today i went out to a taco restaurant and ordered the strangest item i've seen on their menu

chicken tendies breaded in hot cheeto dust, hot cheeto aioli, macaroni and cheese, and fruity pebbles

rated 6/10

the macaroni would've been much better and slop-pilled if kraft rather than their queso fresco. the fruity pebbles were good.

ended up not eating the other taco because this was a behemoth

!goyslopenjoyers

Fried Spam (Great Value luncheon meat) with egg on rice w/corn, feat. sriracha & mayo, drizzled w/soy sauce and wrapped in nori

I have a confession to make. I watch cooking youtubers. I'm sorry, I understand if you block me after having admitted that. I made the thing from this video:

I like Sam the Cooking Guy. He's funny. He posts almost every day because he's a sperg (also because I believe he's the #1 cooking youtube guy right now). You have to take his reactions with a grain of salt. He will make a salisbury steak or something and act like he's jizzing in his pants on camera because it's so good. It probably isn't really that good. This recipe is pretty good, though.

I did everything as described in his recipe link, except for two things. I followed the directions for my rice cooker instead of whatever he said, and I omitted his sauce, because it seemed unnecessary. There were already green onions, garlic, and ginger in the rice. I didn't see a good reason to put a sauce made out of mostly just those same 3 ingredients on top. I just squirted this (awesome) crap all over it instead:

This was a good recipe. It was extremely low effort, and it was very good. I barely spent any time in the kitchen at all. Highly recommended.

PS: sorry about the weird blur, I guess Samsung was feeling artsy today.

The review is a bit weird for modern standards, it never tells the readers if pizza is tasty.

thanks queen for inspiring me to go to the store and buy chef inspired pork to make a gourmet bardfinn sandwich

going to cut the rest of the quality pork filets up and throw them in some fried rice tomorrow with some spicy cabbage

does anybody have any soggy green beans btw

I'm going to put as much effort into this rereview as they put into their menu revitalization, which is to say not much.

They didn't actually fix or solve anything of substance. All they did was remove mustard from all menu items, add cheese to a couple sandwiches, and call it a day. I'm serious, they did jack shit. I only went here with other people, and they like mustard so they don't want to go back. By extension I'm not going back to Panera either. Good riddance.

Also: https://www.reuters.com/business/panera-loosens-animal-welfare-ingredients-standards-ahead-ipo-internal-documents-2024-03-06/

Lmao that was about the only thing they had going for them... I'll stick with Subway if I want low quality sandwiches.

Takoyaki

Tastes amazing. Just love going down my local Chinese owned, Korean employee sushi joint and getting some takoyaki skewers.

!grillers

Stumbled across a thread full of upset kitchen workers sharing experiences working with a well known chef with many series and specials on Netflix - David Chang.

He recently popped up in news over attempting to trademark his version of a commonly used condiment (chili crisp - the most well known brand is Lao Gan Ma) as “Chili Crunch” and has been aggressively litigating against anyone attempting to use that name for their version of the condiment as well.

Here is the thread of various opinions on that particular incident

That thread does have a few references and an article about his dramamaxxing and love for punching holes in walls

Some fun excerpts of the perfect scary asian husband from the article:

“The slightest error or show of carelessness from a cook could turn me into a convulsing, raging mass”

Dave's rage for cooking what was deemed a subpar family meal: “I will scalp you,” Dave screamed. “I will murder your fricking family!”

“It didn't matter to me what your personal needs were. Any needs were indicative of frailty and I was of the mind that there was no place for weakness in our company.”

Various Chang seethe threads:

I knew David Chang was an butthole, but this is ridiculous…

David Chang buying the company that sued him for using their trademark, then proceeding to sue small businesses. Frick this guy.

PBS on David Chang's ‘Chili Crunch'

A review of David Chang's memoir by a former sommelier who suffered his abuse during his early Momofuku days

Young . Big Ego . Narcissist. Well you need to work with the shit heads before you appreciate the nice bosses you meet further down the road . Character building ! . Why you guys get so worked up anyways ? He's just a tv chef. Commercial money . Strip away all the glitz and glamour and social media tv validation . Not much of a chef there . Agreed ? Be happy for him he's succeeding at something . Somewhat like a Jamie Oliver . Not too much of a skilful chef but plenty of success . He found his niche .

David, it's time to put the internet down for the night.

Nobody liked him at work, everyone actively tried to stay out of his warpath. His whole m.o. was to “catch” any minor mistake in the name of quality assurance and then proceed to throw a level 10 tantrum. Swearing, death threats, throwing shit, kicking/denting anything in sight, it was a common occurrence. His style is 100% combative, he would never pull you aside to teach/train one on one. It was always a public humiliation, simply put he enjoyed being the victimizer/chief overlord.

Honest question, did no-one at any point just punch the fricking guy's lights out? Back in the day I worked with some genuinely scary, ex-con types who would have zero issues with fricking up an Asian Napoleon with a sautee pan.

I'd just wait for or even bait him to throw something my way so I can claim self defense and beat the ever loving shit outta him. Frick it if I'm gonna be blackballed anyway might as well be the dude who broke some ribs.

CHANG BANG'D

I worked 4 months as a dishwasher and it convinced me to never work professionally as a cook. It was so fricking toxic and I, at 16, was treated so horribly I had to blackmail my way into quitting

As someone with Korean heritage and the Asian flush gene I've been wondering - was he also half drunk all the time? Every time I happen to see a second of his cooking show he's always red. (I never watch that crap deliberately it's like stumbling on someone's home security feed)

I saw so much racism, bigotry, and homophobia from him. We would call it Chang Banging when he'd scream at someone. He would belittle the CDC in front of the cooks completely undermining their authority

I timidly ask, “hey chef can I get a picture with you?”

He stands in the dining room and shouts into the kitchen space, “who are you?” (He knew who I was as we had interacted multiple times and call me by my name)

I tell him I'm an intern. “No, why are you here?” “To learn under you.” I respond.

He asks about how long i have before i leave, and i tell him. To my surprise, he actually then offers me a job right then and there. He talks about the grandeur of taking me under his wing and will teach me everything he knows. Only catch is, I will not go back to school. I have to break up with my girlfriend (now my wife) and work for him. As temping as it was, I fumbled my words spitting out, “I have to talk about this to my girlfriend”.

3 management level chefs stood by me as this conversation continues. David points to each of the chefs and asks them if they have girlfriends. They all basically say no because they have no time for relationships. “If these frickers are willing to sacrifice their relationships to achieve this level of cooking, you should too if you will ever amount to anything.”

He loudly shouts for someone to get a timer and then says that I have 5 minutes to decide. I run downstairs and run into my chef. Explain the situation as fast as I could as I'm freaking out. Once in a life time opportunity but also the terrible feeling of leaving behind my girlfriend , friends, and potentially letting my family down by not finishing out a full ride scholarship.

I ultimately decided that I will not take his offer. Before I finish thanking him for the opportunity, he yells at me and tells me “good fricking luck. I can't wait to see you on an employee of the month placard in a motel 6 in bumfrick Wisconsin. And no, you don't work for me anymore, so you will not get a fricking picture.”

He left an oven door open without calling "oven" and one of our line cooks walked into it when trying to get out of his way and got a serious burn on their leg from the over door. Chang laughed at them and told them to "get over it."

He sounds dreamy.

As a bonus, here's one of my favorite of his recipes for mul kimchi.

• 1 head napa cabbage, roughly chopped into 2 inch pieces

• 1 tbsp salt

• 2 scallions with bulbs trimmed & halved lengthwise

• 1 thinly sliced carrot

• 2 large red Fresno chiles, seeded and thinly sliced

• 1 tbsp rice vinegar

• 1 1/2 cups 7UP soda

• 1 bunch of watercress, leaves only

Toss together cabbage and salt in a large bowl, and squeeze to slightly soften leaves. Place a small plate, weighted with a heavy can on top, directly on cabbage to release liquid. Let stand at room temperature 1 hour.

Drain and discard cabbage liquid. Add scallions, carrot, chiles, and vinegar to cabbage; toss to combine. Pour soda over vegetables, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate overnight. Mix watercress into kimchi just before serving.

The banana slices are on a layer below the top layer

!goyslopenjoyers

I just ran into these today. My mom always insisted i do not get them, even though by the time i raised my courage to ask for some, i have already eaten moist dog food, thinking maybe i just didnt try the right one. Because it was heckin nasty

The offending post: Little country boy trying his hand. How'd I do with spaghetti and meatballs?:

Frick that fake tilt shift, who thinks it looks good? 75% of the picture is blurred. I also hate the title, but that's not why we're here.

The top comment:

Good but not Italian, we don't put meatballs on spaghetti, that's american [+81]

So you're telling me that in the entire history of the nation of Italy, no one has ever put a meatball on top of spaghetti? [+4]

We first eat pasta, then as the second plate we eat meatballs [+1]#

That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. So basically if you have two Italian foods and you eat them separately, it's Italian. But if you put them on the same plate it's not Italian. Like I said, dumbest thing I've ever heard. [+1]

Well my nonna used to make spaghetti and meatballs ...

Death to all nonna-posters

you can do whatever you want with your food, but it's not Italian. [-1]

The gatekeeping in this sub is off the charts. [+1]

Enter /r/iamveryculinary

Did somebody say "gatekeeping" in a food subreddit? /r/iamveryculinary's monitoring dashboard lights up like a Christmas Tree and it gets reposted there: Someone posted meatballs in the Italian sub. The whole thread is bickering and probably unseen gesturing.

As always the comments are full of hilarity, these really are witty redditors:

If an Italian makes a ball out of meat, they die instantly.

No, the spontaneous combustion only happens when the meatballs touch pasta.

Hot take: if we subtract all the dishes that get eliminated by that sub as "not Italian," Italian cuisine would not be voted the most popular cuisine in the world any more

Where would Italian cuisine be without hot pockets and the Little Caesars lunchtime special?

My hot take is that I don't think Italians do themselves any favors by hyping up Authentic Italian Cuisine(tm) so much. I've been to Italy and I was actually mildly disappointed by the food there at first, I think because it was so ridiculously hyped up in my head.

I'd love to see this Redditor's holiday pictures

Wait until you see all the mean comments I get for my perfectly dark and precisely reproducible roux for gumbo. The Cajuns go beserk when I say I made it in the microwave instead of wasting 30 minutes stirring it on the stove like their memaw, lol. This is, of course, after they've tasted it and liked it.

This post is sponsored by this week's anti-gatekeeping campaigner @Not_a_R-slur. I'd like to thank @Lappland for his weeks of dutiful service and I wish him a happy retirement.

With pork he also hides it

Just like cast iron, redditors are way too precious about this stuff.

!goyslopenjoyers !sodadrinkers