When the package says “add half a teaspoon of butter” or whatever, it’s just straight up lying to you. There is literally ZERO perceivable difference between instant rice made with only water, and instant rice made with water plus a little butter. I’ve tested this myself. If you think the half-teaspoon of butter does some kind of fancy chemistry thing that’s necessary for the instant rice to do its thing… No. The butter literally doesn’t do anything. Absolutely nothing. Zilch. The package literally just tells you to add butter because market analytics show that if the package tells you the truth — that you really only need to add water — people will be biased to think it’s a “worse product”. So the butter is literally a placebo! Just a placebo, nothing more! And the same also goes for an enormous amount of instant foods that tell you to just add water plus, very conveniently, exactly one Extra Ingredient™!
How fucking many cows had their boobs fondled all because instant food companies noticed a slight increase in sales if they lied on their packaging? Hell, even for those who used margarine, how much margarine did you end up wasting on a literal placebo? How many teaspoons did you have to wash for no reason?
What the fuck
of course it’s not “why”. same reason they don’t package water with your instant rice: it’s a cost savings strategy first. what we are discussing is how this strategy is turned into a value-add through marketing.
literally a discussed phenomenon: https://www.leidenpsychologyblog.nl/articles/the-ikea-effect-the-feel-good-factor-of-self-assembly
