# Real vs artificial: preferences? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 17, 2010, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509 "2010-08-17T06:52:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![norinew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb9ed0/32.png) [@norinew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/norinew)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/1 "2010-08-17T06:52:51Z")
When it comes to butter, gimme the real deal. If all you’ve got is ‘buttery spread’, I’d just as soon skip it and just put jelly on my biscuit! On the other hand, when it comes to pancake/waffle syrup, I _do not like_ Real Maple Syrup. I much prefer the artificially flavored stuff. And you? ---
**Author:** ![AClockworkMelon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aclockworkmelon/32/10803_2.png) [@AClockworkMelon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AClockworkMelon)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 7:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/2 "2010-08-17T07:08:31Z")
I typically prefer margarine because it’s easier to dig a utensil into. Taste-wise I don’t really have a preference as long as there’s a lot of it melting in the nooks and crannies of my Belgian waffle. Mmm… ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 9:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/3 "2010-08-17T09:25:46Z")
> [@AClockworkMelon](#): > > I typically prefer margarine because it’s easier to dig a utensil into. Taste-wise I don’t really have a preference as long as there’s a lot of it melting in the nooks and crannies of my Belgian waffle. Mmm… I read that as _wife_ at first. Real butter for me, haven’t used margarine in years. And real maple syrup. ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 9:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/4 "2010-08-17T09:36:56Z")
> [@norinew](#): > > On the other hand, when it comes to pancake/waffle syrup, I _do not like_ Real Maple Syrup. I much prefer the artificially flavored stuff. The road to hell is paved with Mrs. Buttersworth and her ilk. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 9:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/5 "2010-08-17T09:39:17Z")
I prefer real butter, real syrup, and real cream. Why yes, I am having chest pains, why do you ask? ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 9:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/6 "2010-08-17T09:52:52Z")
I would rather use real butter, whole milk, heavy cream and eggs in cooking, just use restraint. I prefer 100% natural in moderation, that eating whatever I want of fake substitute crap. Pancake syrup does not really taste that good compared to real maple syrup. High fructose corn syrup is a migraine trigger in me, and I feel that it is a direct cause of obesity and diabetes as it is in damned near everything. We need to abolish the use of it, frankly. I just think that we evolved to eat the natural stuff, and not the synthetic crap. I would not be at all surprised to hear that science finally determines all the synthetic crap that people do to adjust their diets to lose weight/whatever is actually worse for you than eating the real thing [look at the change in thought about margarine now] and I really wish that the popular media would shut the fuck up about ‘scientific studies’ until there is a 100 % conclusion [again, look at the whole sodium thing] as I am fucking tired about the dietary scare of the week. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 10:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/7 "2010-08-17T10:08:19Z")
> [@Red\_Barchetta](#): > > The road to hell is paved with Mrs. Buttersworth and her ilk. Is that the sticky slope argument? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Accident](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Mr.Accident](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Accident)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 10:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/8 "2010-08-17T10:41:14Z")
I prefer the real stuff over artificial, when I can afford it. Especially real maple syrup. The artificial stuff smells like stale piss to me. ---
**Author:** ![AClockworkMelon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aclockworkmelon/32/10803_2.png) [@AClockworkMelon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AClockworkMelon)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 11:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/9 "2010-08-17T11:10:38Z")
> [@runner pat](#): > > > [@AClockworkMelon](#): > > > > I typically prefer margarine because it’s easier to dig a utensil into. Taste-wise I don’t really have a preference as long as there’s a lot of it melting in the nooks and crannies of my Belgian waffle. Mmm… > > I read that as _wife_ at first. Kinky. ---
**Author:** ![singular1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ba9def/32.png) [@singular1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/singular1)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 11:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/10 "2010-08-17T11:14:45Z")
> [@AClockworkMelon](#): > > I typically prefer margarine because it’s easier to dig a utensil into. Taste-wise I don’t really have a preference as long as there’s a lot of it melting in the nooks and crannies of my Belgian waffle. Mmm… Get yourself an old-fashioned covered butter dish and leave your butter out on the counter. Nothing better than bringing home fresh bread and smearing soft creamy butter on thick. You’ll never look back at margarine (and we’ve never had the butter go bad, even in the hottest summer days). ---
**Author:** ![norinew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb9ed0/32.png) [@norinew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/norinew)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 12:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/11 "2010-08-17T12:02:44Z")
> [@singular1](#): > > > [@AClockworkMelon](#): > > > > I typically prefer margarine because it’s easier to dig a utensil into. Taste-wise I don’t really have a preference as long as there’s a lot of it melting in the nooks and crannies of my Belgian waffle. Mmm… > > Get yourself an old-fashioned covered butter dish and leave your butter out on the counter. Nothing better than bringing home fresh bread and smearing soft creamy butter on thick. You’ll never look back at margarine (and we’ve never had the butter go bad, even in the hottest summer days). This is what we do. I think in all the years I’ve been doing it, it’s gone rancid on me exactly once. ---
**Author:** ![Ronald\_C.Semone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/cc9497/32.png) [@Ronald\_C.Semone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ronald_C.Semone)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 12:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/12 "2010-08-17T12:36:00Z")
I haven’t knowingly eaten margerine in 60 years, I’ve never used “artificial coffee creamers”, I think Kool Whip-like stuff is an abomination, the idea of using imitation vanilla is repugnant, I won’t eat pizza with artificial cheese… I make an earnest effort to avoid all artificial or substitute foods. With one exception: I’ve compared them again and again to see if I was missing anything, and I still can’t tell the difference between real maple syrup and artificial maple syrup, so I go with Aunt Jemima’s. ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/13 "2010-08-17T12:40:30Z")
I like margarine (cheap, always easy to spread) and “table syrup” (don’t care for maple flavour stuff), but I don’t really consider them “artificial”. It’s not like they’re produced from coal tar and polyester. ---
**Author:** ![norinew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb9ed0/32.png) [@norinew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/norinew)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/14 "2010-08-17T13:37:55Z")
> [@Ronald\_C.Semone](#): > > I haven’t knowingly eaten margerine in 60 years, I’ve never used “artificial coffee creamers”, I think Kool Whip-like stuff is an abomination, the idea of using imitation vanilla is repugnant, I won’t eat pizza with artificial cheese… I make an earnest effort to avoid all artificial or substitute foods. With one exception: I’ve compared them again and again to see if I was missing anything, and I still can’t tell the difference between real maple syrup and artificial maple syrup, so I go with Aunt Jemima’s. I will use powdered coffee creamer if it’s my only option. At home, it’s Half and Half (I buy it at Aldi, so I don’t have to mortgage the house to afford it!) Actually, it’s only great self-restraint that keeps me from using heavy cream! 😉 I totally agree on the whipped cream and the real vanilla! I grew up with my Mom serving Cool Whip and using artificial vanilla because it was cheaper. Ugh. She also insisted on using margarine because it was ‘better for you’. Cost probably factored into that, too, though, as she was raising five kids on my Dad’s salary, and we were often pretty broke. ---
**Author:** ![Antigen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/848f3c/32.png) [@Antigen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Antigen)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/15 "2010-08-17T14:10:16Z")
Give me real everything. I can’t think of anything I prefer the “artificial” version of. Real sugar is vastly superior to its imitators. I will _sometimes_ drink a diet Snapple, but I don’t like the artificial sweeteners in any other context (well, maybe in sugar-free gum). Has to be real sugar in my coffee. I’ve tried the pink packet, the blue packet, and the yellow packet, and they can all go to hell. Cool Whip is horrid goo - why not just use real whipped cream? It’s cream plus sugar plus whipping it to death. not really a complex recipe. If you can’t manage to make it yourself, at least use the “Reddi Whip” that has at least a tiny hint of reality despite its aerosol-can presentation. But it’s so easy to make the good stuff in your own kitchen, and it tastes soooooo good. I can’t stand fake maple syrup. Fake syrup should not exist. I think it may actually be a crime for me, as a Canadian, to use what we call (loosely translated) “telephone pole syrup”. My syrup comes in cans and it is absolute maple heaven on my pancakes. Also, butter. I love butter. My grandma liked margarine - it was white and slimy and weird. Didn’t taste like a damn thing, either, as far as I could tell. The “easy to spread” argument never made sense to me, because we kept our butter in a covered dish on the counter, always ready for smearing all over toast. But I grew up with the “real” stuff, so it seems right to me. I’m sure that someone who was raised on Cool Whip and margarine would think the real stuff didn’t seem right. I do use artificial vanilla extract in baking, because it’s close enough to the real thing for my purposes. Then there’s stuff like turkey bacon, which is absolutely not real bacon, but I like it as its own thing. It’s not a bacon substitute… it’s just a different option. does that count? Oh, that reminds me - no fake bacon bits, please. Cook some real bacon and smash it up. ---
**Author:** ![Snickers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5daacb/32.png) [@Snickers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snickers)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/16 "2010-08-17T14:42:53Z")
Real butter. Real mashed potatoes - boxed mashers are an abomination. And like \*\*Antigen \*\*says about whipped cream, mashed potatoes is an easy recipe - there’s like four ingredients! (Yeah, you can make them more involved than that, but at it’s simplest there’s not many.) The potatoes can sit there and bubble away while you’re making the rest of the meal. There’s just no excuse. As for fake, I do have some of those non-dairy creamers in my fridge right now. I’d prefer cream, but I know I can’t use it up before it goes bad. And unless I’ve bought milk for a recipe, we don’t usually have it in the house (we’re not big milk drinkers, clearly). Plus my sister-in-law likes the Hazelnut flavor, so we have some around for when she visits. She doesn’t visit often, but since the stuff keeps forever it’s no worries. So it’s more convenient for me to have the creamers on hand. Plus, then I can have French Vanilla! ---
**Author:** ![Binarydrone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3da27b/32.png) [@Binarydrone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Binarydrone)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/17 "2010-08-17T15:20:13Z")
Are we just talking about pancake stuff or can I add something? Because I _love_ artificial strawberry flavor (like you find in Quik or Crunchberries). I also have a thing for that fake banana flavor. Yums nummers. ---
**Author:** ![Renee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/renee/32/287_2.png) [@Renee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Renee)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/18 "2010-08-17T15:25:40Z")
I don’t eat any artificial “foods.” Bleh. ---
**Author:** ![norinew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb9ed0/32.png) [@norinew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/norinew)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/19 "2010-08-17T15:26:28Z")
> [@Binarydrone](#): > > Are we just talking about pancake stuff or can I add something? Because I _love_ artificial strawberry flavor (like you find in Quik or Crunchberries). I also have a thing for that fake banana flavor. Yums nummers. Nope, we’re talking about real vs artificial _anything_. I like artificial strawberry flavor, too, as well as real strawberries. I also like artificial cherry flavor, and real cherries. To me, the artificial flavors of these things are stand-alone issues. They taste _nothing_ like the fruit they are supposed to emulate, yet they have their own loveliness. Artificial banana flavor is good if it’s a banana-flavored Runts candy, but lately our local 7-11 has been selling banana-flavored Slurpees, and they are an abomination. I do not, however, like artificial watermelon flavor, though I do like real watermelon. ---
**Author:** ![Peremensoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2010, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509/20 "2010-08-17T15:44:31Z")
All real all the time. Or go without. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/real-vs-artificial-preferences/550509.md?page=2)