A writing group in Portland told me my characters all sounded the same

About two years back, I joined a small writing group that met at a library in Portland. I was really proud of a short story I'd written, but after I read it, one of the members, a retired editor named Carol, gave me some hard truth. She said, 'Miles, I can't tell your teenage hacker from your seventy-year-old gardener in their dialogue. They all just sound like you.' That hit me hard. I went home and really looked at my work, and she was totally right. I started doing character voice exercises, writing pages of dialogue for each person before I even began the story, just to hear how they'd talk. It felt silly at first, but it made a huge difference. Now I'm way more careful about giving each character their own words. Has anyone else gotten feedback that made you completely change a basic part of your writing process?

I thought those trunk injection systems for emerald ash borers were just a gimmick until I saw the results on a property in Springfield.

Found out my great aunt's sauerkraut recipe uses a specific weight of salt per head of cabbage

I was going through some old family papers from my mom's house in Cincinnati and found a handwritten note from my great aunt. It was her sauerkraut recipe, which I always thought was just 'shred cabbage and add salt.' The note said to use exactly 1.5 tablespoons of pickling salt for every 5 pounds of cabbage. I'd been just guessing for years, maybe a big pinch per jar. I tried it last weekend with a scale and her exact amounts. The batch is only a week in, but it already looks and smells way more active and even than my old attempts. It made me realize how much of a difference a small, specific measurement can make in fermentation, not just cooking. Has anyone else had a family recipe with a precise ratio that actually worked better than winging it?