Documentation Benchmark: The Pentagon's brownie recipe is 26 pages long...

bobdoering

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#1
From Reason.com

The Pentagon's brownie recipe is 26 pages long. Just grab a copy of document MIL-C-44072C and gather your ingredients: water that conforms to the "National Primary Drinking Water Regulations (Copies are available from the Office of Drinking Water, Environmental Protection Agency, WH550D, 401 M Street, S.W., Washington, DC 20460)," and some eggs in compliance with "Regulations Governing the Inspection of Eggs and Egg Products (7 CFR Part 59)," and you're ready to go!


Government procedure for brownies
 
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bobdoering

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#3
I found it funny that this made the local radio station morning show. I guess quality folks are not the only ones that see the humor in it!
 

SteelMaiden

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#4
All I know is that I'll never be able to make cookies again, because there is no "cookie flour" for sale at my local grocery store.
 

Jen Kirley

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#5
Even the most ludicrous-looking military specs, practices and traditions often have reasonable origins. (ask me sometime why people on board ship have to remove their hats while on the mess decks)

Since food for the military is mass produced by contractors and these brownies can and do end up in MREs, what you're looking at is Customer Specific Requirements for the purpose of supplier control. Look at the last 10 pages and you will see the foodstuff construct requirements switch to inspection and packaging requirements.
 

Marc

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#7
Even the most ludicrous-looking military specs, practices and traditions often have reasonable origins. (ask me sometime why people on board ship have to remove their hats while on the mess decks)

Since food for the military is mass produced by contractors and these brownies can and do end up in MREs, what you're looking at is Customer Specific Requirements for the purpose of supplier control. Look at the last 10 pages and you will see the foodstuff construct requirements switch to inspection and packaging requirements.
And it goes back a long ways. Even during the civil war (not to mention WW II) in the US there were problems with things like bullets with no powder in them. Some of the problems were simply unscrupulous people, others were truly process quality related. I got into quality in a military manufacturing environment and got some good history lessons in the origins of many Mil-Standards. A lot of people used to complain about US$500 hammers, as an example, but few understood the reason for the requirements. Not that all mil specs make sense, but those I've worked with did.
 

Jen Kirley

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#8
And it goes back a long ways. Even during the civil war (not to mention WW II) in the US there were problems with things like bullets with no powder in them. Some of the problems were simply unscrupulous people, others were truly process quality related. I got into quality in a military manufacturing environment and got some good history lessons in the origins of many Mil-Standards. A lot of people used to complain about US$500 hammers, as an example, but few understood the reason for the requirements. Not that all mil specs make sense, but those I've worked with did.
That's correct. Wikipedia has a pretty good history of the Mil Standard.

Wikipedia reference-linkUnited_States_Military_Standard

Of course there's reason to think they're over the top, but I expect other industrially produced recipes to be similarly exacting, for example the KFC chicken coating. Certainly they won't call out things like "1 1/2 cups flour," they are apt to give weights and percentages, and might even list approved sources.
 

Marc

Hunkered Down for the Duration with a Mask on...
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#10
Good link. When I was in military manufacturing a lot of the stress was on fraud vs. issues like tolerances, etc. (standardization), so my post was/is sorta biased. I used to have a lot of 'questions' about them myself but ending up in the industry I better understood their history and the reasons for many of them.
 
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