The boom on this goes back further than the pandemic.

I suspect it comes down to the real estate market. People approaching retirement who got priced out for that whole vacation home dream. An RV, even a trailer and vehicle counts as a second home. So it can be a tax write off. It gives you some of that same shit as…

I think that’s a big part of it. No one seems to be watching. Like there are regs and safety standards for this shit. And “not adequately welded together” certainly doesn’t meet them. If GM started doing shit like that some one would go to prison.

The freaky bit is that a lot of the commercial box trucks, big rig…

Cheaper is relative.

Yeah that sounds like the sort of thing that might side step some of the biggest issues. Like my folk’s frame problem. A bus or van conversion isn’t going to be stuck buying from one frame builder that can’t be assed to weld. Being a vehicle there are safety regs to be dealt with. And to the extent that something like…

From what I hear the high end ones aren’t any better built. At least not with any kind of consistency.

It’s not like you pay $x you get a more reliable one. It’s that some of the more expensive ones also happen to be the more reliable ones. 

Any and everything. New used, doesn’t matter. There was always a little hinkyness with this sort of thing, my grandparents were towing around airstreams in the 60's. Things need to be lightweight, and that has an impact.

I think it’s a bit more specific than just typical cut costs to juke margins BS. And like the article points out, this ain’t new.

My parents just went through something with their 10 year old RV that finally has them replacing it. The frame suspension failed catastrophically. The camper basically collapsed on the…

If you’re not good at cutting off the tops. Take the cake and put it back in the pan, or a larger pan of the same height (or the height you’re looking for) and run the knife across the top of said pan as you cut.

It also helps to have the right knife. You want a very long scallaped knife, rounded bumps rather than…

How much looking did you do?

Nah it’s just something familiar that works as a good example of the difference. Not a lot of people outside the NY Metro are familiar with black and whites, which are actually good.

Poured fondant is also the filling in Cadbury’s Cream Egg. But I hate those with a passion, so didn’t use the example. 

The trend is actually shifting the other way. A lot of the bakeries and catering places around here won’t do it, and I haven’t really seen a wedding with a pretty cake that tasted like shit in years.

Which kinda doubles down on the “looks good on TV” thing. The whole shift in home baking towards the technical and…

Poured. Why would a factory making tons of these be rolling out sheets, punching out circles and carefully lining them up? It’s inefficient.

Fondant is basically playdoh but sweeter/not salty.

I honestly doubt too many of these cakes are getting eaten at all. Even in cases where a cake is “for” some one.

A lot of the key things in making a cake like this are pretty unpleasant to eat. Decorator fondant (also called rolled fondant) is basically culinary spackle, gum paste tastes like chalk with sugar crystals…

Oh also. Restaurants use straws.

Particularly when it comes to impractical jar cups.

There’s no vast conspiracy here.

Not everyone is out to get you man. 

No restaurant is giving that level of thought to it’s glassware, at least not in that direction.

And that would not explain people doing this at home.

I think worse is that it’s taking place in a landlocked state about as far from any source of clams as you can get.

Can we stop putting drinks in mason jars?

They don’t work as cups. The threading just makes liquid drip down your face, and they are bulky and uncomfortable to drink out of.

It’s 20 year out of date, deliberately kitschy, faux Southern or “country” this rooted in places like cracker barrel. It should be long forgotten…

I have a lot of family in Maine. Mainers like to fuck with out of towners.

Like I said. They still make them. They’re just regular hot dogs, died red. There’s a couple of red food colorings that were banned in the 70's, but they wouldn’t have hung on any longer in Maine or made the hotdogs illegal anywhere. Currently…

That’s pretty much default for the “chili” used as a sauce on hotdogs, burgers and what have. And most variations don’t seem to have descended from actual chili at all. Like that whole Cincinnati Chili thing there’s often connections to Greek or Italian immigrants and diners involved.

The exception might be the South…