIP wrote:
On Fri, 21 Dec 2007 12:36:43 -0500, Mike Romain
wrote:


Mike Avery wrote:
snip good explanation

As we told the other Mike several times, the FAQ is not authoritative.
That doesn't mean it isn't valuable. Or that it's frequently posted
bullshit. It is a good resource as it stands.

Mike Avery


Good writeup Mike, it explains a lot.

The FAQ, when posted needs that 'not authoritative' caveat added to it
though, right at the start. That would explain the inconsistencies.


Sorry to disagree with you Mike A, but the FAQ doesn't really need to
be changed. Everyone should already regard it as a work-in-progress,
not the be-all, end-all to sourdough. You don't regard a recipe book
as the final word in cooking so why should you think of this FAQ as
the final word in sourdough?

Me thinks you just like to bitch!


Me thinks you need to learn to read attributions correctly and to be a
bit more careful in who you are replying to. I never said the FAQ
needed to be changed. I was the one who said the FAQ had value.

Mike

--
Mike Avery mavery at mail dot otherwhen dot com
part time baker ICQ 16241692
networking guru AIM, yahoo and skype mavery81230
wordsmith

A Randomly Selected Thought For The Day:
All I want for Christmas is a box of Smurfs and a mallet!

Retired VIP wrote:
On Fri, 21 Dec 2007 12:36:43 -0500, Mike Romain
wrote:

Mike Avery wrote:
snip good explanation
As we told the other Mike several times, the FAQ is not authoritative.
That doesn't mean it isn't valuable. Or that it's frequently posted
bullshit. It is a good resource as it stands.

Mike Avery

Good writeup Mike, it explains a lot.

The FAQ, when posted needs that 'not authoritative' caveat added to it
though, right at the start. That would explain the inconsistencies.

Sorry to disagree with you Mike A, but the FAQ doesn't really need to
be changed. Everyone should already regard it as a work-in-progress,
not the be-all, end-all to sourdough. You don't regard a recipe book
as the final word in cooking so why should you think of this FAQ as
the final word in sourdough?

Me thinks you just like to bitch!

Jack

I think you aimed that at me, Mike 'R', not Mike A.

I keep getting bitched 'at' when I quote stuff from the FAQ, so just got
tired and wanted an explanation.

I am a Repair Techie that is used to RTFM when wanting answers to things
and a 'manual' or a FAQ that is not right is kinda offensive to me. So
be it, I will see what the new year brings, maybe a 'KISS' FAQ for the
group might be something to pass the time at if anyone wanted to contribute.

Mike
Some bread photos: http://www.mikeromain.shutterfly.com

On Tue, 25 Dec 2007 17:15:01 -0500, Mike Romain
wrote:

Retired VIP wrote:
On Fri, 21 Dec 2007 12:36:43 -0500, Mike Romain
wrote:

Mike Avery wrote:
snip good explanation
As we told the other Mike several times, the FAQ is not authoritative.
That doesn't mean it isn't valuable. Or that it's frequently posted
bullshit. It is a good resource as it stands.

Mike Avery

Good writeup Mike, it explains a lot.

The FAQ, when posted needs that 'not authoritative' caveat added to it
though, right at the start. That would explain the inconsistencies.

Sorry to disagree with you Mike A, but the FAQ doesn't really need to
be changed. Everyone should already regard it as a work-in-progress,
not the be-all, end-all to sourdough. You don't regard a recipe book
as the final word in cooking so why should you think of this FAQ as
the final word in sourdough?

Me thinks you just like to bitch!

Jack

I think you aimed that at me, Mike 'R', not Mike A.

I keep getting bitched 'at' when I quote stuff from the FAQ, so just got
tired and wanted an explanation.

I am a Repair Techie that is used to RTFM when wanting answers to things
and a 'manual' or a FAQ that is not right is kinda offensive to me. So
be it, I will see what the new year brings, maybe a 'KISS' FAQ for the
group might be something to pass the time at if anyone wanted to contribute.

Mike
Some bread photos: http://www.mikeromain.shutterfly.com

Yep, you're right Mike R, it was aimed at you. I've got to slow down
and read, not jump to conclusions. My apologies to Mike A.

I am a retired repair techie, electronics and telecommunications, so I
also know about manuals. They saved my a-- several times. But I
don't think of any FAQ as anything more than a list of suggestions. I
think you would be making a mistake to consider to be it anything
more.

Jack