Crumbl- where Less is Less

I’m a dessert person, but I’m poor and frugal. So when it comes to desserts, the notion of Value For Money gets a lot of attention. Pricy components and proper attention to detail can, with care, make what looks thoroughly mundane both justifiably expensive and extraordinary. That was the sort of thing I focused on when reviewing the local cookie shop Butter Pecan. Partially because I enjoy portable desserts like cookies, and partially because you can buy just one cookie without blowing your budget. …Most of the time.

A friend made a mention of getting cookies from a place called Crumbl “Just to see what all the fuss is about”. His resultant glowing review led me to look them up, discover their home storefront was in the next town over, tell myself ‘what the hell, it’s for science’ and get in the car.

Over the course of getting there, getting cookies, and getting home my “Sure, what the hell” had turned into “…wait, what the hell?”.

The shop itself is pastel pink, white, and sterile looking. It’s not remotely friendly aside from the smell of buttery fresh-baked sweets- which is cheating anyway. There are people behind the counters, but none of them are looking at you or even anywhere close. Everything from order to payment is done via kiosks, which led to a Big Problem for me. I got bait-and-switched.

The order kiosk has icons for both Large Desserts and Mini Desserts. The image on the Mini Desserts is of a hand holding what is apparently a Large one. I didn’t find that out till later because there was no actual product visible from the customer accessible area. What sort of bakery does *that*? One that’s not expecting professionals with standards, I suppose. I ordered my cookies- a mini cookie 6-pack because that gave me the maximum opportunity to test the flavors. Three bucks apiece, rounded up, before tax and… tip?. The ‘tip’ calculator was, of course, gibberish math. Plus, who tips big at a place that’s 100% takeout and has no counter service? It’s designed to get people to pay extra for nothing, and I don’t approve. Rather like most modern restaurant websites where you can’t even look at the menu until you start an online order- that’s poisonous as hell.

Anyway, they called my name a minute or so after the order went in, and I was handed a box that was approximately half the size I was expecting. I opened it and looked. Then I closed it and left to go home. 

Upon my return I got out my scale and set to work.

The subconscious value calculations a lot of us do come down to size and weight if we can’t precisely gauge quality. In this case I can do both, but I wanted to start with the easily quantifiable.

Six cookies, five different varieties, just under 250 grams. What the hell? That’s tiny!

The diversity of the cookie styles left me with a wide range of weights, which was even more of a surprise. The Confetti was smallest, weighing in at 29g. Most others were in the 30-35 range, but the Chocolate Mint Mallow swung up to 60g.

Disparity aside, we take the average, and we’re talking about something in the neighborhood of $35-40/lb for these. In the past I reviewed another cookie spot (review linked at the top) and did similar math. Those cookies were $3.75 each, and averaged out at 100g. Quick math, rounds up to $17.00/lb. Crumbl charges literally double what Butter Pecan does based on weight of ingredients.

So yeah- what the hell?! These had better be some absolutely incredible cookies!

They weren’t.

The universals are mostly good overall:

-Deliberately underbaked to extend the shelf life. Totally normal, and I like a soft cookie anyway.
-Doughs are salted for balance to the point where you can taste it. Just a whisper shy of too much.
-All the cookies are S W E E T. Tons of sugar, hence the aggressive saltiness. (Sugar’s cheap.)
-Lots of butter flavor. It comes through very strongly, adding richness to help balance the sweet.

The individual cookies, however, all had their own problems:
“Churro”: way too heavy on the cinnamon, and topped with a swirl of what could almost be buttercream- plenty of powdered sugar in it for that. Sans the cream it’d have been a fine snickerdoodle. I'd rather have had that.
“Milk Chocolate Chip”: The chips were large, bulking the cookie out some but not enough. They were more milk than chocolate, with a rapid-melting texture and a flavor reminiscent of astronaut ice cream. The cookie component was a fairly basic dough, probably also used in some of the others.
“Confetti”: Bog-standard. I’ve eaten many like it. It was a high-quality incarnation of what I expected.
“Peanut Butter”: Despite the massive fat content it still had that sandiness that peanut butter cookies are reliably known for. That said, there were no whole nuts or pieces (in a cookie that small, who’d dare?) so the texture was pleasant.
“Chocolate Mint Mallow”: A very odd sandwich of chocolate cookies with what they claim is a mint marshmallow filling between. The filling tasted more like buttercream, but the mint flavor was milder and more subtle than I expected. Since most mint products go waaay overboard, this left a good impression. The cookies were very dark chocolate and very soft, almost tacky to the touch, which had me considering other preparations. I’d happily have rolled portions of that dough in spiced sugar before baking and sold them accordingly. Perhaps a chipotle sugar? Beautiful with dark chocolate. Less worry for cross contamination too.

Speaking of that, it was the final worry I had. Mint and peanut are both somewhere in that facility and I didn’t see any way to avoid allergen or flavor contamination. The chocolate chip cookie had a faint whisper of peanut come through on my palate, and that’s Not Good.

Overall, I’m not sure how Crumbl got past its first store, much less expanded across the country. It has all the trappings of a vanity project sponsored by someone with deep pockets- niche product, high prices, minimalist décor, tech-heavy processes, minimal human interaction. I don’t like it one bit, but it’s on the main drag in a college town so it probably makes bank. 

I’ll leave Crumbl to the UCB kids who don't know any better and get better product for a better price at Butter Pecan.

They took aim at a childhood treasure.

Someone reeeeally put their foot in it with this one.

Eater: Are Rice Krispie Treats Overrated?

First of all? No!

 

Second of all? What manner of imbecile in food media management tells someone whose whole shtick is Jewish food to give their opinion on something that uses gelatin? You, know, that thing they usually make out of pig's feet?

Immediate facepalm.

Now, a casual reader wouldn't have twigged to that so it's potentially forgivable. And the article starts with A fairly robust bit of background to give a viable shape to the tale. The author is, like myself, a product of the 80s and 90s, when the Rice Krispie Treat was as omnipresent as the Jell-O Jiggler (A different fad which, mercifully, passed), and makes a distinct mention of 1995, when Kellogg's first released the individually packaged version I personally abhor- far too expensive for what you get, even there at the start.

Similarly, when the first recipe showed up on the box in 1941 it was both different and objectively better tasting. The author correctly surmises that the (regrettable and immature) shift in dietary concerns has led to a lower-fat incarnation becoming the standard, which in turn aggressively and adversely affects the quality of the dessert.

But... so? Who actually follows the recipe on today's box? They don't even scale to the measurements of the packaging any more! Marshmallows are now sold in smaller bags, cereal in smaller boxes, and neither of them ratio properly. The first version of that recipe I remember- one I cut off the cereal box and put in my grandma's box of recipe cards when she wasn't looking- called for one bag of marshmallows (at the time 12 oz, now they're 10), half a box of Rice Krispies (you measure one time and then you just know), a third of a cup of melted butter (round it up to 6 tablespoons), and a splash of vanilla. Grandma, in a prescient move, added a pinch of salt. Delicious!

The "recipe" now? Half the butter, no vanilla, more cereal. Of course it doesn't taste as good! They want you to buy the packaged ones!

"So perhaps there’s nothing inherently wrong with Rice Krispies Treats after all. Maybe our moral panic over weight gain and heart disease simply ruined a good thing." she says. Way to walk back the clickbait, lady. You earned your ad revenue, have a cookie.

The article finishes with additional deflection, this time to something valid that I've spoken about in the past- adjustments. The humble Rice Krispie Treat is one of the desserts that I sometimes call Baselines. Perfectly good on its own, but also neutral enough to be highly flexible in terms of flavor combinations. Mentioned are some pedestrian tweaks (Browning the butter? Adding salt? How remarkably innovative...) as well as a more interesting one (a dash of sesame oil and some toasted black sesame seeds) all of which serve to make clear that making impactful changes doesn't require making the recipe any more difficult. 

For a dessert where everything about making it is designed to be simple, what higher compliment could there be?

It's never fair, but sometimes it's reasonable.

 Pursue a life of reckless and irresponsible enjoyment with no regard for your physical, mental, and emotional well-being?
Do not be surprised when your body betrays you.

Sympathy comes hard when you took all the easy ways out.

This is why I still get up early in the morning. I stretch. I exercise. I read and learn new things. I do my part to make the world a better place. 

My life is terrible, but I am not- and provably so.

Knowing there are endless obligations to me that will never be fulfilled, though? Tiring. 

Didn't want to, but...

Apparently I have to. 

I've been reading so many things in food publications lately that I want to throw rocks at. Quite deliberately, I am sure- the relentless trend of sensationalist media continues to fabricate conflict.

Underneath though, all it's doing is endorsing ignorance.

Rule one of writing on a subject: Be well informed.

The audacity of some of these people to put pen to paper, and of other, even worse people, to publish them!

I have to go back a little ways to get a proper head of steam going, but there are exhausting unacceptables aplenty for me to do something about.

I look back and sigh in disgust

I don't want to talk about AI. But as an educator, I have to. It's one of those Great Old One concepts, where the more you talk about it the more power it has to adversely affect its surroundings. Conceptually it's a bunch of gibberish, built by people who think in hours instead of centuries and powered by the ever-shrinking rainforests. It's an objectively unacceptable misuse of resources. Yet it's the Trendy Bullshit of the moment, picking up the slack left by fading or hiding crypto.

So. Consider one of my degrees: a B.Sci in Foodservice Management from Johnson & Wales University. It wasn't hard to get. The technical skills are largely a matter of repetition, but somehow the majority of the student body had trouble with the academics, something I found as astonishing then as I do now. Nobody who comfortably got through middle school in my hometown would have had any trouble with them. 

It was difficult to imagine how some (most) of the students in my classes were ever admitted to university in the first place. Often, as I proofread and (desperately) edited my classmates' work, it really just felt like "Can/will they sign the loan documents?" was the only real requirement, and that soured me on "higher education" quite profoundly. 

My distaste for industry-wide deceptive advertising and predatory loansharking aside, there was very little recourse for the students once enrolled. Either graduate and leverage the degree to try to get a job, or leave and hope for a wealthy benefactor or other miracle that lets them pay the bill. To that end, many instructors understood the limitations of the student body and resigned themselves to making the best of a bad situation. Now, though, things are very different.

The massive upsurge in AI-generated plagiarism and fabrication has left principled staff and faculty grasping at straws for keeping the learning process going and curricula moving forward. Grading has become an obligatory verification process before it gets to become what it's actually for- an improvement process. Instead of being spent improving the students' understanding of a given subject matter, that time is wasted making sure there's any hint of understanding to start with rather than fabricated and parroted bullshit artistry.

What, then, does one do about trade-centric schools, where academic classes are already unlikely to be paid beyond lip-service? I can almost guarantee that current JWU students are taking judicious advantage of AI to fake their way through academics even more desperately and empty-headedly than before, and graduating with even less understanding of / utility to the world they're being inflicted upon.

If they'd hired me like they ought to have, I could fix the problem. 

But they didn't- and there's no way they can. 

Bit of a shame though. If they'd learned how to do research properly they'd have made better choices. Irony.

On the Validity of References

Someone I am vaguely acquainted with tried to make a point about the misuse of the media to create a 'both sides' narrative, rather than directly creating a path to a positive and comfortable future.

He went with Dante Alighieri. 

"The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality."

A fine phrase, and one that makes the point perfectly. Yet it's also one that exemplifies a robust quandary for me, as it should for many.

So much perfectly sensible philosophy, even laudable rational thought, springs up in the most absurd of places. The Divine Comedy is, at its core, no different from something like 50 Shades of Grey. It's self-insert fanfiction based in the universe of a story that was never worthy to be told in the first place- proven over and over again by the thoughts, words, and deeds of some of its staunchest advocates. 

But does the poisonous origin invalidate the impact of the works that follow? Where does one draw the line for where you draw the core tenets of your way of life? How profound a turn of phrase can come from the last place you might ever think to look?

"Do you think God stays in heaven because He, too, lives in fear of what He's created here on Earth?"

If you don't know where that quote is from, take some time to think and then make your best guess. 

Look it up afterward.

A moment of exasperated philosophy.

Lately I've been seeing lots of variations of the "I'm starting to realize that the 'what would people think' barrier is holding 99% of people back from their dreams." bit. How disappointed such notions make me is hard even to quantify, let alone express. But not for the reason most would expect.

Whether you do something or not should only have one qualifier: That you earned the privilege. Doing something because you want to? Fine- if you're finished. If you're worthy of autonomy and choice.
And if not? Doing what you want is simply wrong. Your existence does not have intrinsic value. It does not automatically make the world a better place. Assuming otherwise is a dangerous and terrible but unforgivably common habit.

Do the work to validate your existence before inflicting it upon others and wasting resources that might otherwise be better served.

Don't poison the world for those who put in the time and effort- those that can prove we deserve to be here.

Vegas is Not For Me

My endeavours in Las Vegas were successful! I made some new contacts, spent lots of time exploring, and relished the experience, taking a lot of time to wander and see what it's really like, on-strip, off-strip, and yet further hidden away.

I gave my physical security talk to a couple groups of people, and it went over quite well. Didn't get a lot of questions, but I did get a lot of thanks from the lawyerly-looking types. Seeing my expertise be suitably acknowledged feels good, even if it's on a small scale and a couple of decades late. 

Still. I don't think I like Vegas. 

Somehow, the casinos manage to feel both organized and organic while the general miscellany comes across as hopelessly dissonant and artificial. Further still, the noise and spectacle outside had me feeling like I was at a riot that used to be a house party. 

There's no cohesion to anything outside of the casinos when it comes to entertainment, just endless effort through visuals, audio, and advertisement to get attention- whether the attention is positive or not. 

Shock value seems to translate quite well to cash value, in Vegas, and I do not like such notions at all. It speaks quite strongly of the educational and ethical deficiency of large numbers.

The street theatre was a mix of astonishingly impressive and poisonously unpleasant. Some of it was truly incredible, but in equal measure there was dreck best discreetly tossed in front of a train. Likewise for the shops and omnipresent souvenirs, from keychains to clothing, it had the feel of a flea market made by dumpster diving and designed by /b with some /pol thrown in. I have a 'novelty' shirt or two- most people do. But a great deal of what I saw there, I cannot imagine EVER being worn. Even seeing it exist was staggering.

And then there were the dark corners. Vegas turns up the lights and the noise so nobody looks too hard at the many broken fragments and castoffs that hover around the edges of the scene.

Yeah. I don't think I like Vegas much at all.

Right on cue...

Just as I'm starting to get a handle on my second new position -taking over the running of the city's Meals on Wheels operation- I've got to run out of town. Now admittedly I knew this was coming months before I took this new position and everyone relevant to it knew, but the timing is still less than stellar.

On the flip side, it's going to be fun. I'll be in Vegas handling some contracts for a chunk of the next week, which I've been looking forward to very much. A few orgs have finally bit on my physical security panels. "Clipboards and Catering Carts: Low-Tech Pentesting" got enough eyes on it that I'm being flown out to give proper in-person lectures and demonstrations.

Being noticed (and well regarded) for being invisible. It's an interesting way of things.

An Opportunity! ...As if.

Pete Wells is stepping down as the NYT Food Critic. This pleases and intrigues me, because that's a job *I* want. The relocation, I can handle. The requirements, I blow away. The expertise, I blow out of the water. The physical strain, I have no worry over. A lifetime of athletics and a thorough understanding of culinary nutrition and exercise science have left me more than prepared for fending off high blood pressure, diabetes, and gout.

Now, given the very predictable results I've seen when I put in for similar positions (Washington Post, Eater, etc), I'm not likely to get the call. But whoever they pick is almost inevitably going to crash and burn. It's all I've seen from every single not-me choice so far throughout the last several years, and I expect that to continue.

A dish I've been considering lately

No reason in particular. Certainly not a critically acclaimed expansion to Fantasy Meso/South America or anything.

'Cochinita Pibil'. It's delicious. One of a great many variations around the world of what one might call 'pulled pork' (and probably get smacked for calling it that, but it gets the gist across). It's not necessarily hard to make , but it definitely can be a bit tricky to get all of the commonly accepted essential components.

First and foremost, it's a pork dish. A slow-roasted pork dish, which means temperature control is more important than other slow cook methods like braising. Usually/traditionally it involves a whole or half pig, though for the home cooks, a sizable chunk of shoulder or butt will do nicely. If there's a fatcap or a slab of skin? Leave them on. Maybe score the fatcap with a nice crisscross to ensure faster and more even rendering, but you don't really need to play with it.

Next, the marinade. It's extremely vigorously acidic, so it shouldn't be done for too long before you get it cooking. The traditional method is heavy on the juice of the Bitter Orange / Marmalade Orange. I didn't have a lot of those, so I fine tuned with Cara Cara orange juice and Calamansi lime, both of which I happened to have on hand.

Other universal components are garlic (shocking, I know) and Achiote. The latter is a seed (looks rather like Fenugreek, actually), and when toasted/ground, provides a mild flavor and massive burst of color, somewhat akin to a red version of what you might get out of Turmeric. However much you're using is probably not enough.

One last necessary is the banana leaf. They become the vessel in which the marinated pork and other miscellany are wrapped to ensure the slow-roasting process doesn't dry it out. (I'm reminded of Beggar's Chicken there) You can usually find these frozen at Latin or Asian markets. They're pretty cheap and keep for ages.

The rest is other aromatics. You'll see varying quantities of things like Oregano, Allspice, Cinnamon (the real stuff), Peppercorns, and Bay Leaves. You'll also see additional water-heavy aromatics like onion, fresh chiles, and tomato for extra liquid generation (hedging one's bet- no way to tinker once this goes in the oven) and flavor development. I added smoked paprika to my marinade for additional color and smokiness since I didn't have access to the traditional cooking method.

My recent effort didn't use all of those spices I just listed in the marinade (a mistake, in retrospect). My concerns that the flavors would be too potent and throw off the balance of the finished dish led me to apply some of them in the preparation of the accompaniments instead. 

Most commonly this is served with a violently spicy salsa as well as pickled onion (wherein I used cinnamon, bay leaf, and smoked peppercorn to enhance my pickling liquid and apply those flavors from a different direction). I should have spiced up both. So don't be afraid to go hard.

Now, the cooking itself is interesting. The 'pibil' in the name denotes the usage of a pib, a sort of underground oven. Imagine doing this like you might a clambake, or on a campfire, covered and with coals. Since most of that's a little rough to manage in a home kitchen, I simply used the oven, and in case my banana leaves cracked open, I put everything in a lidded cast-iron pot. Wrap the pork package as airtight as you can in those banana leaves, then set it in the pot, clap the lid on, and away you go.

I mentioned temperature control. I meant it. When I say slow-roasted I mean s l o w. We're talking the 250-275F for four or five hours kind of slow. You've got to give it time for the collagen to convert to gelatin, and the tissues to break down / soften. Without the added liquid from, say, a braise, it can take longer and it's much easier to accidentally end up with a dried-out, sad result.

But that's the lot of it, really. Once it's tender, just shred it and make tacos. Meat, spicy salsa, aromatic pickled onions, maybe some cilantro. Can't beat it.

Ow!

Bit of an accident. Busted up my ribs. Spent the last couple weeks trying not to cough, sneeze, laugh, etc.

Catering gig went off without a hitch at least. Or as much as can be expected for a toddler's birthday outdoors on a 90 degree day. I hardly needed to light the chafing dishes!

New things, new gigs... and school's out!

 What a month.

New job- not a restaurant, at least not yet. I reloaded my first aid certs and got picked up as a lifeguard at the city pool, so that's a good bit of usefulness (and I didn't have to pay for the certifications, so double bonus). More work to come, I'm sure, but for now that stops the bleeding of my savings.

Catering has gone quite well too. After the last big one (which was apparently an offsite meetup for a bunch of Vtubers in the area for a convention) I'm hip deep in preparing for another big event in a couple of weeks. Summertime can mean a lot of outdoor events (Lots of summer birthday parties too! Hard to celebrate on a school night.), and not everyone wants to run a grill all afternoon or make the common backyard barbecue sides. A knack for the classics can potentially carry one quite a ways as long as they taste sufficiently better than the ones at the supermarket.

Short update- been busy!

Short version: Multiple interviews over the last week or so, things look good. I may have found a suitable position offered by staff that actually recognize what makes a perfect candidate. Shock!

Also booked a catering job near the end of the month, so that's been rather occupying as well. I realized that I hadn't updated my catering menu offerings (Or prices! Yikes!) since before the plague, so that's taken a fair bit of research and effort as well. I may do a writeup on that this week if I can squeeze it in.

Munchies: ViceTV Gives Retrospective Food-For-Thought

 

I've said this before- when you open a cookbook, you can gain an impression of the time, place, and circumstance from whence it came. Be it the photography (or lack thereof), the writing voice of the author, the people and establishments referenced, or any number of other things, almost any cookbook that's not actively trying to be a reference text (and most that are) can be dated to some greater or lesser degree. 

This is "Munchies:  Late-Night Meals From the World's Best Chefs". Sounds awesome, no? Now, this concept was a unexpectedly slow burn. Riffing on the rise of an open, honest, appreciative approach to food in entertainment media over the course of the mid-2000s, eventually VICE started leaning in with 'Chef's Night Out', a raucous mess following chefs and foodservice professionals of all sorts as they stumble through their after-work whatevers.  

It's full of the usual mix- people you might have heard of, people you'd rather never hear of again, rising stars, jaded pros, they're all here. But boy, does this incarnation read like they shanked it. Most of the stories and recipes in here are quite disjointed, as befits an attempt to turn a watched experience into a read one. They want to be interesting but often aren't articulated in ways that do them any favors. A fair number of the recipes are a long way from home kitchen friendly, and some of them seemed a rather far cry from delicious to boot. (Look. I'm not a serious cheese guy. But breading and deep-frying chunks of Camembert and drizzling them with maple syrup? I weep for that wasted syrup.)

But what Munchies does do, and rather well, is evoke a quite poignant and painful memory of a very specific period in the culinary industry's modern era- what it felt like to be a chef as the public was being made aware of / wrapping its head around the notion that working a blue-collar job might actually be okay. That it might not have to carry the social stigma that comes with long hours and inadequate pay. That maybe those things might even improve. An era of, if not comfort, at least confidence that the world might be willing to understand that the people who hold society up are the ones worth understanding and celebrating. A genuine time in food media where the concepts and attitudes that could have changed the world's perceptions of the industry essentially hit a concrete wall and vanished from the public eye what felt like overnight. 

Everything spoken of with such joy, such exuberance, is just... gone. That world has ended. Much of it died in 2016, not long before this book actually came out. It probably felt like an obituary on the New Releases shelf. What remained of the feeling this book fought for was dealt a crushing blow in 2018 with the death of Anthony Bourdain, and the plague cut down what felt like the last of it.

People are trying, here and there, but there really just isn't much to smile about in the world of food these days. Munchies tried to make it feel current with classic undertones, and frankly if the world weren't such a disaster it would be. As is though, it feels like a memorial to what could have been. A loss, and perhaps the end.

"Butter Pecan: Best Cookies in the Bay" - ? Let's See.

 

Any time I see an establishment "Best XYZ in (region)", I'm rightly skeptical. 

I've lived in Philly, and saw that claim argued between plenty of cheesesteak places- they've all got similar signs on their windows staking that claim, and will defend that honor with a brash and uncompromising fervor that does Gritty proud.

I've lived in New England, where chowdah, clam cakes, and fried calamari are the subjects of debate heated enough to make people forget about the reliably miserable winters.

I grew up in Jersey. I've literally seen (and been thrown into) fistfights over pizza opinions. And don't even ask me what my favorite diner is.

So yeah. I see 'the best' and my first reaction is to call BS.

Enter 'Butter Pecan'. I first saw this place driving home one day and had a few immediate thoughts: They're probably going to be expensive, fairly simple, and might have some sort of gimmick. But, if they can keep a storefront open on cookies alone, they've got to be pretty good. Or they do corporate catering. Or both.

So I went to find out more. The Hollis Street branch was empty at 2:30 on a Wednesday. Not necessarily a surprise, and a point that made me think they do a lot of catering. 

(Relatedly, most desserts are easy money when it comes to that. All sorts of handheld individual desserts are no trouble to batch, and many also freeze well in various states of readiness, so day to day it can be as easy as chiller, sheet tray, oven, box, done.)

I looked at the pricing and was immediately vindicated in my price worry. 3.75 a pop. Twenty-one dollars gets you six, and thirty-six dollars gets you a dozen. That sort of price point leads quite readily to catering being the backbone of the operation. Being sans a day job at the moment (though open for catering, consulting, and all manner of things), I went with the 6-pack to stay within reason (that's more than my entire weekly budget for food). They have ten varieties as their baseline offerings, and a couple more that change month to month. Some are classic combinations like 'Dark Chocolate Sea Salt', and most others are cookie incarnations of other desserts, like 'Strawberries and Cream' and 'Banana Pudding'.

Now I'll be the first to admit it- I do not like nuts or nut pieces in cookies. Or in my desserts at all, really. Ground up for almond or hazelnut 'flour'? Sure. Marzipan? Love it. But if you put peanuts in my peanut butter cookies, expect me to be a little grouchy.

But the place's name is Butter Pecan, so for integrity, and for science, I went for it anyway. Got one of those, plus two of the Dark Chocolate Sea Salt, a Birthday Cake, a Cookies and Cream, and an Oatmeal Raisin Pecan.

The cookies themselves are fairly large, between 90 and 110 grams each. Yes, I weighed them when I got home. I take my job seriously, thank you. Then I split most of them in half to share with my beau, and got to nibbling.

I'm not going to get into too much detail about the flavors, but they all do the things they say they'll do, and do them quite well. Their baking technique appears solid, they're all slightly underbaked to maximize gooiness, and while their butter tastes quite high quality (and quantity!), they don't brown the butter first except when it's listed (one of their staples is Brown Butter Pecan).

Butter Pecan says "Best cookies in the Bay", and after trying them, I can't immediately argue. They're pretty damn good cookies. Price-wise they're definitely the Five Dollar Shake of the cookie world so I'm not likely to make these regular purchases, but I'd readily and happily endorse it for people with the disposable income to go for it once in a while.

...Wait- crap! I can't even USE that reference any more, can I? A shake at any fast-casual chain is probably way more than five dollars now. Even a large at Jack In The Box is about that much. Oof!

Chili crunch is older and better than David Chang.

 

That's all that needs to be said, really. Dude tried to claim "Chile Crunch", two words that describe a sizeable array of products with history in many parts of Asia, as a trademark of the Momofuku product line.

So, branding is a common horror, and taglines aren't new concepts either. The common pattern is a notion of "what it is, and what it does", whether the phrase is literal, figurative, or ironic. "Think Different", for example. That one from Apple got some serious mileage but also took no small amount of heat- particularly when Gandhi showed up as an example in their ad. Imagine the uproar if they'd also put in the Dalai Lama like they'd planned!

But how many things can you think of that use some variant of the word 'chili'? 

How many more that use 'crunch'?

Momofuku inexplicably owns the rights to the term “chile crunch” (spelled with an “e”, you know, like the country), as noted in a 2023 trademark from the US Patent and Trademark Office. This, to my mind, is a staggeringly unethical breach of linguistic protocol, using technicalities and semantics to put a thumb in the eye of 'truth in advertising' law and open up a massive profiteering exploit, made abundantly clear as Momofuku started selling licenses to others. They created an artificial chokepoint! 

Recently, Momofuku also filed for another trademark, this time to 'protect' chile crunch on a broader scale, expanding its territory to chili oils and seasonings, as well as taking swings at alternative spellings. Chile? Chili? Chilli? Talk about overreach.

I can't imagine how they managed to get such a thing approved in the first place. Did they want a brand identifier? Just add the notorious Momofuku name in front and I doubt anywhere near as many people would be complaining- but to keep it deliberately vague, using common descriptors that have decades of history on supermarket shelves? And then take swings at other businesses via Cease and Desist orders? It's clearly an attempt to cut off competitors' ability to openly access, use, and riff on an extremely common product.

Whose palms got greased to make this nonsense happen? I'd love to know.

This ham-handed shot at creating a rigidly defined proprietary product for the Momofuku brand -while deliberately avoiding the name or adding anything distinctive- has managed to aggressively highlight it anyway- and then drag that name straight into the mud where it belongs.

This probably won't sink Momofuku, but it's a solid hit that hopefully does some lasting damage.

Process and Production

 

One of the most difficult things about writing, for me, is continuing to write. On this blog alone I have said many things, and try not to repeat myself too often. The problem comes when I have to produce quantity rather than quality. I've a habit of refining things to what most would consider excess- that's why I have a book draft with a only hundred pages and a dozen sections but only... perhaps two of those sections are actually what I consider to be complete. I've also developed a predilection towards brevity- to the point of my words feeling hamstrung to my subconscious. They're there, they just won't come out. So I have to take enough of them away to be able to lift the remainder from their dwelling place, and set them upon the page where they belong.

Being one's own worst critic is essentially what a writer does, after all. The drive to overcome that internal urge to endlessly tinker and refine is what helps build a successful writer more than almost anything else. 

That and a giant pile of money.

On An Unwelcome Trend

 

You are on the internet. A place meant for knowledge, exploration, and improvement- but full of uncertainty, unfamiliarity, and unpleasantness.

Deal with it.

To see someone prefacing a picture, a film, or a piece of writing with aught like "(cw:xyz)" is to immediately be less inclined to pursue any interest I might have had- largely out of sheer indignation. In the past, I have said that knowing how a story ends doesn't spoil the journey of it for me, and that will always remain true. But to see a writer or an artist making a conscious decision to knowingly turn away potential enjoyers of their work before they can take the time to explore it for themselves? That burns. When exploring media, the discovery of the experience is so much more than words, sounds, or imagery.

Are so many so unwilling to explore outside their comforts that they need be warned of what might come? Are creators so fragile as to censor themselves before their work so much as sees the light of day? Do they feel the rise of fear in their hearts if they choose not to? 

But... what if they believe it necessary?

A fine broad-strokes example, something I have seen fade to such obscurity that it may well be lost: the craft of the film trailer, or of the dust jacket blurb. Instead of intriguing or inspiring a prospective enjoyer with the work's potential possibilities, all too often now they simply lay facts and figures out in a manner so bland, so banal, as to hamstring any opinion that might be developed of the work itself. Film trailers that spoil the big twist. Book synopses that offer names and actions sans any intent. 

What is missed above all in these flawed, misappropriated mediums and methods, is the reason to delve. To interest someone enough that they explore the depths of a story, to do the detective work that might reveal to an audience that story's very soul, and through it perhaps highlight some facet of their own.

In a time where creative expression is relentlessly stifled unless tirelessly monetized, and potential audiences are so much more willing and able to spread uninformed venom, then what might yet be done?

All I can offer is the proper thing to do: ignore the warnings placed by others, and respect the quality of your audience by offering none of your own.

Yet principles do not pay for groceries. And so ever shall I hunger.

There's a reason we don't say "I'd Buy That For A Dollar!" any more

 

On occasion, I make note of a concept called a 'food desert'. In brief, those are places where there is minimal to zero access to food that isn't some sort of  quick-service food operation, or that's purchasable but prefab/frozen/dehydrated/etc. Essentially a no-fresh-groceries zone. 

They tend to be in what you might call low-income areas. Often but not always urban, they tend reliably with gerrymandered oppressed voting districts too.

This is going to kill people.  Well, more people, given that even the king of drag-ass, OSHA, 'last year criticized the company for a “continued disregard for human safety” that “suggests the company thinks profits matter more than people.” '. That's nothing new to anyone with sense, and certainly applies to far more companies than this. But for it to actually be said is always a legitimate surprise.

In many locations, establishments like Dollar Tree and its contemporaries are potentially the only affordable source for... produce. I can't even bring myself to say 'fresh produce', because some of the incarnations I've been to would give that word a hell of a workout.

The problems here are numerous, and they chain together something like this: 

• Small 'dollar stores' exist where they do because there's no viable space for the larger 'discount' chains like Walmart or Target, and the travel time and distance to such places can be logistically prohibitive.
• Bargain hunting is a myth now. Look at my supermarket comparisons from just the other week. People see 'sale prices' that aren't really any more affordable, but they still pay out. They already committed to being there and may not have the time to find an alternative- if one even exists.
• Bargain hunting is also a long-developed and constant state of mind, particularly in lower-income areas. Having been achingly poor for most of my life, I will forever despise what it's done to my shopping and spending habits. I'd rather go hungry rather than pay 'full price' for what I want to eat.

So consider. How far would you travel to get groceries? How much would you spend to get there and back? How much could you transport at a time? How much can you afford at a time? 

All questions that can loom very large for people who live in and around food deserts. Dollar stores are a shitty mitigation, but at least they exist. This latest debacle is just going to introduce more stressors where there are already too many.

Why You Must Lead With "Yes"

"No." is one of the most aggressively abused words and concepts in any language.

Refusing something is a nebulously acceptable notion, but it's one that has requirements.

"Yes" is the only acceptable default. "No" requires valid justification. You can't say no to something just because you want to, nor can you say it because your beliefs don't align with something provable.

It's tiring to see the meteoric rise in preventable disease because "people" who are uppity about vaccines think they deserve the luxury of refusing them. I have to qualify the word usage simply because that designation is, to my mind, forfeit. Upon making the choice to actively sabotage a cooperative sociocultural environment and endanger the lives of their betters, they're worse than people, even than animals.

"Oh, this prevents the spread of a disease? No, I don't care about that." Well, off to the proverbial leper colony with you. No access to any public services ever again, because you've proven that you'd poison the well if you wanted to badly enough.

Shunning the willfully ignorant, the contrarian, the reckless, the ego-driven... it's all simply good practice. Lots of actual people with knowledge, experience, and skill do incredible amounts of actual research, experimentation, and verification to make the lives of others visibly better. 

Not every person can follow the minutiae behind most of it, and that's okay- that's why expertise as a concept exists. But thinking it's acceptable to dismiss those experts' efforts due to an inability to understand them?

No, that's definitely not. The aggressively politically motivated countercultural movement towards blatant distrust of the scientific method and disregard of validated expertise in the name of profiteering and personal preference is easily the greatest danger the U.S. (are they really though?) has faced in at least the last hundred years.

And it's spreading.

The loss of a titan- Akira Toriyama

 

The news from yesterday about the death of Akira Toriyama hit really hard. There are probably about as many people alive today that would recognize his characters as readily as they would the Mona Lisa- Toriyama had a level of impact that's hard even to quantify because of how robust his work's appeal was.

I've worked in kitchens and bars where the only event besides the World Cup that got back-of-house priority was the Cell Games. There's art in every medium and style, from artists and artisans with literally nothing in common but knowing Toriyama's work. 

It could safely be said that without him, the modern anime convention might not even exist, and certainly wouldn't be nearly as well known or popularized. There's a generation or two of kids who grew up on Cartoon Network or Toonami, for whom he might have been the first introduction to the world of anime, manga, or Japan in general. 

I happened to be logged in to Final Fantasy XIV when the news broke. Within ten minutes, there was a vigil being held in one of the MMO's major cities outside the Pugilist's Guild. Within half an hour there were so many people the game couldn't even render them all on screen at once (and the number of people with orange gi glams brought a tear to my eye). None of those people probably know each other- but they all knew exactly what to do.

Dr. Slump was a fun ride. Dragon Ball is iconic. Chrono Trigger is the greatest JRPG of all time, the Dragon Quest series might never actually stop, and even his lesser known contributions like Tobal no.1 resonate with their fanbases.

That's a hell of a legacy to leave behind.

For those who can read Japanese, there are thoughts from several of his contemporaries given here- names and creators hugely well-known in their own right, all united in their respect and admiration for a departed great.

Pop Quiz: Supermarket Edition

 

I went grocery shopping today- just got back in fact. Went to two different grocery stores.

Pak'N'Save, the low-income version of Safeway.

99 Ranch Market, the closest Asian Grocery to me.

Quiz is just one question: Which one of these sets of groceries do you think cost more?

Weight-wise, the 99 Ranch haul came back 5lbs heavier, about 17 vs 12. Think it mattered?

 

 

It didn't. Pak'N'Save was 34.43, and the 99 Ranch 32.54. Five pounds more and two dollars less.

Even scouring the shelves for sales (those bagels were BOGO, the pasta was $2.00 off per box, and both the grapes and tomatoes were at least half price), the pseudo-Safeway still dug deep into my wallet.

Rather more Pak'N'Gouge than Pak'N'Save, really.

99 Ranch though? I don't even usually look for obvious sales except on known expensive items (for those not in the cheap seats, that typically means meat), and I still almost universally come out ahead. Notice also that I didn't buy anything extravagant. Maybe the lunchmeat or the tteok might count, but that's a serious stretch.

I bought nothing for drinking, no spices, no herbs, no prepackaged meals, candy, chips, snacks, none of it. That all costs so much more I can't even try to justify anything like those.

It's depressing to look at how badly some communities are being taken advantage of when it comes to something as necessary as grocery staples, and it's a serious fight to find anything workable.

Small wonder so many people are struggling to make ends meet.

Not even a day goes by, and they're walking it back

Apparently bullying corporations out of being intolerably exploitative works sometimes!

Do it more.

Make them undo the damage they're doing to us.

Or make them close down.

Or both! Both is good.

Notice they didn't leave it off the table, they just added delays and obfuscation. They hope we'll get used to the idea over the next year and spring it later. Screw 'em.

Dave would be FURIOUS

Now who's Dave?

Dave Thomas.

Why?

"Surge Pricing" is coming to Wendy's. Supposedly the existing operations are being 'upgraded' with tech-heavy digital menus. So of course the first thing that comes out of some money-grubbing idiot's mouth is "How can we profit more, the better to recoup this entirely unnecessary expense?".

Everybody on the user end hates the notion of 'surge pricing' with a furious passion. Jacking up the price of something arbitrarily just because the options are limited or the conditions are suddenly difficult? It's something largely pioneered by car-sharing services, designed to extort more profits from people in a bind by making them pay a premium for a service that might not have any competition due to time, place, or other circumstance.

Now on some level, I get it. As somebody who's gotten that 2am call for a rescue from somewhere dark and cold (more times than I care to remember), I get the sentiment. You go above and beyond, you are owed. But this is something people are already on call for. Everything is already in place and all set to go. You can't just randomly double the rate just because it's 2am, or because a concert just let out. The decision to be available was made ahead of time, and the service provider is obliged to deal with the complications, not demand random amounts of additional compensation. 

This sort of approach has been proven to create terrible relationships between users and services, through wholly unnecessary financial vagaries. Would you go out to lunch with ten bucks in your pocket if you knew you'd be charged twenty? Would you have even considered going out at all?

Even some of what I'd consider industry apologists have stepped forward to say "What the hell?!". In Eater magazine just today (Edit: Yesterday, now), we have this from Amy McCarthy:

It’s long been clear that, for many major corporations, cranking out every cent of possible profit is far more important than customer satisfaction, as evidenced by the scourge of “shrinkflation” and what feels like a widespread decline in food quality across the board. While in theory Wendy’s could use its new menuboard technology to discount fries when the drive-thru is deserted, dynamic pricing also offers chains the ability to implement the price hikes we’ve seen everywhere else at an individualized level. And it’s not because they need to make a little more money on their french fries to stay open. What they’re actually doing is testing you — us, consumers — to see exactly how much you’ll pay for a burger and fries when you’re in a hurry and Wendy’s is the only good option around for lunch.

I don't know about you, but I don't like the notion of paying random prices. For the same reason I don't buy food in airports- I'd rather go hungry than be held hostage.

Too many are grudgingly willing to pay premiums for the illusion of convenience, and they're being fleeced more thoroughly every single day. Where's the tipping point? Should have been a long while ago.

What's the solution? Well... it's a messy one, but quite simple in concept- If nobody made cheap stuff, there’d be plenty of resources to produce valid quality at affordable prices. Get rid of 'quick service' and 'fast casual' dining. You immediately free up incredible amounts of farmland, foodstuffs, factory production capacity, highway space, and commercial real estate. If every Fridays was a farmer's market? Every BK a bodega? Food deserts would disappear.

There's more, of course. But that's where it needs to go.

Bet it won't.

Recipe Affordability- or 'Screw You, Short Ribs'

Groceries are crazy expensive for no valid reason, so a decently nourishing meal grows harder to manage almost by the day. Likewise, most food media paints elaborate pictures that will never pan out properly. Even the simple stuff gets dressed up with gratuitous expense, so the plan becomes looking at a recipe and toning it down to keep it on a budget without losing impact.

Here's an example for you. Simple recipe that supposedly makes 8 servings but could conceivably run you seventy bucks to make depending on where you're buying: Food and Wine Magazine- Sunday Sauce

Don't believe me? I normally shop at what most would call the poor-people supermarkets, and if I see bone-in short ribs, they're all sorts of expensive- never less than double what I'd comfortably pay for them. They average 13-16 usd / #. So you're already around the fifty dollar mark, and you haven't done any other shopping.

Two 28oz cans of whole tomatoes could run you another ten bucks. (Apparently you're supposed to pop them all by hand? That's silly, and an extra potential mess. Use crushed.)

Two pounds of spaghetti could well be another ten bucks (I wish I were joking, but even the cheapest generic stuff around here is near 3.00/#. Lunacy.)

Yes, these are nice round numbers for simplicity. To compensate for any rounding up, I'll stop there, and just skip pricing out all the other ingredients. I won't even talk about how onions can be upward of 1.99/# because it hardly matters,

Look at the principles of the dish. It's a braise, designed to tenderize tough cuts of meat over a long period of slow cooking. This sort of recipe started a long time ago as a way to effectively use off-cuts, cheap stuff, and leftovers. These days, there is no cheap stuff, and the same resulting product is marketed and treated like a premium item. Madness.

I'm going to make something like this later, spending the same amount of time and effort, but for a quarter of the price. How? Magic.

My local Asian market does a lot of its own butchering in-house. It lets them keep some prices a little lower than you might see elsewhere. That also lets them offer useful things you might have to dig around for in most western-style markets. My 'Sunday Sauce' (or 'gravy', as my grandma would have said) is made with pork instead of beef because it's cheaper, and with neck bones instead of those staggeringly expensive short ribs.

Now, you might think "Neck bones? What?" 

Well, let me break it down.

One point of the original recipe's use of ribs is to enrich the sauce with the marrow and other flavor drawn from the bones, the same as you might when making stocks. Getting more out of less. 

Another point is to use heavily worked, tough muscles since they take more time to cook and historically less expensive as a result. Every single breath you take, every time you turn your head, the exercise never stops. 

Lastly, both cuts of meat also tenderize by the collagen/gelatin conversion process, so the enrichment process from the meat itself is identical.

The recipe says to remove the ribs after several hours of cooking, get the meat off, and toss it back in without the bones. That's still happening, and it's smart. Eventually the bones have given everything they have to give, so they're just dead weight. You could conceivably just eat around them, but it's much friendlier to remove what you can't eat and might accidentally bite down on.  The neck will take a few more minutes of work than the ribs since there are more cracks and crevices for meat to hide in, but it's not so long as to be significant.

I didn't really change the recipe. I simply returned it to its natural state- a pursuit of affordable deliciousness. 

In the end, it's all about finding alternatives you can live with, and live on. 

Adjusting to a Second Setup

 I recently configured my desktop for some streaming (my current setup comes via my laptop for positioning/teaching in the kitchen). My plan for a desktop streaming is related in many ways, but also offers a completely different side of my skillset. This way, I've got easy access to screen capture, so I can do real-time analysis and critique of, for example, food and cooking video clips that have been posted elsewhere. Now, being just another 'reacts' is going to get lost in the shuffle, so the plan is to widen my approach. Food, cooking, book and media reviews, plus desktop gaming of all genres, the goal is to display as much of my broad spectrum knowledge as I can, in a way that's a little more difficult when it's purely in front of a stove.

My last stream was, in fact, a gaming one. I'm replaying my way through the Main Storyline of the Critically Acclaimed MMORPG Final Fantasy XIV. Currently in the Stormblood expansion, which spends most of its time in Fantasy Asia, there's a lot for me to talk about even if I were ignoring the primary cast of characters themselves. Now, I'm not as aggressively well-versed as some friends of mine (looking at you, Nyri), but am nonetheless more than sufficient to offer informed commentary on the Asiatic analogues the game is (not subtly) drawing from the 18th through mid-20th century. It's fun!

(Potential spoilers in the following examples)- 

Punning In Stormblood

Yotsuyu's Accent

These are just off the top of my head, but you see where I'm coming from. Asian language patterns, cultural norms, accents, voiceover work, acting principles, dramatic character development, and the list goes on.

So that might be a good bit of fun in the future.

Parenting and Colors

A faint but persistent rumble I've been hearing in some parenting spheres is around color, of all things. The modern bad habit of sterile, bland colorlessness in architecture and interior design is a problem in all manner of ways, but somehow its muted visage has managed to overwhelm its betters at near every turn.

I could go for a while about how much of it comes from the poor ethics of landlords and 'investment property' management companies impeding personalization to adversely affect the psychology of society at large, but that's macro. For now, I'll keep it about parents and kids.

Not only does a failure to explore color and shape in one's private environment deny sensible adults an opportunity to indulge their creativity, it actively impedes the development of their children, should those same adults become parents. Babies need contrast to develop their eyesight. Shape, color, everything. Uniformity of color in something like a nursery? Generally speaking, terrible plan.

And then... there is what I consider the real worry. That parents may feel as though they have to protect their own identity, and shape their child's development in a manner that doesn't conflict with their own aesthetic sensibilities. Worst thing you could do? Maybe not, but that sort of stifling is near the top of the list.

A parent's goals and obligations are ideally quite simple: a comprehensively developed child, and a better world to leave them than they themselves had. All else is secondary.

We live in a world awash in beige, eggshell, taupe, and grey. 

Raise your children to know it's not normal, necessary, or even correct. 

See that they well know every color of the rainbow- the better to draw out the colors of their soul.

Writer's Block and Spoiler Talk

 

Everyone who wants to write has it. Or something like it. My book has been dragging for ages, and it's drowning in my inadvertent urge to polish every last line. I suppose that comes from part of the very approach and methodology the book outlines, but that's not the whole of it. Another vital part of the manuscript's focus is on knowing when to stop planning, stop refining, and just let the chips fall where they may.

Finding that balance is where so many writers struggle. The manuscripts are there, they just haven't yet revealed themselves. They exist in the minds of their writers, simultaneously both complete and incomplete. Perhaps 'untranslated' might be a better way to describe it. The concepts, the phraseology, the characters, the facts and figures - they're all there... somewhere.

What stops so many is the fear of doing them justice- but one must also consider the Pottery Class Parable and recognize that hypothetical success does not come without the understanding born of experimentation, effort, failure, and improvement.

To some extent, this blog is my vehicle for development. It's somewhere I can write things down that I want to write, and that deserve to be read. Sometimes the problem is not having enough to build a coherent narrative. Other times, it's that the information holds secrets that aren't mine to share. Most often though, it's that I turn out something and think 'that should go in the book', and then it's tucked away.

I'm not worried about theft, though it happens all the time. Perhaps some part of me is thinking about showing things in their proper order- of what you might call spoilers. Many people have Opinions on the importance of avoiding such things, and fight against them as best they're able. The notion bothers me much less than it might, something that comes from a mix of my approach and my experience.

To me, the most important thing about spoilers is that they only matter when the story isn't strong enough to bear the weight of a lost surprise. Knowing the plot of a film or a novel in advance doesn't make the novel itself better or worse. You probably know what's said, and by whom, at the end of The Empire Strikes Back. The movie is still extraordinary- the knowledge changes naught. Foreknowledge never dampens the thrill for me because the thrill of the unknown is only one variety among a great many. Indeed, knowing the end might well spur the desire to discover the path traveled to get there.

A road to a far-off place doesn't change in length when you find out that's where you're going.
The flavor of your favorite dish doesn't lessen every time you eat it. (You might think so- but trust the chef.)
Your life isn't worthless just because you know how it ends. (It still might be, but that's another topic entirely.)

So don't worry about spoilers when it comes to writing any more than you might at any other time. There's no better way to overcome that worry than to see words appear on the page in front of you, either. If you know an ending, start writing how to get there. If you have a beginning, write what happens next. If you know something happened, write how or why. Be vague if you have to, and precise where you can. Details are laid upon shape and form, but those shapes and forms must be before they might.

I am not a 'Content Creator'

 

The depersonalization of expertise and expressionism is an extremely unwelcome bit of corporate linguistic shift.

I am an educator. A writer. A master culinarian. A personal trainer. I am a great many things, but when I choose to share them, it is for purpose. The notion of 'content creation' is designed to showcase the superfluous, the distraction, to work as camouflage for the exploitation beneath.

No matter how reliably I continue to do the correct and proper thing, I lose ground. The things I produce, the information I unearth, collate, refine, and share- none of it will become less valuable or less important as time passes. But it feels quite often as though I am filling a bookshelf that's somehow hidden, the contents unread.

To an extent, this is very much what might be considered a #firstworldproblem. To be grousing that no one pays attention could likewise easily be considered sour grapes. But it isn't. It's a valid and robust concern about the state of the general public, its approach to media, and the media industry's relentless efforts to homogenize, commoditize, and dehumanize.

Look for ways to improve rather than escape. You owe the world that much at least.

Much more, really. But that's a good start.