Talk:Pizza cheese

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Pizza cheese/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Ritchie333 (talk · contribs) 15:52, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

How could I forget this? Seriously, Pizza cheese is a bit of an in-joke between me and Mrs 333 when we go shopping now eg: "ooh look, pizza cheese in aisle 3!" so I can't resist doing the review. I'll read through the article now and see what comments I have.

My initial concern is that the article, at 1146 words, is quite short, which strikes me as not meeting the "broad in coverage" criteria. Obviously a GA shouldn't be longer than necessary but I tend to find that articles less than about 10K of prose don't stand up to scrutiny.

• I am in the process of expanding the article. It is presently at 9399 B and rising. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 00:18, 13 February 2016 (UTC)

Lead

• "mozzarella-like processed cheeses and Mozzarella variants." - do we need Mozzarella twice? I appreciate "x-like" and "x" can be quite different things, but I'm wondering if there's a nicer way of writing this?

• It seems best to leave it as worded, because some pizza cheeses are designed to resemble and have properties of Mozzarella, but are not Mozarella, while others are variants based upon formulations for Mozzarella. In other words, they're two different types of general product classifications. Regarding the latter, additional information is in the article, "Some pizza cheeses derived from skim mozzarella variants were designed not to require aging or the use of starter". North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 21:46, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

• "Estimates have placed 30% of all pizza cheese used in the United States is mozzarella cheese" - what about other countries? Is Pizza cheese popular in Italy, China, Japan or India? I'd be surprised if it wasn't, and I think these facts ought to be long in the article.

• At the time the article was being developed, it was written based upon sources that are available. Sources about pizza cheese consumption in all countries of the world may not be available. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 21:51, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

• "Processed pizza cheese is manufactured to produce preferable qualities...." - not sure about "preferable qualities" - how about "Processed pizza cheese provides a better...."?

• I have rewritten this content, changing the word "preferable" to "optimal" (diff). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 21:52, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

• "Many studies and experiments have analyzed the impact" - rather than saying "Many studies", it would be better to link a few specific ones

•  Done This has been performed in the lead of the article. It has been rewritten to "Several studies and experiments have analyzed..." and more journal sources have been added to verify. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 22:05, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

• "In 1997 it was estimated that annual production of pizza cheese was 2 billion pounds in the United States and 200 million pounds in Europe, and in 2000 demand for pizza cheese in Europe was increasing by 8% per year." - these figures are rather out of date, have we got anything for demand in the 2010s? Given MacDonalds menu has done a significant volte face in the last 15 years, providing salads and (at least superficially) healthier options, I dare say demand may have changed to reflect this.

• Source searches (e.g. [1]) are not readily providing a great deal of more recent information. However, I was able to find a source stating that increases in pizza cheese production and consumption "has continued into the first decade of the 21st century" (source). This has been added to the article (diff). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 22:30, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

More comments to follow. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 15:52, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

Varieties and types

• "Most pizza cheeses are" - shouldn't this be "Most pizza cheese is", or maybe "Most varieties of pizza cheese are"?

• I believe this has been addressed while I copy edited the article. The phrase is no longer in the article as worded above. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 04:57, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

• "with different moisture and fat densities" - do you really need three citations for this, also the middle one of the three doesn't appear to be directly anything about pizza cheese

• I removed one of the citations. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 04:55, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

• "Provolone is the second most popular pizza cheese, and is sometimes mixed with Mozzarella" - this information in the second paragraph has already been mentioned in a different way in this first one

• Rewrote to read as "Provolone is the second most popular one." (diff). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 06:00, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

• "A diverse variety of processed cheese and analogue pizza cheeses are produced." - I don't understand what this sentence means

• Rewrote to: "A diverse variety of processed pizza cheeses are produced, including analogue cheese." (Analogue cheese is a type of processed cheese.) North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 20:11, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

• "a combination of Mozzarella and Cheddar may blister less when cooked compared to other combinations" - it would be worth mentioning (as the source does) that is is due to the small elasticity

• Added to the sentence: "because cheddar has less elasticity". North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 20:54, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

• "many mass-produced pizzas in North America, the United Kingdom[20] and elsewhere." - where specifically?

• I am presently unable to access the source where this was verified at the time it was written, so I have removed the phrase "and elsewhere." (diff). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 05:01, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

• Do you really need five citations to cite analogue / analog pizza cheese?

• The number of citations for this sentence has been reduced to two (diff). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 05:56, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

• "It has been stated that analogue pizza cheese appears to be the leading type of cheese analogue produced globally" - rather than a vague claim, I think this would be better as a specific opinion - who exactly thinks analogue pizza cheese is the production leader?

• Rewrote the sentence to: "In the book Technology of Cheesemaking, editors Law and Tamimethat state that analogue pizza cheese appears to be the leading type of cheese analogue produced globally." North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 20:17, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

• "They may lack in a fusion, or melting together of the shredded product when cooked" - I don't understand what this means

• Added "in which the cheese gels together" to the sentence. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 19:30, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

• "Rennet casein-based Mozzarella-like imitation processed cheeses" - this is a very wordy and roundabout way of saying what appears to be "fake Mozzarella", can we think of a better way of saying this?

• I have copy edited this, but the sentence in part expounds upon the previous sentence regarding analogue pizza cheeses prepared with casein, including information about how rennet is used in some. Changing it in the above manner would not really state anything, because it would not expound. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 20:08, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

• "causes the proteins in the mix to gelatinize" - I wonder if a link to Gelatin#Uses would be helpful

• No, because the process is not related to the food product gelatin. See the definition of "gelatinize": "to make or become gelatinous" (example source: [2]) and "gelatinous", "Having a jellylike consistency" (source). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 19:34, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

More in a mo Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 16:43, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

Research and development

• "Several patents exist for specialized varieties of it and for its processing" - what is it in this context?

• Rewrote to "Several patents exist for specialized varieties of pizza cheese and for its processing." (diff). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 00:19, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

• "A study by Rudan and Barbano" - who are Rudan and Barbano? Similarly, who is "Perry (et al.)"? I'm a little concerned the information is sourced from a single report of tests against cheese and then presented as hard facts - I'd rather see if there is another source available regarding vegetable oil experiments, or failing that, attribute it specifically to this book. This is particularly important for scientific claims, which are a special part of the GA criteria.
• What is "vetch-bovine" milk?

• Added more content to the article to provide clarification (example diff). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 01:14, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

• Galactose could be linked and described (it is linked later in this section), as could Trisodium citrate

•  Done (diff, diff). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 01:18, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

• "but that the improvements were very slight and not economical" - I'm sure there's a better way of writing this, maybe "but results did not show any worthwhile improvement"

• In this instance I have rewritten the sentence to slightly expound; it now states, "Research published in Dairy Industries International suggested that denatured whey proteins increased moisture retention, but that the improvements were very slight and not economically worthwhile relative to the minor improvements." (diff). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 11:00, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

• I would link fermentation starter in full, so people understand exactly what the context is

•  Done (diff). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 01:23, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

Production and development

• "the production and consumption of pizza cheese in the United states steadily increased in the mid 1900s" - the source doesn't seem to match this claim. Are you absolutely sure that pizza cheese was established in the US in 1909 - this is decades before modern fast food as we know it today.

• The source states (underline emphasis mine), "production and per-capita consumption of mozzarella and pizza cheese climbed steadily during the second half of the twentieth century and through the first decade of the twenty first century, reaching new records year after year." Is your "1909 reference above a typo? The article makes no mention of this year. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 10:52, 17 February 2016 (UTC)
• I added "and Mozzarella" to sentences in the article (e.g. diff). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 10:55, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

• I think the confusion here is the phrase "mid 1900s", which I interpret as being the years 1900-1909 and nothing more. Do you mean "mid-20th century" ie: c. 1945-1955, which I find a much more believable timeframe for pizza cheese taking off? Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:23, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

• Y Rewritten in article to "mid-20th century" (diff). North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 11:30, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

• "that annual production of the product was 1 million tons" - be careful, the source says "tonne", meaning the metric tonne, not "ton", which may mean a number of things depending on whereabouts in the world you are. I would re-check all the weight / measure figures you've listed here carefully; use the {{convert}} template if you can, as it gets calculations right. I can help in this area if you get stuck.

• Thanks for finding this. The {{Convert}} template does not appear to convert tonnes to pounds, so I manually performed the calculations using 2,204.6 pounds per one tonne, per the conversion in the tonne article. I used the convert template to convert tonnes to tons, and after this then substituted the convert template to manually include pounds within the parentheses in the article. Diffs: [3], [4], [5], [6]. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 11:17, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

Use by region

• This section is too biased towards the US. Can you find examples in Europe in particular?

• The section has been expanded. Sources regarding this subtopic are not copious, but I was able to find some to expand the section. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 11:48, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

More later tonight, hopefully. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 17:27, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

Okay, I've gone through the article now and addressed everything I can find, making copyedits where necessary. I'll have a read through your responses in depth and we should hopefully be in a state to pass the review once they are all addressed. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:22, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

Right, I've had a look through and I think this can now pass the review and be listed. Sorry about the wait! Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 18:49, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

The phrase "Pizza cheese"

Overused in this article. Boring. Bad writing. Redundant and repetitive (this edit brought to you by the Department of Redundancy and Repetition). We need to use synonyms and pronouns more. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 16:51, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

• I have copy edited the article to reduce use of the phrase in it. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 04:54, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

 Fixed 7&6=thirteen (☎) 11:28, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

I took out a few myself as part of the GA review but it seems more was needed. Thanks all. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:43, 17 February 2016 (UTC)