@Ash Yes, other thinning agents--chemically

But ya, makes sense to say only what we know

@adamaero well - most people are not concious of the chemistry and physics of food

In most cases, you just do stuff till it works

its only at industrial levels where that's a primary concern

@Ash Milk works too, e.g. in doughs that use milk instead of water.

Hii everyone! I've got a question for you guys. My mother used to own a copy of a famous German cookbook (Kiehnle Kochbuch) and of of our favorite recipes from it is the so-called Mandelring, which is a Bundt-style cake with almond filling.

The copy of the book was from an old-ish edition (probably 80's or a bit older even). She recently got a newer copy because the old book had started falling a part; this new copy was of a more recent edition. To our dismay, we have now discovered that the Mandelring recipe has disappeared from this new edition, and we are no longer able to make this wonderful cake. I've been thinking about posting a question on the main site asking if anyone could recover it for me.

The book is well-known enough that I hope there is a reasonable chance of this succeeding. Before I proceed, I just wanted to ask if it is an appropriate question for the site. Anyone care to comment?

@Danu It would be very hard to formulate a question based around this situation which is not closable.

And the ones which are most likely to stay open are probably the ones which are least useful to you, and at the same time, they are still likely to be not very welcome by the community

for example, you won't be able to ask directly for a recipe, that's an important closing reason for us

we do allow sometimes a "where can I buy" question, but they are rare, get generally downvoted, tend to either have no answers or a myriad of equally good answers, and we never even have had those for a cookbook, only for food ingredients

it is also a gray area whether cookbook recommendations are on topic, with a development towards "no" in more recent years

@rumtscho I see... How come?

@Danu Because it is a question that is not at all suited to stack overflow

It is the epitome of a big-list question - I don't know if you were around in the early days of the network to remember those discussions and the kind of quetsions that spawned them

anyway, here is the good news for you

I think you are looking for that:

abebooks.de/servlet/…-srp1--title1

A 1981 edition of the book in good condition.

Unless you expected somebody to provide you with the recipe directly and not the book - for that, I guess the Chefkoch forums might be a better place, they are not strict QA sites and allow all kinds of requests.

@rumtscho Hmm... OK. I respect that (and don't mean to argue with you), but I think I would be asking specifically for a single recipe from a specific book. I understand if that is still off-topic, but perhaps it wouldn't be a big list question.

@Danu That one instance won't be a list question, I agree

@rumtscho Right, this is what I had in mind. Thank you very much for the detailed feedback and the recommendation

Still, the rule is stated such as to cover all recipe requests, and if you post it, it will create some amount of drama, and no matter the final decision (allow the exception or not allow it), the drama will exist and we (you, we moderators, and the site as a whole) will have to deal with it and with its aftermath

Yes, so I better avoid it ;) I am not a frequent user of Seasoned Advice and therefore wasn't aware of the controversy surrounding recipe requests---is there any specific reason why this is such a controversial topic?

I must admit that, as a moderator, I prefer to stick to enforcing imperfect rules, even with the few unfortunate cases which get restricted even if there would have been no harm in allowing it, than to say that I can bend the rules as long as I see fit - because that exposes the community to the bigger danger of some day being ruled by what a handful of people see as "right", leading to one-sidedness, favoritism, etc.

@Danu I think I didn't expressed it properly. The big discussion was on Stack Overflow for any kind of big-list questions. Here, there wasn't much of a discussion, recipe requests were clearly forbidden from the earliest days.

Ah, I see. All clear

@rumtscho Sure, this is never easy (I moderate on History of Science and Mathematics) ;)

Your case is a huge exception, I have not seen anything like it and I have been around since 2011 - a recipe request is typically "please give me a good recipe for lasagna" and everybody starts posting their favorite recipe.

We actually have an exception called "restaurant mimicry" which is meant for people who are trying to reverse-engineering an exact known dish with an unknown recipe

The expectation there is that nobody in the world (except the people who prepare the recipe at their restaurant) know the real recipe, and the asker is somebody who is trying to get somewhat close to it, is doing the experimentation work needed for it, and needs help with a few details

We have mostly have rather disappointing questions under that tag

@rumtscho Hehe

@rumtscho Right, that makes sense. This situation is also rather exceptional, and lame. Why did they remove this recipe?! :P

usually the people come up with the expectation that they just will get the exact recipe, instead of being helped in the reverse-engineering process. Also, they more often than not don't ask for an exact dish which others may have encountered, but try to describe something they have had at a tiny restaurant somewhere, and of course the description is not even sufficient to know makes the dish so special for that person.

@Danu Indeed, I also don't see why a traditional cookbook would remove a recipe.

I guess they want to modernize their books, some types of food just fall out of fashion

@Danu let me check my library...

Ok, I will check whether the 1928(!) edition has the recipe.

May take a while, it’s at my Mom’s house.

@Danu so..... that’s what I found:

Sorry if the image quality is a bit crappy.

Ping me, if you need a transcript.

I could also add the instructions (it’s only a sort-of recipe) from Luise, the other Swabian standard reference. I bet about every teen girl in my Mom’s generation had one.

Thank you very much @Stephie! I actually followed @rumtscho's advice and asked on Chefkoch, which also gave me an answer :)

Of course the two answers coincide ;)

@Stephie Your willingness to help is heartwarming

@Stephie I would actually be curious hehe, if it's not too much effort. My mother also received her copy from her own mother, who is from the region.

@Danu What do you need?

I'm curious if Luise has an equivalent, but please don't waste too much time on it

Yep. Does.

just a sec.

Beautiful!

@Danu ^ Just use almonds.

Yes, of course :)

@Danu if you're interested in exploring this kind of cake, look up slovenian potica recipes.

I am! I'll look into it, thanks for the recommendation

This is the one I've made, I liked it.

especially the filling, I haven't worked with this kind of filling before.

@Stephie Heh, I passed this on to my mother and she got so excited that she is now asking me for the Inhaltsverzeichnis of the book... Do you still have it lying around? ;D

@Danu that’s Luise Haarer... sure, that is mostly within my reach.

@rumtscho This sounds very good too, especially the honey :D

@Stephie Sorry for bothering you with all these requests... Tell me when it starts to get annoying.

@Danu yes, it's really good. Also, the texture is interesting. The nuts are chopped, not ground to flour, but the filling becomes a paste that kinda hardens after baking. And the amounts are calculated such that you have roughly equal thickness of paste and dough, leading to an interesting appearance and great taste.

Also, note that there is no vanilla in the recipe - I would keep it that way, I think that the Anglosaxon and German tradition to put vanilla in almost all sweet things is overdone.

@Stephie haha! There are actually services that take this kind of thing, even though for a 1928 book, you won't be able to use the legal ones for a few more years :)

I wonder now, what did Louise think about the rules of composing meals?

@rumtscho I think there’s a section on that.

there is, I started reading the list of contents

she spends 3 pages on clear soups and 5 pages on offal, yay 1928

and 11 on ice cream!

@rumtscho uh, that’s not the 1928 book. That’s my 1984 Luise.

haha :)

I was just thinking, "pastry crusts" and "cheap pastry crusts" one year before the Depression? But 1984, they were still reeling from the oil shock :)

She uses wonderfully oldtimer-words and concepts for being so new

Nah, that’s after WW II economy. First edition is 1958.

I must admit, I do have a soft spot for these "everything for the housewife" compendiums

Many, many thanks @Stephie you've made my day

ha, she also has a chapter on good manners when eating

@Danu My pleasure! If you ever consider getting a Luise, make sure it’s not the modernized one.

I'll keep it in mind!

@rumtscho and the 1958 edition is the “illustrierte Ausgabe”, the original is older. 1930 or so, iirc.

Yep. 1932.

I am trying to imagine a modern cookbook, of the "buddha bowls and smoothies" style, or one of those pretentious ones by big-name chefs (Piere Herme anyone?) with exact instructions and photos larger than the recipe text, and the publisher trying to include a chapter on table manners.

closest to that are the admonishments that you should source your vanila beans directly from small farmers in Uganda :)

(In all fairness, I don't have a book which admonishes the readers to do so, but I do have a book in which the author flaunts that she does it, and tells everybody how much richer the smell is)

now I'm considering going to Abebooks and getting a Luise

even though I actually prefer modern cooking methods, more Kenji style recipes with exactness, etc.

But I just like the idea of having this kind of book even though I might not actually use it.

@rumtscho pretty basic and very sensible:

nice!

@rumtscho I've settled on buying it for my mother's birthday :)

It is a book designed for cooking classes (at school or as it was the custom in the 50s, “Hauswirtschaftsschule” after regular school) or cooks with basic knowledge of methods, compiling basic recipes and a few varieties, but not like a book aiming at the “my mom never cooked, now I find myself suddenly living alone and clueless” clientele.

@Danu just remember - “illustrated” is ok, “neu: mit Phasenphotos” is not what you want if you go for the basic recipe version. The one with the Phasenphotos is a “revamped modernization”. I suspect like the new Kiehnle.