User talk:Macrakis

I wonder if you'd care to comment: I'm getting fed up with POV-pushing idiots trying to impose their own definitions of "shepherd's pie" and "cottage pie", and have drafted in my sandbox a possible opening section for the main text of the article explaining the facts of the nomenclature. I have asked User:SchroCat to comment, too, as he has done his share of repelling boarders. If you are minded to look in, please feel free to edit the text in my sandbox. Tim riley talk 13:27, 4 February 2026 (UTC)

@Tim riley: Thanks for asking me to comment. I agree that the POV-pushers are very annoying. But I'm not at all convinced that writing a long Terminology section will make any difference at all. Without actually reviewing all the past incidents, I seem to remember that they all edit the lead, and don't touch the body of the article, where the explanation is already quite clear. I'm pretty sure that they don't even read the body of the article.

Since the POV-pushers are typically (always?) anonymous, we can only speculate about their motivations. On this and other food articles, there seem to be several cases:

1. The naïve corrector. "Everyone knows that XXX, that's what my dad always said".
2. The logical corrector. "Since it's called 'shepherd's', how could it possibly be made of anything but sheep-meat?"
3. The troll. "Let's see if I can annoy and provoke those holier-than-thou Wikipedia editors".
4. The gastronationalist. "I have to protect England from this offensive slander".

These overlap, of course. But in none of these cases is filling out the body of the article going to make any difference.

I have had similar issues on this article (and some others):

• Whipped cream: "everyone knows" that Chantilly contains sugar (1); logically, it must have been invented at the Château de Chantilly (2); how could you possibly think that crème chantilly isn't of French origin? (4). See my recent revert on the French WP, where I seem to remember fr:User:Fleur44 being particularly outraged years ago, but I can't find the quote.

I did of course provide full sources for my edits, but Fleur44 cut the relevant paragraph claiming "Source non vérifiable et invérifiable" apparently because my sources weren't available online. This is a rare case where it is not just the lead which is mis-edited.

---

As for your specific text, I love the full documentation, but the multiple, extensive, in-line quotations just lengthen the article without making it more complete or clearer, because they largely overlap in meaning. Rather than something of the form

Author A says 'the moon is made of green cheese'[footnote A]. Author B in their book BBook writes 'Curds are the main substance of the moon'.[Footnote BBook] Dictionary D defines the moon as 'a celestial body largely composed of cheese'.[Footnote DDict]

I would much prefer to write

The moon is widely said to be made of green cheese.[footnote A][footnote BBook][footnote DDict]

You'll see this style in action at Whipped cream#History (which I wrote). It does mention specific authors when they are famous, and equally importantly their geographic location, since that is relevant. But mostly the bibliographic information is in the footnotes.

I'm not a big fan of quote= in footnotes, but if we have to have quotes, I'd put them there rather than the body text.

You start the terminology section with a claim that British usage "tends" to distinguish them, citing the OCF. But that article is particularly prescriptive, so I wouldn't count on it. And it seems to reflect Helen Saberi's position, so attributing the quote to the OCF gives is perhaps more weight than it deserves. Anyway, the OCF isn't supposed to reflect British usage in particular, is it?

Using the M-W dictionary definition as evidence for usage in the US is equally unreliable. After all, we have a full table of usage in cookbooks which shows a US Cottage Pie made with lamb, and one made with pork (!).

In any case, all this careful documentation won't change the POV-pushers' behavior. Macrakis (talk) 17:51, 4 February 2026 (UTC)

PS I have added a geographical annotation to the cookbook authors in the table so it's easier to "read off" the correlation (or not) of name and ingredients. --Macrakis (talk) 17:55, 4 February 2026 (UTC)

Thank you so much for this thoughtful response. I had toyed with adding nationalities to the the table, and I think your additions are a good move. I'll confer further with SchroCat and then, I think, add a preliminary section on terminology, though I fear you are quite right that it may not deter the POV brigade. Tim riley talk 18:31, 4 February 2026 (UTC)

Thanks once more for stepping in again to remedy disruptive editing. I requested page protection yesterday, which brought in an editor who restored your edit, and also protected the page for three days. I hope that will give you a little vacation from continuously removing inappropriate content from Dubin's article. All the best, AM for Dubin (talk) 12:36, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

Hi Macrakis. I recently posted an edit request at Talk:Glenn Dubin#Epstein section with a ping to you, so this is a little nudge asking if you can please take a look. In light of recent news, the Giuffre testimony has significantly deteriorated in its reliability, to the point where her allegations about the Dubins are WP:FRINGE, and should not be given a platform in a Wikipedia BLP. I am hoping you have time to make whatever edits you believe will return the article to its previous NPOV. Once again, thank you for your concern and efforts. AM for Dubin (talk) 16:32, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

I am conspiring with SchroCat to put the article up for FAC. He and I will be co-nominees and we would be pleased if you cared to be another. (The duties would be purely nominal, unless you were inclined to wade in.) Tim riley talk 15:37, 8 February 2026 (UTC)

An honor! Thanks. Macrakis (talk) 01:58, 9 February 2026 (UTC)

Excellent. Duly nominated on behalf of all three. Tim riley talk 08:31, 9 February 2026 (UTC)

@Tim riley: Perhaps I have misunderstood the FAC process. User:SchroCat's recent Talk comments seem to suggest that we shouldn't continue improving the article during the FAC, while I think of it as encouraging us to improve the article to make it worth of FA ("wading in"). If it is not a good idea to work on the article (with of course the expected back-and-forth among editors) during FAC, then I withdraw my co-nomination until we resolve the issues I mention on Talk. Macrakis (talk) 16:39, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

Well, it's a question of balance. One tweaks an article in response to helpful suggestions at FAC (and Lord knows I've done a helluva lot of that in my time) but it's not really fair to reviewers to introduce one's own gratuitous tweaks in the middle of the review process - it gives reviewers a moving target that's harder to hit and may mean that early reviewers are supporting or opposing quite different versions of the article from those later reviewers are looking at. Tim riley talk 17:44, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

Got it. So since the article needs considerable reorganization to reach FA, I will withdraw my co-nomination. Sorry for making extra work for everyone. --Macrakis (talk) 17:48, 16 February 2026 (UTC)

@Macrakis: The reason why I am sending you this message is because User:ScrubbedFalcon closed the discussion as merge, I 100% disagree with it. I have created an against the merge section on the page Talk:Ferrero SpA, with multiple reasons of why I am against it. Catfurball (talk) 22:55, 12 March 2026 (UTC)

If I understand correctly, WK Kellogg included the North American breakfast cereal business of Kellogg's, which I hope was well covered in the Kellogg's article. If not, that should be addressed in the Kellogg's article and cross-referenced in the Ferrero article. I don't think it needs a standalone article. Macrakis (talk) 23:38, 12 March 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for your edits and cleaning up the Bacon Jam article a few months back. I added a brief note on its recent appearances in US restaurants (Applebees, Dunkin Donuts) in the history section. Is it an appropriate addition or should it be rolled back?

If you think it's an appropriate addition, do you have any expansion on that note from restaurant usage before 2025? ☘︎☘︎☘︎ALEXHammeke (talk | guestbook | SANDBOX!!!) 07:14, 24 March 2026 (UTC)

Documenting its appearance in major chains' menus is certainly appropriate! According to Gemini, other chains introduced bacon jam before Applebees and Dunkin Donuts: Sonic and Red Robin (2021), Denny's (2023), Dairy Queen (2024). You definitely need to check those out carefully and find reliable sources before adding them, because there are many ways Gemini could have gone wrong: it might have confused bacon jam with other bacon products (Gemini mentioned Denny's Baconalia in 2011, but that didn't include bacon jam); it might have gotten the dates wrong, etc.

Gemini also came up with this: The Bacon Jams (now TBJ Gourmet) popularized bacon jam on QVC in 2014. By 2015, they had created a shelf-stable, USDA approved product, which they distributed through Gordon Food Service. By 2016, it was sold in over 1000 restaurants. I don't have the time to chase down reliable sources for this -- do you? Macrakis (talk) 19:36, 24 March 2026 (UTC)

Thank you for the quick response! I should have some time over the next few nights to look. I wanted to give a basic two or three line addition at first and then see if I could expand further from there with older dates/restaurant adoption, etc. and have sources on hand first before adding more content. For some reason I was having an issue with the citation generator last night so I uploaded them manually for now and will clean that up tonight

A quick google search found a press release for the Sonic bacon jam burger, so that'll be in my next edit ☘︎☘︎☘︎ALEXHammeke (talk | guestbook | SANDBOX!!!) 19:47, 24 March 2026 (UTC)