Talk:Blancmange

Blancmange function

Blancmange is also the name of a specific mathematical function.

The Blancmange function, also called the Takagi fractal curve, is a pathological continuous function which is nowhere differentiable. The iterations towards the continuous function are batrachions resembling the Hofstadter-Conway 10,000-Dollar Sequence.

See: http://mathworld.wolfram.com/BlancmangeFunction.html

Kees Brantjes. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.41.168.18 (talk) 22:59, 1 June 2005 (UTC)

the disambiguation page deals with this. -- Akb4 02:29, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Updates (Monty Python title and others)

I did the following:

- Changed the title of the Monty Python section to the Wikpedia standard "xxx in popular culture". This properly refocuses the article to what the title "Blancmange" says.

- Added a reference to the "Manjar Blanco" article. In Spain this is Blancmange but in Latin America it is something different.

- Added categories for various European cuisines.

--Mcorazao 19:19, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

"properly refocuses the..." nah, too linear and boring, not to mention overcat of a single popcult case. Legendary TV stars, and their fans, deserve a headline. Milo 06:24, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

? Well, reverting a change without discussion actually violates Wikipedia policy. In any event how "boring" this is is not really the point. Wikipedia is not a fan site and this article is not about Monty Python (or if that was the intent then it was mistitled). I'll simply cite the section for inappropriate tone and request that you or somebody else reconsider how this is written. --Mcorazao 04:58, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

"reverting a change without discussion actually violates Wikipedia policy." Incorrect in a non-controversial context. Single reverts are routine. It's double and triple reverts that are to be avoided by taking disputes to the talk page. • If you want respect as a newbie encyclopedia editor you need to do prior research to avoid making baldly incorrect statements, or at least phrase your concern as a question. • To the point, a recurring Monty Python theme was lampooning the kind of petty ruleslawyering that you have invoked. Arts and entertainment pages (page section in this case) have looser Wikiguides than for other articles — more slack. My advice to you is to avoid editing them. Your strict style is better suited to history and science. I can also edit strictly — it's a matter of switching context. Milo 23:00, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

I guess I struck a nerve. It seems to me you're stretching the intent of the guidelines but it's not worth arguing over for such a trivial subject. --Mcorazao 03:04, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

User:Akb4's comment refactored to new section "Move "Blancmanges in Monty Python's TV Humor"?"

Back to editing, 207.228.157.18 added a second popular culture reference (by author Louisa May Alcott), so I've restored the "Blancmanges in popular culture" subhead. Then I outline demoted the "Blancmanges in Monty Python's TV Humor" to a sub-subhead under popular culture, which still meets my concern that Monty Python have a headline visible in the contents box. Milo 05:24, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Move "Blancmanges in Monty Python's TV Humor"?

My feeling is that an article dealing with a popular food that has crossed continents and been modified over at least 600 years should probably not have half its content devoted to a money python episode. even though that episode totally rocks. Since at this point I think there's an article for every episode of south park, there should certainly be an article for every monty python episode, and this article should just have a one or two sentence bit pointing to that. -- Akb4 02:29, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, for different reasons, I too am ready to move it. It will be damaged beyond recognition if it's left here. • By sorting it reasonably belongs here; every paragraph of the Monthy Python portion of the article mentions blancmanges. Also, here was the first place to which I and other readers have navigated when we read that strange word on the TV screen. • The real problem is that Monthy Python intends to irritate people, and at least two food editors have, in my opinion, attacked the section because they don't like being irritated when they are are reading about food, or are irritated by the intentional disorder of that art. (They will probably deny that, so it will just have remain my art juror opinion.) • However, a move to an episode article doesn't work well because this half episode is one of the very few linear stories in any Monty Python episode. If one puts it in an episode guide it would get lost under unrelated nonlinear material in the first part of the episode. • I think it should be moved to it's own article "Blancmange (Monty Python TV)", and a disambig pointer should be placed as usual at the top saying "For the TV episode, see Blancmange (Monty Python TV)". Milo 07:15, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I moved it to Blancmange (Monty Python TV), refitted a brief description into the section "Blancmanges in popular culture", moved the main page to Blancmange (food), and added the new titles to Blancmange (disambiguation), but the line at the top seems more appropriate as "This is the main topic. For other uses, see Blancmange (disambiguation)."

Blancmange is currently an auto-redirect page to Blancmange (food). Blancmange ought to redirect to Blancmange (disambiguation), but that means changing links on many pages to Blancmange (food). Maybe someone else will do that, or not. A low-Python happy new year to the blancmange food editors. Milo 04:08, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

The whitedish

I just created the article whitedish, about the origins of the blancmange and manjar blanco. I've read a lot about the whitedish in works on medieval cuisine, but I have yet to come across some of the information contained in this article. I tried to verify some of historical information, like the mehallabiyyah, but couldn't find it in the sources assigned. Do we have any confirmation on this connection?

Also, I think it would be more accurate to consider the blancmange, the manjar blanco and the medeival-early modern whitedish as separate dishes. Do keep in mind that sugar was used in the early versions with chicken (or fish), and was not something that appeared when it turned into a dessert pudding. Mixing the sweet and savory in the same dishes was extremely common up until sometime in the late 17th century.

Peter ^Isotalo 23:40, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

My opinion:

• "Whitedish" is not a commonly used term (you won't find it in most (any?) dictionaries whereas you will find "blancmange". Perhaps Whitedish should be considered a case of "jargon" used by historians that differs from standard terminology?
• I find the medieval dish more commonly referred to as blancmange.
• If there are going to be two articles for the medieval and modern European dishes I would recommend "Blancmange" and "Blancmange (medieval)" to stick with more common usage (obviously "whitedish" would hash to the medieval article).
• I question whether two articles are needed. Granted the medieval dish is different from the modern dish but ultimately I don't think there is enough content to justify more than one article.
• Regarding the Manjar blanco article, in principle this could be merged. The article was originally about the Peruvian desert only and gradually expanded to include the Spanish desert and others with this name (all apparently are historically related). This was kept as a separate article because, although there is not a ton of content, the Latin American side of it was deemed culturally distinct enough to warrant a separate article. This is perhaps a flimsy excuse and I would not be opposed to trying to merge this into the Blancmange article provided that the differences are clearly described. Note, though, that this is awkward since although the Spanish expression for the European dish is "Manjar Blanco", nobody refers to the Latin American dishes as "Blancmange" in English.

I've added a merger proposal for blancmange and whitedish since, IMHO, they are close enough to the same subject matter as not to warrant two articles. Feel free to disagree and remove the proposal if there is a general consensus to do so.

Regarding the Arab connection I couldn't say. I did not write that content. I had seen other articles that mentioned this connection although they were not authoritative. Turkish Tavuk Gogsu and medieval Blancmange are very similar dishes which it would be hard to believe are not somehow related and the similarity of modern mehallabiyyah (other than the missing capon) makes it a plausible vehicle for transmission. But without documentation that is all speculation. Whoever wrote the original text needs to supply that info.

--Mcorazao 15:11, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree with the merge proposal as long as the difference is maintained between the medieval dish and the modern dish. Although I have not done any real research into the dish, they seem to be similar enough to warrant being part of the same article with a re-direct from white dish to Blancmange.Christopher Tanner, CCC 15:19, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

"Blancmange" is not used as a term for the original white dish in any literature on medieval cuisine that I've read. The authors aren't entirely consistent, but I've only really seen "blanc mangier" or "whitedish/white dish". Whenever they refer to the modern jelly-ish dessert, they call it by it's current name. If there are to be two articles, having a "blancmange (medieval)" would be like moving sop to "soup (medieval)".

The reason why I think whitedish is an appropriate term is because it feels somewhat arbitrary to call it, say, "blanc mangier", since the term varied from one language to another. While it might be tempting to say that the Old or Middle English term is the given choice, I can't help feeling that it would be a tad anachronistic.

I'll remain neutral to the merge, but whatever is done, I recommend that it be done fairly quickly, as I've never liked the idea of having merger templates hanging around for long. There's no problem in splitting the articles if consensus changes.

Peter ^Isotalo 17:57, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps you've done more reading on this than I have. The articles I've seen, though, never mention the term "white dish". If you say that "whitedish" is really a widely used term then I'll accept your expertise.

I'll state one philosophical bias on my part. I see various cases in articles where nomenclature is chosen that deliberately distinguishes separate but related things. Although that can be beneficial it often adds as much confusion as it saves (consider refering to the modern U.S. as "the United States" and the early U.S. as "the Nation of Renegade Colonies"; although the modern U.S. is substantially different from the early nation, such a nomenclature is more confusing than helpful).

Anyway, any other opinions on this out there?

--Mcorazao 18:36, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't want to give the impression that I know for certain that "whitedish/white dish" is the most common term (technically, "blanc mangier" would probably score higher), but I chose it because it felt like a better compromise.

Peter ^Isotalo 06:11, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

OK, I've taken a stab at a merge. Feel free to modify at will ...

--Mcorazao 06:40, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Why did you remove almost all wikilinkage and replace the reference to Regional Cuisines with a fact tag?

Peter ^Isotalo 07:25, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Sorry about that. How does it look now?

--Mcorazao 15:18, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Etymology

Just curious if anybody has more info on this. The dictionaries and articles I have seen all say the English term originated in French (and, of course, they give the origins of the separate words "blanc" and "mangier" which is not really relevant). I'm curious, though, if the term truly originates with French. Supposedly the dish came to Western Europe through Spain and Sicily and, presumably, before the dish got to France they must have called it something. In Spanish "blanco", of course, is a word in modern Spanish and "manjar", although currently mostly just used in the expression "manjar blanco" today, was probably a more widely used word in the past. I don't know Italian/Silician so I can't speak to that influence. But the point is the it seems entirely likely that the term came from one of these languages to French and not the other way around. It may in turn have been a translation of some Arabic term if anybody has info on that.

This doesn't actually matter much but my curiosity is piqued. --Mcorazao 03:52, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

There's no indication as to which region came up with the idea first, but the first attestation is as far as I know in French. I've read more on the issue of Arab origins, and it seems as if there is no evidence that this dish actually existed in Arab cooking around the Middle Ages. Rice and almonds are Arab influences fer sure, but that doesn't mean the dish as a whole is. I'll add more detailed info on this later.

Peter ^Isotalo 22:54, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Popular Culture

Just a note to say that I think I agree with the person who deleted the 'popular culture' section from this article. Wikipedia:Avoid_trivia_sections_in_articles says that trivia sections are a bad idea; in this case I think all the information in it is 'tangential or irrelevant' to the article. So it's not just anonymous vandalism. pm215 09:09, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. This article doesn't need an unencyclopedic laundry list. Keeping it just to explain how Americans might have heard of blancmange is Americocentrism. Percy Snoodle 09:13, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree with both comments. I'd like to ask, what is so signficant about the fact that most Americans have not heard of it? One could argue the same thing about probably the majority of the articles in Wikipedia. An article does not have to argue why some particular group should care. --Mcorazao 22:36, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Trivia guidelines aside, it seems as if the stance taken against just about any fictional references is a tad unforgiving. I don't want bulleted lists of appearances in random fiction, but I would be very interested in seeing a summary of any trends about how blancmanges are portrayed. Considering how obscure the medieval origins are to most people, it doesn't seem all that constructive to throw just about everything that has to do with pop culture out of the article.

Peter ^Isotalo 22:58, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

If there's scholarly work on portrayal of blancmanges in fiction, it would be entirely appropriate to summarize it here and link to that work as a reference. If not, then a section about that would be original research, which isn't allowed. Percy Snoodle 14:12, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

I can't believe I'm saying this, but cut pop culture some slack here. Everything that isn't attributable to a small minority of scholars is not mere original research. As long as there's no wild speculation we shouldn't just be deleting stuff just because we don't like it. And, again, I'm saying this as someone who actually has actually read a lot on the history of the blancmange. I'd say that the medieval and early modern history of the blancmange is about as important as perception of the dish in the 20th century.

Peter ^Isotalo 14:37, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

I do agree that pop culture does not have to be ruled out. But all discussions, pop culture or not, should be meaningful. A lot of times these "topic in Popular Culture" sections are just random lists thrown in "just for the fun of it." And the justification given here of trying to show Americans why they should care is equally pointless. However if there is a real discussion of how something has influenced popular culture in some significant (not necessarily earth-shattering) way then that is appropriate. The text that was put in there, though, did not qualify. It was just arbitrary trivia.

--Mcorazao 19:26, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Since most Americans came to know the word blancmange from the Monty Python skit. I think it would be good to mention it. Although not the entire world, America is a major country in the world, so I think it is significant. For Americans who do know the word, the first thing they think of is the Python skit. --Westwind273 (talk) 05:19, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

If you can find a source that mentions the significance of the Monty Python skit for the notability of the dish, then please add it. Can't just assume that it's notable because of that, though.

Peter ^Isotalo 08:18, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

I see this section has returned. Some fractal and a bit of rock somewhere are 'popular culture'? Seriously? Ewx (talk) 08:55, 13 November 2015 (UTC)

Explain rewrites?

Peter, can you explain your rewrites? Although certainly the article was in need of some work, the way you have rewritten it seems to me less clear. You've moved a lot of text into the introduction which makes the whole introduction less readable, and removed a section. I would say that the intro should just stick to a quick discussion of what the desert is (i.e. from the perspective of somebody eating/looking at it) and leave other details to be discussed in the sesequent sections. The previously existing section discussing the modern desert -- I thought -- needed to be expanded going into a little more detail regarding the preparation and modern variations.

Can you elaborate as to your thinking?

Thanks.

--Mcorazao 16:13, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

I've moved about two sentences into the lead and it is now about four sentences in total. One sentence of that is about the medieval origins of the dish. That's hardly excessive considering that my original contribution, whitedish, was merged with this article.

My general impression of the blancmange is that the wobbly white-gray-pink dessert version has had a much lesser impact on culinary history than the original "white dish". My interest in this topic comes from being interested in primarily medieval and to some extent early modern cuisine, and I've made my additions based on my research on the cuisine of these periods. I'm sure there's a need for more info on the modern form of the dish, but considering there wasn't much info on that to begin with (and even fewer sources), I don't feel that I have to limit my contributions. Why not fill in the gaps yourself...?

Peter ^Isotalo 17:38, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

French

The origins of the word are without question French, but is the word actually used in contemporary French? If not, the French pronunciation seems a bit superfluous.

Peter ^Isotalo 11:29, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

Even if it is used in modern French, it's probably not a sensible thing to mention on the English-language wikipedia page. Percy Snoodle 11:55, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

History

Our history section says:

it is believed that it was a result of the Arab introduction of rice and almonds in early medieval Europe. However, there is no evidence of the existence of any similar Arab dishes from that period

However, the Arabs didn't introduce rice into Europe; it was known since ancient Greek times, and was very familiar to the ancient Romans. Also, while there may have been no similar Arabic dish, the Turkish dish tavuk göğsü is identical to the early, meat containing version. But -- the Turks believe they got this dish from the Romans! In short it sounds distinctly unlikely that it was introduced by the Arabs, and the vague "it is believed" should be supported by a cite or removed. I would also like to see a cite that blanc desirree is Anglo-Norman (i.e., archaic French) for "white Syrian dish". "Desirree" happens to be almost identical to the modern French for "desired", so it looks a lot more like "desirable white." -- Securiger (talk) 11:00, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Did you by any chance check out the source called Sorting Through the Titles of Medieval Dishes: What Is, or Is Not, a "Blanc Manger" by Hieatt?

Peter ^Isotalo 07:34, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Other flavours

This article in the Telegraph mentions other flavours - chocolate, strawberry and raspberry too - so to say it is almond or vanilla is a bit inaccurate. See here too for a packet of it. The latter is priced in dollars, so I don't think this can be just a UK thing. Malick78 (talk) 14:04, 18 September 2008 (UTC) Lemon flaour.--86.29.249.180 (talk) 07:38, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Infobox

I reverted the infobox because it really just duplicated the lead without much benefit. It also over-simplifies certain facts, like the origins and the supposed "variants".

Peter ^Isotalo 07:28, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Malabi?

I've never heard of a blancmange referred to as "malabi", nor that it's part of Spanish or Sephardi cuisine. Is there confirmation of this?

Peter ^Isotalo 07:36, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

In Hebrew it's known as malabi. It's very common in Sephardi cuisine in Israel and other places. --PiMaster3 ^talk 20:44, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

So is it a synonym or a variant? Manjar blanco, for example, has the same origins and is etymologically identical, but has its own article.

Peter ^Isotalo 04:51, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

It looks like in the pictures shown and contains mostly the same ingredients, but it doesn't contain gelatin. --PiMaster3 ^talk 20:35, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

Should we consider an actual synonym, though? It doesn't seem that it would be relevant to count it as such in the context of English language usage except in some rather specific contexts. Tavuk göğsü is clearly very similar to the medieval form of the blancmange, but it's nevertheless considered a separate dish. Having information about malabi in this article seems to be have merit, though. Maybe it should be in the form of a Sephardic Jewish subsection of the history section. If you have sources, please don't hestitate to post them.

Peter ^Isotalo 13:08, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps it is a contraction of Mahallebi? Sephardic Jews used to live in the Ottoman empire. --kupirijo (talk) 08:33, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

Perhaps, but I noticed that the article was attracting a list of various similar dishes claimed to be "variations", which isn't an accurate description. That dishes are similar doesn't mean they're related. Most of these are worth mentioning, but they should remain "similar dishes" unless someone has sources elaborating about how one affected the other. I removed the list of variations from the infobox altogether for now.

Peter ^Isotalo 08:41, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

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Brit. Eng. Versus Am. Eng.

set in a mold...alternative colours.

Does this article obey British/Commonwealth English or American English spelling rules? Or both?

Nuttyskin (talk) 08:43, 23 October 2019 (UTC)