Sirius XM Podcasts
Hey, it's Dan here with a two-part reheat for you.
Two episodes in one.
Part one came via request from a listener named Doug.
He writes, As I recall, you had a debate about layered versus stir-fried?
Maybe it was San Francisco-style versus L.A.-style?
I want to try some of the other places.
Well, Doug, we're going to reheat that episode for you right now.
And by the way, the refried beans at Al and B's in Boyle Heights in L.A., best refried beans I ever had in my life.
So I'm happy to revisit my California burrito odyssey.
Then later on, another sportful episode to share when friend of the show, Kenji Lopez, Alt and I take your calls and questions.
We litigate a marital conflict involving loud burrito eating.
See the link there?
We'll discuss how to find a decent corn tortilla and we'll cover the right way to store tomatoes.
Should they be refrigerated?
That's a big one.
Kenji will tell us the answer.
And hey, learn from listener Doug.
He sent in a request.
Now he's going to hear the episode he wanted to hear.
So thank you, Doug.
And if you want to do what Doug did, drop me a line.
We take requests.
I'm at hello at sporkful.com.
Tell me your first name, where you are, the episode you want to hear, and why.
Thanks so much and enjoy.
Burritos.
As a native of San Francisco's Mission District, the home of the burrito, it is a food that has emotional resonance for me much greater than any other food.
You know, it's sort of like the equivalent of mom's pot roast for me.
That's Bullseye host Jesse Thorne.
He loves burritos.
I grew up in Los Angeles, so my experience was formed by my Chicano friends whose mothers would make them burritos when we would come home from school.
That's Good Food host Evan Kleiman.
She also loves burritos.
But the L.A. burritos she loves and the San Fran ones Jesse loves are really different.
The classic San Francisco burrito is, I'm going to say, nine inches long and pretty thick.
I mean, the thickness of the top of a drinking glass, at least.
It involves rice, which Southern California people don't care for You get some avocado, you get some sour cream, you get some rice, you get some beans, you get some meat, you get some salsa
A beautiful flour tortilla some great beans would be applied down the center finely chopped onions and a very finely chopped chili and then it was wrapped up and handed to me so there was no rice
No guacamole, no sour cream.
I never had a burrito like that until I went to San Francisco.
I don't know, it was like four inches in diameter.
And then I bit into it and there was all this stuff getting in the way between me and the beans.
I just thought it was the weirdest thing ever.
There is a thing called a burrito in Southern California, but I don't even count it.
You might as well say that Philly cheesesteaks are a New York food.
Oh, snap.
There's only one way to settle this.
I gotta go to L.A. and San Francisco and eat burritos like it's my job.
Because it is.
So today on The Sporkful, that's what I'll do.
Plus, when a burrito's fillings aren't spread evenly throughout, is that the fault of the burrito or the burrito maker?
Jesse and I debate.
And Evan and I throw down over whether a burrito is a type of wrap.
Then later in the show, Vox's Matt Iglesias explains why a Chipotle burrito is like an iPhone.
Stick around.
This is The Sporkful.
It's not for foodies, it's for eaters.
I'm Dan Pashman.
Last fall, Nate Silver's site FiveThirtyEight did a burrito bracket to pick the best burrito in the US.
And I want you to know, both the places I'm gonna visit in California in this show made it to the final four.
So let's begin where I began, L.A. Evan recommended Al and B's, a burrito joint in Boyle Heights that's been there since 1966.
It's now run by Al III, the founder's grandson.
But it hasn't changed much.
They got picnic tables set up in a little outdoor courtyard.
While I was there, a street musician came by, and I talked to some regulars.
My name is Luis Abeyta.
Have you been coming to this place for a long time?
They have been here since in the 60s.
And I've been eating here since the 60s.
And what makes it better than other burritos?
It's a combination of the sauce that they use, the meat that...
And the beans, of course.
Not lardless.
So give me some help here, Luis.
So a burrito place, I mean, I'm sure it's not a very good one, but open near me in the New York, outside New York City on Long Island, not known as the burrito capital of America.
And...
They're advertising on the window, no lard.
And I'm like, that's not something to brag.
Nothing at all.
Don't brag about that.
No.
Because Mexican people are used to
Cook with lard.
It's got to be lard.
Luis, I don't know if you're aware of this, but there's a bit of a rivalry between Los Angeles and San Francisco burritos.
Have you heard about this?
Don't go to San Francisco.
I've been coming here since I was five years old.
I'll be 50 next year.
And she's my daughter.
She's been coming here since 1987.
Wow.
Is that when you were born?
Yes.
Is this your son?
Yes.
So this is three generations here at Allen B's, right?
And what's your go-to burrito?
The bean and cheese with the red sauce.
Your son is here.
He's eating a hot dog.
Does it concern you that he's not eating a burrito?
No.
Not yet, not yet.
He's only two, so.
All right, so I would like one combination burrito, please.
That's the shredded beef, right?
Shredded beef, beans, cheese, and green chili, our most popular burrito.
And I'm also going to have one chicharron burrito because, I mean, when's the next time I'm going to be back here?
Let's go crazy.
There you go.
Very good, very good choices.
Wow.
The beans, holy cow, they're so rich and smoky, garlicky, creamy.
They're like liquid gold of beans.
Oh man, those refried beans.
They cook them for 16 hours.
And yes, they cook them with lard, like God intended.
Bottom line, those were the best refried beans I've ever had in my life.
Next stop, San Francisco.
Por eso elevo mi voz bendiciendo tu nombre y pidiéndote amor.
Before we get to the Bay Area, there's one big burrito issue we need to discuss.
It's especially relevant to the San Francisco-style burrito.
That's the bigger one that inspired most of the burritos you find around the U.S. today.
This issue came up when I was talking to Jesse Thorne.
There's a complicated system of layering of the ingredients that's very important because otherwise you don't get an equal distribution.
What they do, if they're doing it right, is they put the tortilla flat and...
And then they move left to right with layers of the stuff so that once it is wrapped up, if you're eating from the end, you're getting a little bit of each layer.
Does that make sense?
Yes, Jesse, I think that makes sense in theory.
I just think that in practice, what usually happens is the burrito roller builds this big pile of stuff, puts the tortilla over the top, and then tucks with their fingertips.
And somehow in that process, they...
Shift the fillings and those nice neat layers end up in these different pockets of emphasis.
You got a big hunk of cheese over here and a big hunk of beans over there and it becomes really hard to get a bite with a little bit of everything.
Wouldn't it be a lot better if you took all those fillings and mixed them together in a bowl and then wrapped the fillings in a flour tortilla?
Wouldn't that ensure that you get a little bit of everything in each bite?
Let me ask you this question.
Do you like apple pie?
Yes.
Would it be better if we just took a fork and just squished all the stuff in the apple pie and then mix it up in a circle?
So that it's perfectly distributed.
It'd be easier to chew.
I think that if you're going to a real good taqueria that knows how to make a burrito, one of the distinguishing characteristics is to be able to take a bite and you get some avocado, you get some sour cream, you get some rice, you get some beans, you get some meat, you get some salsa.
I arrived at La Taqueria, in the heart of San Francisco's Mission District, where they also had a musician playing.
Y esta mañana amaneció nublado Y esta mañana el sol me hermosoló
It's a bigger operation than Al and B's.
They have two burrito rollers working side by side all day long, and the line never quits.
The pork, is it carnitas?
Yes, it's carnitas.
Okay, so I would like one carnitas.
Taco burrito.
Burrito.
Jesse's comments about filling distribution were fresh on my mind, so while I waited for my food, I talked to Miguel, one of the burrito makers.
How long have you been doing this?
About 30 years.
30 years rolling burritos and tortillas?
Yes.
When you sleep, do you dream about burritos?
Yes.
Oh, yeah, man.
I dream every night.
I can't sleep because it's too much people.
Do you know, how many burritos do you make in one day?
Well, like 700.
So you've made like, hang on, I got to get my calculator.
All right.
How many days a week do you work?
Five days a week.
Five days a week.
Okay, so, Miguel, you've made more than five million burritos.
I didn't even know that, but now I know.
You should go have a party or something.
Oh, definitely, yeah.
Watching Miguel make burritos is amazing.
It's like flick of the wrist, perfect distribution of salsa.
Swipe of a spatula, perfect distribution of guacamole.
You know, it reminded me of Patsy Grimaldi, the 80-something-year-old New York pizza legend I had on The Spork for a while back.
He flicks his wrist, and it's like...
Flour goes up in the air like pixie dust and settles perfectly distributed on the pizza dough.
It's just an amazing thing to see, like the muscle memory in action, and it looks effortless.
But in reality, it's the kind of thing you can only do effortlessly when you've done it five million times.
Anyway, watching Miguel work, I was ready to eat.
Man this is the best burrito i've ever had in my life the ingredients the flavor the meat is so soft and tender the guacamole is fantastic the beans oh my god it's just everything and
Arrayed throughout the burrito so every bite gets you just about everything you want.
No pockets of emphasis, no big giant ball of cheese and big giant ball of guacamole.
Oh man.
I'm gonna come back here tomorrow.
In the end, I made three trips to La Taqueria in three days.
You know, for research.
My personal favorite was when I ordered half carnitas, half tongue.
That made it sort of salty and a little bit crispy from the carnitas, but also fatty and just ridiculously soft and tender from the tongue.
Oh, man.
I gotta go back there.
Anyway, I gotta say, for me, on most days, I personally would prefer the San Francisco style.
I like the combination of all the flavors, but the refried beans from Allen B's, those things, like, haunt me in my dreams.
And really, I don't think that one is objectively better than the other.
Like, they're just so different.
I mean, I can't imagine either one satisfying me when I was craving the other.
Coming up, Evan Kleiman does not like it one bit when I tell her I think a burrito is a type of rap.
I really thought you veered slightly too close to the insane when you asserted that.
And I'll take some WNYC podcaster friends out for burritos.
That's coming up.
Stick around.
Time to cook up some advertisements.
Bye.
Bye.
Welcome back to another Sporkful Reheat.
I'm Dan Pashman.
Want to watch me walking my dog while ranting about some food-related issue that's on my mind?
Want to see what I'm cooking?
Want to see what I'm eating?
The best way to do that is to follow me on Instagram.
My kids make occasional appearances.
There's a lot of fun to be had.
So please follow me on Instagram at the Sporkful.
Again, that's at the Sporkful.
Thanks.
Now back to this week's reheat.
Coming up in a minute, Vox's Matt Iglesias explains why the Chipotle burrito is like an iPhone.
But first, as you know, I like to debate issues of language.
When I met up with Evan Kleiman in LA, she took issue with one section in my book where I say that burritos are raps.
Yes, and I really thought you veered slightly too close to the insane when you asserted that.
Why?
Why do you disagree?
Well, to me, when I think of a rap, I think of something that is...
I always think of it that it's going to be an insipid version of a filling that I could have on a regular sandwich in really great bread.
And I've never understood why that would be appealing to anyone.
Is it possible that your disdain for sandwich wraps and your love for burritos is creating this sort of...
False association where you're like, I don't want burritos in the same category.
I mean, isn't a wrap just a delivery system?
No, because raps are something that just came into be through marketing.
I remember a time when there was no such thing as a rap.
You of course are quite young, so you probably do not remember such a time.
But I do remember, and I think raps only really came into being in the 80s.
How could something that came to be in the 80s
But I think what came to be in the 80s was really just a term and an American co-option of what has been a longstanding way to deliver food, which is to wrap it in some kind of a flat flour bag.
Whether it's a burrito or whether you're talking about Peking duck or Mushu pork, there are a lot of different ethnic cuisines all over the world that involve something like a wrap.
This is true.
So I think it's always been there.
You are conflating two issues.
Rap is the American English word that we have, as I see it, for any food that is wrapped inside a single, usually doughy structure.
Whether it's a burrito or you wrap up some Peking duck, it's a wrap.
I want you to go tell that to some Chinese people.
Tell them that their Mushu, their revered Mushu with that sort of gossamer thin pancake made with lard is a wrap.
So you have this gossamer thin pancake.
What word would you use to describe the action you now take to fold over, to put the whole thing together before you eat it?
I would call it nestling.
But what do you do with the pancake itself?
Embrace.
Well, after this interview, Evan, I'm going to give you a big old wrap.
Let's go have a great tuna wrap.
I thought you were going to say a tuna embrace.
Evan Kleiman hosts Good Food.
It's a radio show and podcast out of KCRW in L.A.
So far, we've spent the show talking about some of the best burritos in the world.
But I know that a lot of you don't have access to those burritos.
Most of the time, neither do I.
Which brings us to Chipotle.
Vox's Matt Iglesias is a big fan.
He wrote a piece for Slate in which he argued that Chipotle is innovating in the restaurant world the way Apple has in the tech world.
People tend to think of technology and innovation pretty exclusively in terms of gadgets, but you have innovators in other fields, including in food.
Chipotle, I think, is a real example of that.
They use interesting new technology in terms of how they're actually making their carnitas.
Innovative in terms of just how does a fast food restaurant look and how does it operate.
And you're starting to see they have more and more influence on the industry that Taco Bell has tried to move us to a sort of Chipotle competing paradigm that you see more and more chains using that assembly line style creation of the food and that, you know, just like in the
High-tech world, in the food world, in the burrito world, we see real innovation and change and dynamism.
You got a lot of backlash to that column for your hailing Chipotle.
You especially got backlash from people who are loyal to Bay Area burritos.
Well, you know, the center of the sort of technology press in the United States is in the Bay Area, which is also the traditional center of the burrito industry.
And so it was a sort of unfortunate confluence, people with strong feelings about technology and people with strong feelings about burritos.
Really, let me have it.
Right.
So I was recently out in San Francisco and was able to sit down with a couple of Wired writers who'd been on my case and go to their favorite place in the Mission District there and try out a grassroots, authentic Mission burrito.
You went to La Taqueria.
I'm curious what your thoughts were on the experience.
It's a mom-and-pop kind of thing.
It's very different from a chain experience.
It's homier, but you can also tell it's a less efficient operation.
They have sort of where the door is situated versus where the line is versus where the menu is is all a little bit kind of haphazard.
Which is part of the appeal.
It's part of the charm of a traditional establishment.
But also, you know, as a business writer, I do always sort of admire the efficiencies that the chains bring to things.
Right.
What are some of the things that a place like Chipotle does in situating the door and the line and things that we might not notice but that make it run more efficiently?
Well, you know, they're very careful to make it so that if you go in the door …
Where you stand is sort of right where the line is going to be forming.
At least they try.
And so that while you're standing on line, the menu is very visible because the idea is they want people to come up to the front and know exactly what they want to order.
Where I was at La Taqueria, I was kind of standing in line, which forms at the opposite side of the restaurant from the door.
You're facing then away from the menu.
So it takes until you get quite close until you can really see what's on there, what the price options are.
OK, but logistics aside, which burrito would you rather eat?
Well, you know, I did appreciate that at La Taqueria they made a more it's a more mixed up burrito.
You know, Chipotle tends to give you sort of layered ingredients, which, again, is faster.
It's easier for them to put it together that way.
But I think it tastes better with the things jumbled up.
Now, my wife, I know, she's a very sort of particular person.
And so she actually sort of takes the burrito, stands it up.
She gets her spoon, a small spoon.
And as she eats, she constantly mixes and remixes so that each bite can have exactly the ratio that she prefers.
I don't really have that level of fastidiousness in me.
I do the exact same thing she does.
I sit there with my fork and I look at the opening and I see what ratios I have in this bite.
And I will, on a bite-by-bite basis, I will manage the ratios, move things around to try to get equal proportions in every bite.
See, I feel like half the reason you're going someplace, though, I want the other people to, you know, make my food for me and to make it well.
And that was definitely something I appreciated about La Taqueria is that I didn't need to do any reassembly of the food.
That's Matt Iglesias.
He's the executive editor at Vox.
His piece for Slate is called Chipotle is Apple.
Well, friends, we have one more stop on our burrito odyssey.
There's a Chipotle down the street from WNYC, so I decided to invite some of my fellow podcasters out for lunch.
I brought Manoush Zomorodi from New Tech City and Anna Sale from Death, Sex, and Money.
The worst is when your tortilla tears at Chipotle and then the server looks at you and goes...
Huh?
As if, like, is this okay?
Right.
Oh, my God.
I'm like, no, it's not okay.
No, like, the whole point of what we're doing here is to encase the food in a single structure.
Yeah.
All right, I'm going for it.
All right, I'm ready to order.
I'd like a, can I get half chicken, half carnitas?
Yes.
White rice.
Pinto beans.
Half chicken, half carnitas.
Just a little bit of rice, please.
Just a little.
That was a lot.
Half chicken, half carnitas.
Someone give me a hand here so I can hold the mics.
Got it?
I have to say that that was a little stressful.
Manoush, was that stressful to you?
Yes, extremely stressful.
I need to leave.
I'm overwhelmed.
There was loud music, lots of people yelling at me what kind of rice I wanted.
I need to go and sit quietly and eat.
Getting through that line is very stressful.
And I feel like they're rushing you.
And I also felt like I told the woman just a little rice and she just wasn't listening.
And she gave me a lot of rice.
So Chipotle was fast, but we left frazzled.
And when we got back to the office, we realized the burritos weren't labeled clearly.
All right.
This one says C-A.
Is this mine?
Is this the chicken and carnitas together?
I think that's just carnitas maybe.
So I think we may just have to start biting into some of these and see what happens.
Is anyone sick?
Producer Alex Goldmark's burrito was so huge it came undone almost immediately.
I wonder, like...
What responsibility does Alex have for the fact that his burrito is so stuffed and that it fell apart?
Technique's off, Pete.
Unwrap the whole thing
You can't do that
You have to leave it in the wrapper man it's not
It's not
It's
Not my wrapping technique it was my ordering technique that made me go wrong
What do you mean
Like i took the foil off i heard that we had a free burrito and i was like i want to try everything
So the guacamole on there which i don't usually do because i'm not going to pay the extra and i got greedy so it got too overstuffed
You unwrapped the foil.
From the first moment I held it, it lacked the architectural stability of a normal Chipotle burrito.
But the foil is the corset.
It's the corset that holds the burrito together.
It holds everything in place.
I think that Joanna's right that you use the foil to help hold the burrito together.
In the foil, except for Alex.
Except for you, Alex.
Don't call me a burrito outcast.
I just want to fit in.
All right, well, that's a burrito, by which I mean that's a wrap.
Sorry, I couldn't resist.
If you want to see a video of Miguel's amazing, ridiculous burrito-making skills at La Taqueria, go to sporkful.com.
There's also photos from my adventures.
Again, sporkful.com.
Quick note that I am aware that there is such a thing as San Diego burritos that we did not cover in this show.
My apologies to the people and the burritos of San Diego.
We hope to cover your burritos in the future.
Coming up, Kenji Lopez-Alt joins us for part two of today's reheat.
We take all manner of listener questions, calls, debates, and disputes.
Things may get a little heated.
Stick around.
It's time to open up a can of advertisements.
Welcome back.
Let's open up the phone lines and take your calls with my old friend Kenji Lopez-Alt.
Today on the show, we're opening the phone lines and taking your calls.
And riding shotgun with me for this episode is our old friend, Kenji Lopez-Alt.
He's the man behind the Food Lab column on Serious Eats and the author of the excellent cookbook, The Food Lab, Better Home Cooking Through Science.
Hey, Kenji.
Hey, how's it going, Dan?
It's going well.
And later in the show, Kenji, I'm going to put you to the test.
We're going to have a lightning round.
Are you ready for the lightning round?
Yeah.
Sure.
I'm gonna ask you three questions, some from me, some from listeners, and you're gonna have to answer them in three minutes or however much time it takes.
Okay.
And I should add, one of those questions will address a very controversial topic.
Should tomatoes be refrigerated?
Oh, man, this is a big can of worms or a big can of peeled tomatoes.
That's right.
This is a big one.
But first, let's take a call.
Hi, who's this?
Hi, this is Jackie in Plattsburgh, New York.
All right, Jackie, what can Kenji and I do for you?
I am looking for an impartial third party for an issue that I have with my husband.
Basically, Sean has a really weird way of eating in general.
He has a lot of food hacks that he has invented for a more efficient way of eating food.
And some of these hacks are kind of embarrassing and some of them are just kind of like weird to me and don't make any sense.
Can you give us a couple of examples of the greatest hits of Sean Food Hacks?
Yeah.
The most embarrassing one is when he's eating a burrito or anything that has like moisture in it, any kind of sandwich.
He sucks in and I call this one the suck.
Like with every bite, he makes this like audible sucking sound.
Like he's slurping up noodles?
Kind of, except there's no noodles.
Can you do an impression of the sound right now for us, please?
It sounds like... That is embarrassing.
It's audible.
It's not something subtle at all.
So he does that right in the middle of the chipotle.
Every bite with every single bite.
And can other people...
It's embarrassing.
It's a little bit unappetizing.
Other people can definitely hear it.
I've never had someone come up to us before, but I'm sure they can hear it.
And the biggest issue that we have is really like a legacy issue here because we have a two-year-old and...
He feels very strongly that she should be learning these pearls of wisdom.
I'm sorry.
So the idea is that is he doing it to cool the food down?
Is he doing it to just prevent drippy things from coming out of his mouth?
Or what's the point of that one?
It's for the drips.
Okay.
I want to bring Sean in on the conversation, but can you give me one more example of a food hack, Jackie?
Ah, there's so many.
I'd say another one is when he, this is more of a drink hack, but if he has like a can of something, then he, and he's done this
For as long as I've known him, it's been six years.
So he makes a dent in the can for where his thumb would go to make it more ergonomical.
I mean, it's not a problem for me personally to hold a can.
I don't really understand why it's so necessary.
But it is a problem for you when someone else dents their can.
Well, and he also is very adamant about how his way is the right way to do it.
Everyone else is holding the can the wrong way because they haven't done this to their can.
Jackie, I know you came here looking for an impartial third party, but I just want you to know that you are sort of heading into enemy territory right now because you're talking to someone, Dan, who lives on food hacks.
You're talking to a man who tears his hot dog buns up into inch-long pieces and uses them as a handle to eat his hot dog.
Yeah, I might be in the wrong.
I might be setting myself up to be ganged up on here.
I'll try and be your advocate, though.
Okay.
We'll see.
Let's bring in your genius husband, Sean.
Okay.
Dan, I like the way you think, my friend.
I like the way you think.
This is tip of the iceberg, let me say.
There's a lot of hacks.
Before we get into more detail on the slurp or the suck, as Jackie calls it, and the thumb dent in the can, Sean, just tick off real quick a few other of your favorite food hack maneuvers.
The popsicle.
The popsicle is one of the worst ones.
You like the popsicle.
I mean, listen, I can admit that the popsicle one is probably embarrassing to the onlooker.
I wouldn't want to make eye contact with another human while doing this.
Well, essentially, I put the entire popsicle...
In my mouth like down the side of my cheek again between my cheek and my tongue right because you get like the most amount of flavor that way and you eat the popsicle evenly
There are no drips
I've never had a popsicle drip on my fingers
Just saying that
So, I mean, are you doing this with just those sort of single stick, small banana sized popsicles?
Or are you going, are you also doing this with like your red, white and blue, you know, rocket shaped giant, you know, triple X magnum popsicles?
Yeah.
Yeah, like, let's say I were to have a giant red, white, and blue popsicle.
I'm fitting as much of that popsicle in my mouth as I can.
And, Sean, it seems like there's something of a pattern that I'm detecting is that a lot of these hacks are partly to reduce mess.
Yes.
If you're really doing the suck, partly for the sake of neatness, then I think it's actually might be in your interest, both of you, as part of this debate to actually test its efficacy.
Get yourself a burrito, cut it in half.
You don't want to cut the burrito in half.
Okay, well, then easy.
Just get two burritos.
Eat one of them using the suck method and the other one just using a normal human being method.
And maybe count the number of napkins required.
I would say that on average I use zero napkins.
Zero napkin.
You're telling me that because of the suck method, you can eat an entire burrito without using a single napkin?
You heard me right, my friend.
Zero napkin.
You don't even do the single wipe to check that there's nothing there?
I don't need to.
I don't need to.
Jackie, can you confirm that Sean can eat an entire burrito without using a single napkin?
I don't want to, but...
So I'll take that as a yes, you can confirm it.
Now, Jackie, have you ever tried any of these hacks?
I haven't tried the sex.
No, you tried one.
I know you have.
On principle, I haven't tried the dent, but I have tried the Popsicle method.
And?
Surprisingly, it does make the Popsicle taste better.
I just don't want him to have the satisfaction of feeling like his way of doing this is better than my way, and then I don't want him to feel like he has an opening to start directing me in every other area.
As you can see, we have a very healthy marriage.
There is, of course, something to be said about Jackie's point about sucking down a burrito in a public place being embarrassing and maybe setting a bad example for your daughter.
My wife, Adriana, that is one of her biggest, biggest pet peeves is when people make slurping noises while eating, which I can tell you was a big problem.
We spent about three months traveling around China and other parts of Asia, and that was terrible.
Her biggest complaint while we were there is that it's just part of the culture to slurp while you eat.
And I grew up in a Japanese family, and so slurping was never an issue for me.
And if I'm eating noodles, I'll slurp.
But since we've been married, I've tried to kind of tone it down a bit because I know that it negatively affects her.
Jackie, are you more worried about your daughter adopting these techniques because you're afraid that she will be ostracized?
Or is it that you're worried that you'll be outnumbered?
I'd say pretty even 50-50 there.
50-50 split.
You guys have been together six years total?
Dating and marriage six years total?
Yep.
This has been an issue that entire time?
We went through a honeymoon phase where Jackie pretended to ignore it.
Was there ever a point, Jackie, early in your relationship with Sean that you thought it was cute?
I thought the can thing was cute.
Did you ever think the slurp was cute?
No.
Was there ever...
The problem is that you're proving my point that even if I slurp, I won't be ostracized because...
Despite the fact that I've slurped for our entire relationship, you noticed it early on, didn't think he was cute, yet still married me.
True, true.
Well, she's gotten the chance to become close to you and know that despite your eating flaws that there are other redeeming qualities about you.
But the person sitting next to you at the Chipotle is not going to get to know you other than you're slurping.
Yes.
Conversely, was there a time early in your relationship, Sean, that maybe you toned down?
Like the very first time you guys got a burrito together, did you go straight in with the slurp?
Or maybe did you start with some mild suckling to test the waters and see whether... Like you took the words right out of my mouth.
I recall specifically trying to tone down.
I never noticed it.
So that means that on some level you do know that what you're doing is is distasteful.
Yeah.
I mean, you know, I am I am a human aware of myself in the world, I guess.
Truth comes out.
Truth comes out.
Mm-hmm.
Yep, I would say so.
Are there other issues in your relationship where the reverse is true?
Where, Sean, you feel that Jackie is trying to impose her way of doing things on you?
Yeah, we have a normal relationship.
Sean, can you give me one or two quick examples of an area where Jackie thinks that she knows best and she's telling you that she thinks you should do it that way?
Absolutely.
So we actually play music together in a band, and we are the two members of the band.
Jackie plays piano and sings and writes all the songs, and I play drums and do other instruments.
And I would say that in that situation, I'm extremely micromanaged.
And Sean, when Jackie treats you that way, how does it make you feel?
When Jackie treats me that way, it makes me feel, I would say, a little belittled.
And Jackie, when Sean tells you that you're not eating something or drinking something correctly, how does it make you feel?
I'd say the same.
It makes me feel kind of belittled and like he doesn't trust me.
My own instincts on how to eat.
This debate does hit close to home for me, because Sean, you and I are definitely kindred spirits, and I am often trying to impose my way of eating onto other people in my house, both my wife and my children.
And I get very similar reactions, both for my wife and my children.
My wife is like, don't tell me how to do it.
Leave me alone.
And my kids think it's really fun and cool to play with their food and try new things.
They're a little older than your daughter, but still small enough to think that I'm cool.
Right.
And so I totally get that tension.
And I think that maybe you can both do a better job of being receptive to the other person's suggestions when you're the one receiving.
And you can both do a better job of maybe having a lighter touch or picking your battles when you're the one giving the suggestions.
Oh, that was so good.
That just felt like the minute at the end of the show with Jerry Springer.
No, that's really good advice.
I think we've had a real breakthrough here, guys.
I think so.
Like, I feel like I should pay you.
Yeah, seriously.
One quick addendum, which is that I think that the suck or slurp technique should be put in a different category from all the others.
Pushing a dent in the can, like, no one's really harmed by that.
The only harm is that Jackie's annoyed because Sean is smug.
The greater world, no damage is being inflicted on the world at large.
But the sound of the slurp in a restaurant, I can understand how that could be a little gross.
So, Sean, I think that one in particular, I would encourage you to dial back and pick your spots.
Maybe go with just the gentle suckle.
Right.
Exactly.
And the others, I think, Jackie, you know, you could take it easy a little bit more and hopefully you'll find common ground.
Okay.
Yeah, we can do that.
Oh, one other thing I want to add with regard to your daughter is that I predict, I can't say this for sure, but I predict what will happen is that she's going to increasingly pick up your techniques, Sean, because you're her father and she's going to think it's really cool.
And then if you continue with the suck or slurp at full volume, eventually she's going to hit an age where you're going to be eating burritos with her and her friends.
And she is going to be horrified.
Yeah, deeply, deeply embarrassed.
She'll be totally ostracized in college.
Right.
I think what will happen, actually, is that she will order you, don't ever do that again in front of my friends.
You are so embarrassing, Dad.
You are the worst.
You need to sit in silence.
Just don't.
But then eventually, when she gets a little bit older, like when she's in college or even out of college and she's older and sort of more self-assured, I think it's gonna come full circle.
And I think that she's gonna tell her friends and her kids,
My dad was this weird eccentric who would eat his burritos in this way, and she's going to slurp her own burritos and think of you.
While she's counting the money she saves on not buying napkins.
All right.
Well, Jackie and Sean in Plattsburgh, New York, we wish you the best with your music and your eating and your daughter.
Thanks, guys.
All right, Kenji, it is time now for the hot seat.
This is where I'm going to ask you three questions, some from me, some from listeners, and I'm going to put three minutes on the clock, and you have got to answer these three questions in three minutes or however long it takes.
Are you ready?
I'm ready.
Okay.
Yeah, I'm going to go for the three.
Okay.
Hey Dan, this is Simon in Las Vegas, Nevada.
My wife and I constantly debate storing tomatoes in the refrigerator.
She dislikes the idea of them getting warm on the counter and feels like, you know, like a lot of fresh food they'd do better if they were stored cold.
On the other hand, I think that they kind of fail to fully ripen and get to full flavor when they're in the refrigerator.
She's a fantastic cook, aside from her questionable tomato etiquette.
Maybe you can enlighten us on the proper ways of the tomato?
Thanks, Dan.
I once said, like two years ago, I mentioned that I had put a tomato in the fridge and I got so much hate mail from sporkful listeners.
How can you put a tomato in the fridge?
But I know this is something you've looked into, Kenji.
Where do you stand?
Actually, more sporkful.
Specifically Daniel Gritzer, the culinary director at Serious Heats.
I've done a little bit of experimenting, but he did a massive set of experiments a few summers ago.
We know on a scientific level that there are certain things that happen
When a tomato is in the refrigerator, certain enzymes that get deactivated and certain flavor compounds that get destroyed.
And those scientific studies are where people get this idea that storing tomatoes in the refrigerator is a bad idea.
But those studies are generally for industry and they're meant for people who are deciding what's the best way to ship tomatoes and what's the best way to store them in the supermarket, for example.
Those studies don't necessarily apply when you're trying to answer the question of,
Is it better for me to take a tomato from the supermarket or from the farmer's market and put it on my counter or put it in my refrigerator?
One of the things is that if you're buying it from the supermarket, those tomatoes have almost undoubtedly already been
Exposed to refrigerator temperatures.
And so those tomatoes have already had those enzymes and those flavors destroyed, which means that subsequently putting them in your refrigerator is not really going to do much more damage to them.
The other thing to consider is that when you're bringing a tomato home from, say, a farmer's market or even from your backyard,
A perfectly ripe tomato that you store on your counter doesn't magically stop ripening.
And in fact, it can start to lose flavor and start to lose texture as well.
And what Daniel found in his experiments and a couple of the ones I did at home as well was that
Even with tomatoes that you're getting fresh from the farm or fresh off the vine, in most cases, if you take two identical tomatoes picked off the vine the same day, put one in the countertop and put one in the refrigerator, in most cases, if you wait a few days and then taste those tomatoes again, making sure to let the one that went in the refrigerator come to room temperature before tasting, you'll find that people prefer the one
That went into the refrigerator.
What?
That's a bombshell, Kenji.
Do you realize there's a microphone in front of your face right now?
Are you sure you want to say that?
The reason is the one that was left on the counter actually ends up over ripening and that's detrimental to it.
And it's more detrimental to it than what can happen in the refrigerator in most cases.
So the real question you have to ask yourself is when am I going to be eating this tomato?
If you have this ripe tomato that you got from your vine or from the farmer's market and you're going to be eating it within a day or two, then you're probably best off leaving it on the counter.
If it's going to be any longer than that, then you're actually probably better off putting it in the refrigerator.
With the caveat that you have to make sure the tomato comes back to room temperature before you slice it and eat it, because cold tomatoes do have a significantly reduced flavor and also a sort of mealier texture that letting them come back up to room temperature can help alleviate.
All right, well, you heard it here.
Don't send me any more hate mail, people.
Send it to Kenji or Daniel Gritzer if you don't like the conclusion.
All right, Kenji, question number two.
I love a good corn tortilla, but it's so hard to find a good corn tortilla.
There are decent flour tortillas in the supermarket or in some specialty shops.
I know they're not as good as homemade, but they're pretty good.
But it is so hard to find a decent corn tortilla anywhere where someone isn't making it right in front of my very eyes.
Right.
10 seconds before I eat it.
Why is it so hard to find a decent corn tortilla in the supermarket?
And what can I do to improve a corn tortilla in the supermarket and make it better, if not less bad?
Well, you know, according to Alex Stupak, you know Alex, he's the chef at Empayón.
Taqueria in New York, he had a great book called Tacos.
According to him, the reason is because corn starches, when you first cook them, the starches gelatinize.
They're fluid.
They are pliable.
Once they cool down, those starches retrograde.
They recrystallize.
And unlike wheat starch, which can be re-gelatinized by heating again, cornstarch, once it recrystallizes, it cannot be re-gelatinized.
So it retrogrades in a way that you're not able to save it again.
So
If you think about a loaf of bread or a flour tortilla, it's great when it's fresh out of the bakery oven.
You know, six hours later or the next day, it's going to be stale, but you can sort of revive it almost back to its initial state just by throwing it back in the oven and reheating it again.
A corn tortilla does not act the same way.
Once it cools down, it's impossible to bring it back to its original state again.
Is there anything that I can do to make them a little better?
My method for reheating corn tortillas, well, these days I use a little griddle that I have set on my countertop.
But you can use a cast iron pan or even a nonstick skillet.
You want to get it nice and hot.
Dip the tortilla in a little bit of water before putting it into the cast iron pan or the skillet.
And as that water steams, the steam will work its way through the tortilla.
It'll help it gain a little bit moisture.
So you basically cook it on the first side until that first side starts to show little brown spots.
Flip it over, char the second side.
So you get some nice toasted flavors that can help add some flavor back to it.
And then it also stays pliable because you're adding liquid to it.
Then the real key, though, is that after you do that, you want to make sure you let the tortilla steam.
So what I have
Is a plate with a clean dish towel set on it.
As I reheat the tortillas, I stack them neatly together, wrap them up in that dish towel as I go, and then let them sit before serving them.
And you'll find that allowing them to steam together is going to actually help them regain a lot of that sort of pliability.
It's never really going to have the sort of stretchiness of a very fresh tortilla, but it'll at least be pliable.
Okay, Kenji, you just got one more.
Gus in Brazil asks, does frying stuff that has been frozen generally lead to crispier results?
It definitely can.
When you're frying something, what you're really doing is a two-step process.
You're dehydrating and you are getting proteins to set.
At the same time, generally when you're frying something, the exterior texture is going to be different from the interior texture.
The exterior is going to be crisp, dry, and light, and usually the interior is going to be something moister.
So what you want to do is kind of battle against that moisture on the inside.
From making the exterior soggy.
The question is whether freezing helps.
Well, freezing can actually help in one important way, which is that as you're heating foods, you're causing moisture inside them to escape.
So when foods are really hot inside, a lot of moisture is going to escape, and that's more likely to cause the exterior to become soggy.
So if you can keep the inside of your food cold while you're doing the work of crisping up the exterior...
You can actually sort of minimize the moisture that escapes from the center so that you end up with something that actually is crisper on the outside and is actually moisture on the inside.
So in most cases, yes, freezing a food will actually help it fry up better.
There are exceptions to this.
So for something like, say, a...
Breaded chicken breast, freezing it can actually disrupt the protein structure of that chicken.
It can cause muscle fibers to puncture and tear, and it can actually lead to more moisture leaking out because that chicken breast has been frozen.
For things like vegetables and smaller pieces of food or ground meats, then yeah, I would say in almost all cases, freezing can actually help improve crispness.
Well, Kenji, you survived the lightning round.
You answered all the questions in three minutes or some other quantity of time.
Congratulations.
Thanks.
Kenji Lopez-Alt is from Serious Eats, and he's the author of The Food Lab, Better Home Cooking Through Science.
Thank you, Kenji.
Yeah, thank you.
It's a pleasure.
This was even more fun than usual, actually.
I thought so.
I thought so.
We'll talk to you soon, buddy.
Take care.
All right.
Thanks.
By the way, as you heard, our callers in today's show, Jackie and Sean, they have a band.
It's called Roan Yellowthorn.
That's R-O-A-N Yellowthorn.
Check them out.
And if you have a food-related dispute that needs settling or a food science question for Kenji, drop me a line.
Dan at Sporkful.com.
And you can find yourself in an upcoming episode of The Sporkful.
This show is produced by Anne, Sandy, and me.
Editing help from Dan Charles.
Music help from Black Label Music.
The Sporkful is a production of Stitcher.
Our executive producers are Chris Bannon and Jenny Radelet.
Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman.
And this is Barbara Turteloe with the Spring Peepers in Skullburg, Virginia.
We'd like to remind you to eat more, eat better, and eat more better.
But not the frog legs, please.
This reheat was produced by Gianna Palmer.
The team that produces the Sporkful today includes me, along with managing producer Emma Morgenstern and senior producer Andres O'Hara.
Our engineer is Jared O'Connell.
Music help from Black Label Music.
The Sporkful is a production of SiriusXM Podcasts.
Our executive producer is Camille Stanley.
And hey, did you know you can listen to The Sporkful on the SiriusXM app?
Yes, the SiriusXM app.
It has all your favorite podcasts, plus over 200 ad-free music channels curated by genre and era.
Plus, live sports coverage.
Does your podcasting app have that?
And there's interviews with A-list stars and so much more.
It's everything you want in a podcast app and music app all rolled into one.
Right now, Sporkful listeners can get three months free of the SiriusXM app by going to SiriusXM.com slash Sporkful.
Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman.
