Don't try this at home! was: RE: Which do you prefer and why?

[Emily Berk <emily -at- armadillosoft -dot- com>]

Guys:

By simultaneously

1.  Substituting the names of food products I knew nothing about into the place of technical terms I actually do understand and 
2.  Throwing an extra, stray colon 

into the sentence I presented for your consideration, I immediately ran afoul of both:

1.  The highly-professional techwr-l Food Police and 
2.  techwr-l's ever-alert Punctuation/Grammar Police.

Report of the Food Police:
=========================
An anonymous tip from one of the cooks in our group, who obviously knows a lot more than I do about food products:
 
>There is no such thing as "pure, unprocessed, brown sugar".  Brown sugar 
>is, in fact, processed white granulated sugar that has been mixed with 
>molasses and/or syrup.  can't help it.  it's the pastry chef in me. ...

Report of the Punctuation/Grammar Police, in the person of Chris Thiessen, 
but thanks to the many others who concurred:
==================================================================
>Both are incorrect usages of the colon and commas, and the double dash
>(?em dash) can be replaced with a parenthetical phrase. How about:

>  Add only pure, unprocessed brown sugar (not white sugar or molasses) to
>  your confections.

>For emphasis, I would juxtapose the things you don't want to use with
>what you do  want to use, as well as anticipating and answering the "gee, I 
>have white sugar,  won't that work?" question. I'd also eliminate the comma 
>just after unprocessed:  the noun string is sufficiently clear for folks to 
>understand (especially since you've got the phrase "white sugar" occurring 
>immediately for clarification).

I went with (and please note deliberate change of ingredient order, for the pastry-savvy among us):

    Add only pure, white cane sugar (not brown sugar or molasses) 
    to your most ambitious confections.

Thanks all!

--Emily

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~                            Emily Berk                                 ~
On the web at www.armadillosoft.com *** Armadillo Associates, Inc.      ~ 
~             Project management, developer relations and               ~
extremely-technical technical documentation that developers find useful.~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


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