Inspired by a recent post on The Cut, here are some other new words to describe your food angst

Earlier this week, The Cut published a compelling list of 78 “new emotions,” identifying complex feelings previously unnamed in our everyday lexicon, like “homerriment” (“The feeling of being greeted by a pet or person who is unself-consciously delighted to see you”) and the excellent “moral masturbation” (“The solitary pleasure of being right”).

Among these emotions, I came across “mid-meal regret,” defined by writer Bryan Washington as: “The unsettling feeling that arises when eating one thing while simultaneously knowing you’d rather be eating something else.”

Besides being endlessly relatable (I experience mid-meal regret basically anytime I pick up a salad), this excellent Cut blog inspired me to come up with my own food-related emotions. We all know the sensation of being “hangry”; it’s time we grow our vocabularies to explain the ways food makes us feel.

Recipoplexy

After trying and failing at successfully executing a new recipe, a bubbling of fury so uncontainable that it ends in categorical destruction of whatever poor excuse for food you produced.

When you don’t often venture away from your stable of tried-and-true dishes, failing at an unfamiliar recipe — or, put another way, having a recipe fail you — is not just a cooking disappointment, but a soul-crushing breach of the faith that you placed in your own skill, and an argument against the very concept of risk-taking. I once tried to make a pound cake; the attempt ended with me mangling the flavorless brick with my bare hands, squeezing cake into crumbs in a pure distillation of recipe rage.

Ghrelinsatiable

That special kind of hunger induced by a trip to the grocery store on an empty stomach.

See: snack aisle, hot bar, the entirety of Trader Joe’s.

Named after the “hunger hormone” ghrelin. In a study in which some participants were injected with the hormone and told to bid on food and non-edible items, those participants were willing to pay more for food and less for everything else.

Invis-Imbibe

The sudden questioning of your own corporeality after a fourth failed attempt to get the bartender’s attention.

Am I a specter? Have I escaped this plane of existence? No, I just lack presence.

Transcendine

When taking the first bite of a meal that is so sublime, the immediate understanding that you’ll spend the rest of your life chasing that exquisite high.

The best fried rice I’ve had to this day was in Kyoto, in a ramen shop tucked away in a long, nondescript shopping arcade typical of Japan. There, seated alone, I found gastronomic ecstasy in a bowl of fried rice: grains that were lusciously moist and yet individually defined, lip-smacking umami from a perfect wash of soy sauce caramelized over high heat, the slightest hint of pork from barely there chunks scattered alongside whispers of egg. By now, I’ve forgotten the name of the shop, but the memory of that fried rice remains, the ghost of its flavor just beyond reach.

Leftoverjoyed

An overwhelming sense of love for your parents (or other familial figures), felt most keenly when reheating a Tupperware container of their home cooking.

Each reunion ends with a bundle of painstakingly prepared dishes, either thrust into your hands on your way out the door or left in your fridge as they say goodbye.

Silver Lyan brings microwaved Manhattans, chokeberry sours, and fancy Jello shots to the Riggs hotel

One of the world’s most famous chefs confirms his ritzy Rodeo Drive restaurant

Eater staffers appreciated their time working in restaurants, but there are some things we just can’t unsee

The skills you gain working at a restaurant stick with you forever, whether it’s being able to wash dishes faster than anyone you know, balance a tray of shallow martini glasses without spilling, or master the firm but friendly smile as you tell an entitled, drunk bro that, sorry, there is absolutely no way you can seat him and his date right now but you can put his name on the list.

But those skills usually come with a curse — that is, of knowing exactly how a restaurant runs. Sure, most high-end restaurants are safe and clean and are only guilty of putting an ungodly amount of butter in every dish. But if you’ve worked a chain, fast-food place, or just your average neighborhood pub, you’ve probably seen or heard some shit that now directly impacts your ability to eat out. Maybe you know just how much sour mix the bar goes through, or can’t un-smell the scent of black olives straight from the industrial-sized can, or were doomed to listen to one novelty playlist every shift for four years.

We’ve decided to share our knowledge with our readers, because in order to save ourselves we have to pass it on. It’s like The Ring but for borderline health code violations. Happy eating!

Ketchup

When I worked at a popular retro-designed burger chain, my regular side work included marrying and refilling glass Heinz bottles, which was one of the grossest things I’ve ever done. The practice involves dumping half-empty ketchup bottles into a giant tub, so that all the remaining ketchup gets pooled together for redistribution into washed-out ketchup bottles. The original bottles could be months old or more, and also consider the amount of people who stick things into the ketchup bottles — let’s say, a knife that you’ve already used with bits of burger on it. That little piece of ground beef is now a forever friend in the restaurant’s ketchup universe.

Once you’ve redistributed ketchup into new bottles too many times, the bottles have a tendency to explode open, usually all over you. I finished many shifts with a once-white button down shirt covered in old ketchup, and the smell stays with you forever. I couldn’t eat ketchup for months after quitting. I’ll eat it now but sparingly, partially because I’ve come around to better condiments, and partially because I can’t unsee what I’ve seen. — Stefania Orrù, coordinating producer

She-crab soup

I worked for 82 Queen, which is very popular with Charleston tourists. They had coupons for a free cup of she-crab soup in the visitors booklets at hotels, so every table would use one. Since the soup was so popular, servers would ladle it out themselves instead of the chefs, and it was so viscous and messy that you were sure to get some on your arm or clothes. A warm, cream-based, seafood soup in the Charleston heat is enough to make your stomach curdle. I never loved she-crab soup, but I saw it as a regional dish to be cherished. Now I will rant all day about it on the internet. I will eat crab though — as long as it’s not covered in heavy cream. — Erin Perkins, Eater Charleston editor

Chocolate

I worked as a server and hostess at a chocolate-focused restaurant that served all manner of fondues and lava cakes and sweet martinis. We’d pump chocolate scent onto the sidewalk, and as a hostess I had to stand under the machine, so I’d be smelling chemical chocolate all night. And as a server I’d basically be covered in chocolate sauce at the end of every shift. Customers liked to joke that they could never work there because they’d be stuffing their faces with chocolate all night, but it took me about a year after leaving that job to really enjoy it again. — Jaya Saxena, staff writer

The band MGMT

I worked at Two Hands when I first moved to New York City in 2016, which is a very trendy and busy Australian restaurant (I served Leonardo DiCaprio). After a big brunch rush, you’d kind of turn to another server and go, Is this the eighth time we’ve heard “Electric Feel” today? And then we’d realize we’d have listened to the same 12 songs on repeat all shift. I couldn’t tell you why we were so bad at playlists; I don’t know who was in control, but I just know if I hear that song now, I get a sick feeling in my stomach. — Milly McGuinness, director of audience development

The smell of Subway bread

For all the processed meats that should be unpalatable after working at Subway, it was actually the bread smell that was most off-putting. It sank into fabrics (mostly your uniform) and at times felt like it settled into your skin, too — people often asked what we did to make the store smell like that, and the answer was “nothing,” it’s just whatever they do to the bread in the production facility. Also, instead of drying out, the bread would get lumpy and deformed after a day. We could take home leftovers at the end of the day, and nobody wanted to take the bread. I more or less liked Subway before I worked there, but 10 years later, the smell is still weird. — Tim Forster, Eater Montreal editor

Ice milk

I worked at a seasonal Dairy Queen in Iowa when I was a teenager. Every summer, on the hottest, muggiest days of the year, the ice milk machine would overheat. So instead of doling out frozen ice milk with a curl on top for sundaes, Blizzards, and Peanut Buster Parfaits, straight liquid ice milk would gush out of the machine. The lines grew longer, people grew antsier, and there wasn’t a thing we could do except wait until the machine started working again. Now the sickeningly sweet smell of that ice milk makes me want to gag. It brings back those memories of lines of angry people stacking up, refusing to leave, but willing to share their ire with teenage employees making probably $4 an hour. — Susan Stapleton, Eater Vegas editor

V8 juice

V8 tomato juice has always deeply grossed me out, but the way it stained the glasses I had to bus at a retro-designed diner was deeply upsetting to me. To this day it makes me nauseated if someone sitting near me on a plane orders a can of tomato juice. — Madeleine Davies, daily editor

On the hunt for organization solutions, in this week’s ‘Add to Cart’ newsletter

This post originally appeared on February 6, 2020, in Add to Cart — the weekly newsletter for people who love shopping (almost) as much as they love eating. Subscribe now.

As far as cooking tools go, I’ve been in acquisition mode for some time now, between entering my 30s (and realizing it was time for my old dorm-kitchen tools to go), getting married (and getting a ton of registry gifts), and, um, working in this job. I love new products; I hate figuring out how to store them. Traditional cabinets — wide, deep, with maybe one shelf — just don’t work for the jumble of pots and Dutch ovens and sheet pans and Pyrex containers and other heavy, oddly shaped, and unbendable items I try to stuff in there. It doesn’t help that I live in a small rental in an old New York City building, without the kind of newly renovated kitchen that contains more thoughtfully designed drawers and cabinets.

It’s not that there aren’t any storage solutions or hacks out there. Products promising to ease my cabinet issues fill the aisles of Bed Bath & Beyond, not to mention dedicated spots like the Container Store, and DIY hack videos abound online. And yet nothing has seemed groundbreaking or solved all my problems — which is why I’m cautiously optimistic about the next breed of cookware startups.

Caraway

, a recently founded direct-to-consumer pots-and-pans company whose main selling point, beyond the usual startup cookware pitch (nonstick yet nontoxic, stylish colors, costs less than Le Creuset), is its accompanying storage system. At first blush, the system — consisting of a magnetic rack that looks sort of like a magazine holder, into which you slip your pots on their sides, and a lid holder that’s basically a hanging shoe rack — seems too simple to be all that disruptive. Also, the storage comes with the pots, which lord knows I don’t need more of. But the fundamental idea of considering kitchen storage hand-in-hand with kitchen tools is, to me, a very good one. If this is where cookware startups are headed, I’m all ears.

Things to buy

• The one kitchen organization hack I have found to be helpful thus far is shelf risers. The ones I have now are made of sterile gray metal, so I’m intrigued by these white-washed wood shelf risers by Open Spaces, a new home organization brand from Pattern, which also founded cookware startup Equal Parts.
• Unrelated to my pots-and-pans problems, I strive to be the kind of person who organizes their spices and other dry goods in neat, beautifully lined-up oversized Mason jars, as seen in the kitchen of Annie Kamin of San Francisco’s Dandelion Chocolate, who’s also a 2019 Eater Young Gun. (If only I had the shelf space...)
• For all the Maryland natives out there, this “Spicier Than Old Bay” sweatshirt is for you.
• These porcelain “crinkle cups,” used to serve panna cotta at ABC Pony in Washington, D.C., pack a ton of charm (and perhaps nostalgia for your college beer pong days).

Things to know

• Bottled cocktail company Wandering Barman (mentioned in this newsletter a few months ago) is now opening its own “cocktail brewpub,” where the innovation is producing batch cocktails on-site and making them available on tap.
• As someone only vaguely familiar with tiffins, the cylindrical metal lunchboxes used widely in India, I never knew they were part of a massive, complex daily lunch delivery system in cities like Mumbai.
• Smoothie bowls are a beautiful lie.
• “Making a perfect Bolognese lasagna might seem like an odd form of clout-chasing, but most people can’t party like they’re 25 forever… At a certain point, people want to start signaling that they’ve evolved as humans, and cooking is the perfect cultural signifier for the job.”

Vox Media has affiliate partnerships. These do not influence editorial content, though Vox Media may earn commissions for products purchased via affiliate links. For more information, see our ethics policy.

Plus, Tartine Bakery moves to unionize, and more news to start your day

The two chefs’ teammates include Bad Bunny and Chance the Rapper

Guy Fieri, a longtime basketball enthusiast, and José Andrés, a one-time baseball pitcher, are officially on the roster for this year’s NBA Celebrity Game. Part of the NBA’s All-Star Weekend, the game has ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith coaching one team, with Fieri serving as assistant coach. Jose Andres will actually be playing on the opposing team, coached by Michael Wilbon, also an ESPN commentator. Other players include Bad Bunny and Doritos spokesman Chance the Rapper.

Fieri is a huge Golden State Warriors fan, and can often be found on the sidelines with friend E-40. But will that translate to coaching ability? It can’t hurt, plus Fieri has plenty of experience directing staff at one of his many restaurants. Is there really much of a difference between perfecting layups and perfecting donkey sauce?

Each team buoyed by a culinary icon presents the possibility of fueling up with their respective chef’s dishes. Which is better carbo-loading for a basketball tournament: patatas bravas or chicken parm-eroni?

And in other news...

• Tartine Bakery workers have become members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, with many saying they hope to negotiate better wages. “[Tartine was] expanding like crazy, opening multiple restaurants in a short period of time, and then telling us that they don’t have the money to give us a $1 an hour raise,” said one server. [In These Times]
• PETA is holding a sit-in at Starbucks because non-dairy milks cost extra, a frustrating but common practice at many coffee shops. [Insider]
• The Center for Consumer Freedom ran an ad saying fake meat makes you poop. Then fake meat companies ran ads saying there’s poop in beef. Advertising is great. [CNBC]
• Be careful when eating pizza, because it sent 3,800 people to the ER in 2018. [NY Post]
• Cereal sales are declining, so Kellogg’s is relying on fake meat and Pop Tarts to get through. [Fast Company]
• Dunkin’ is spending a lot of money on new coffee machines in the hopes it’ll make its coffee taste better. [WCBV5]
• A perfect story: Liam Gallagher’s son and Ringo Starr’s grandson got into a fight at a grocery store. [The Guardian]

• All AM Intel Coverage [E]

For the freshest cup at home, you should be grinding the beans yourself with these tool recs, from the Strategist

Even if you’ve purchased the coffee maker of your dreams, your morning cup of coffee is only going to be as good as the beans you’re using. And any coffee snob will tell you that you’re going to get much better results — and fresher-tasting coffee — if you grind coffee beans yourself, as you need them. Coffee beans can stay potent for a while if they’re left whole, but the flavor starts to degrade once they’re ground. So if you want good coffee in your kitchen, you’re going to need a good coffee grinder.

All of the experts we spoke with favor burr grinders over blade grinders. “Burrs give you a consistent grind size, which is the most important thing when it comes to brewing coffee,” says Joanna Lareau, general manager at Blue Bottle Park Slope. “Blades just chop the coffee up into inconsistent sizes,” which can leave some of the coffee “over-extracted,” and some “under-extracted,” she says. “Burrs give you more control over the extraction, so you can tinker with it until you find what tastes good.” To figure out which coffee grinders are worth the investment, we asked baristas, roasters, and coffee-shop owners about the coffee grinders they keep on their own kitchen counters (and sometimes even in suitcases, because good coffee never takes a vacation).

Best overall coffee grinder

Baratza Encore Electric Grinder

The Baratza brand came up more often than any other. Some experts favor their higher-end models, but five of the coffee experts we spoke with recommended this more affordable option, highlighting its quality performance and solid build, especially for the price. “You can spend way more money on the higher-end Baratza models, but this one does the job for a fraction of the cost,” says Yasmina Palumbo, co-owner of New York City’s Mud Coffee. Lareau tells us, “For home use, I 100 percent recommend the Encore. It’s simple to use and super consistent. I’ve had one for almost three years now and it’s still amazing.” Barista and founder of Third Rail Coffee Humberto Ricardo adds that Baratza machines are “designed to be repaired instead of thrown away should something break, which is good for my wallet and for the planet.” To top it off, the Encore has 40 grind settings, so you can easily adjust to whatever coarseness or fineness you’re looking for.

Best (less expensive) coffee grinder

Krups GX5000 Professional Electric Coffee Burr Grinder

Paul Schlader, co-founder and head roaster at New York City–based Birch Coffee, calls this “a more affordable alternative” to most burr grinders. In fact, you’re getting a burr grinder for about the same price you’d pay for a blade grinder. The Krups GX5000 is pretty simple, but it has the essentials: nine settings for selecting your preferred grind size, and a “cup selector” dial to grind the exact amount of coffee you need.

More expert-recommended electric burr coffee grinders

Breville the Smart Grinder Pro

“Breville has consistently provided near-commercial-level quality with consumer-level costs,” says Mike Jones, director of retail at Variety Coffee Roasters. This is his favorite grinder for making coffee at home. “Obviously, there will be some quality differences between this and the best pro grinders, but considering it’s over $2,000 cheaper, I’m not going to complain,” he says. Although this Breville is on the pricey end, Jones says it has a lot to offer anyone looking to seriously upgrade their coffee setup: “It’s easy to use, easy to clean, and is a worthwhile investment if you want to dramatically improve the quality of your coffee at home. Just get a simple pour-over (Chemex, V60, whatever), use filtered water, buy this grinder, and some high-quality beans, and you’ll already be making better coffee than the majority of coffee shops out there. No joke.”

OXO Brew Conical Burr Coffee Grinder with Integrated Scale

Schlader told us that he loves this OXO Barista Brain burr grinder “for a number of reasons,” chief among them is its “built-in intelligent scale.” This feature simplifies “the process of grinding coffee for your average home-brewer, and cuts down on the equipment you’d need,” he says. Enter the number of cups you want and your preferred coarseness, and the grinder spits out exactly what you need. Schlader also likes that the scale is “both preset and customizable.” So if, for example, you prefer more or less coffee than might be traditionally recommended, you can adjust for that too. “You can really play with it depending on your brew method. It’s an incredibly thoughtful product,” he says, adding that he also appreciates details like the UV-blocking plastic hopper that’s designed to “protect the integrity of your beans.”

Baratza Virtuoso+ Conical Burr Coffee Grinder with Digital Timer Display

Baratza’s Virtuoso grinder is Ricardo’s “favorite grinder, and the one I use at home,” he says. It’s generally seen as a step up from the Encore, and he swears by it. “It’s rock-solid and technically superior in ways that get kind of geeky.” He especially likes that it’s “fast” and “relatively quiet,” which makes a big difference. “Grinding coffee is inherently noisy, so getting it done quickly is very much appreciated by your spouse when they’re trying to sleep in.” In addition to fine-tuned grind settings and premium components, the Virtuoso comes with a digital timer and display.

KitchenAid Burr Coffee Bean Grinder in Silver

Jamie McCormick, the co-owner of coffee shop Abraço in the East Village, swears by this KitchenAid grinder, which he uses to evaluate his roasts. “It grinds at an insanely consistent particle size, right up there with my shop’s Mahlkonig EK,” a commercial coffee grinder that costs over $2,500. In addition to the top-notch technicals, “it’s also really classic-looking in the kitchen. Most other contenders to look like they need to be hidden when not in use.” He says it’s “very sturdy,” too, and still worked fine after being dropped on a concrete floor at the roastery. “It looks totaled and unusable, but it still purrs, no problem. It is loud and sounds like the machine it is.”

Baratza Vario-W 986

Steven Sutton, CEO and founder of Brooklyn-based Devócion Coffee, describes the Baratza Vario burr grinder as “a great professional-grade grinder, but for the home.” It’s what he personally uses. “Grind setting is easy and consistent,” he says, but it also has some higher-tech and more advanced capabilities. “It weighs out the coffee to stop at the exact amount you need for your drink. Of course, I prefer when people come into my shop, but with equipment like this, it certainly helps make a ‘professional’ coffee in your house.”

Best burr hand grinders for coffee

Porlex Mini Stainless Steel Coffee Grinder

On the other end of the spectrum are manual hand grinders. The ones featured here employ the same burr grinding method as the electric models, but you have to do the work yourself. Although it might sound strange to take a technological step backwards, grinders have plenty of fans. They’re more compact, which makes them especially great for travel, and you never need to worry about finding an outlet. Lareau uses this stainless-steel mini Porlex hand grinder when she’s traveling, and while she admits it’s sometimes “a pain” to do it by hand, “It’s good at what it does.” Which is the most important part.

Helor 101 Hand Coffee Grinder Conventional Burr

According to Aric Carroll, operations manager at Sey Coffee, “For the money, the Helor Coffee hand grinder is the way to go for home use.” Carroll highlights the “even and consistent particle size, which is extremely important in coffee brewing.” This model is unique in that you can choose between two different “burr sets” — one optimized for coarse grinding and one optimized for fine grinding. You can also, of course, buy both. “I know people are sometimes wary of the involved effort of a hand grinder, but I believe they give you the best bang for your buck,” says Carroll.

Knock Aergrind Hand Grinder

“At Black Fox Coffee, there is only one grinder we sell on the shelves, and that’s because we think it’s the best option out there for both home use and for travel,” says Kris Wood, former coffee director at Black Fox Coffee, of the U.K.-made Aergrind. According to Wood, the high-quality “burr set,” which is “honed to precision, giving a uniform grind size that delivers coffee of the highest caliber.” The best part, as Wood puts it: “It’s also compact enough to take with you on holiday, so you never have to go without a delicious cup of coffee!” And Aeropress users will appreciate the fact that the Aergrind is specifically designed to fit snugly inside an Aeropress canister, making for an even more compact and space-saving package while traveling.

Vox Media has affiliate partnerships. These do not influence editorial content, though Vox Media may earn commissions for products purchased via affiliate links. For more information, see our ethics policy.

Banking on a single concept for an extended period of time is risky

The potatoes are the most versatile item on the Taco Bell menu — hefty enough to be a substantial base, but not so obtrusive that they overwhelm the Quesarito or Crunchwrap Supreme

Taco Bell has long been the subject of worship for fast-food connoisseurs who rightfully praise the portably delectable Crunchwrap Supreme, the craftily engineered Doritos Locos Taco, and the comforting Shredded Chicken Mini Quesadilla. But even aficionados tend to overlook and under-appreciate one specific Taco Bell staple: the potatoes. All of Taco Bell’s offerings that consist of these tasty taters are feats of genius. The Cheesy Fiesta Potatoes are a party in a small bowl, the Loaded Potato Griller is a must-have for those that know the power of putting fries inside a burrito. If you haven’t ordered something with potatoes at Taco Bell, you haven’t lived más.

Take a closer look at the potatoes and you’ll understand why they’re morsels of heaven. First off, their size makes them one of the most versatile staples on the Taco Bell menu — just hefty enough to pile up and be a substantial base of something like the Cheesy Fiesta Potatoes yet not too obtrusive to swap into one of the beloved TBell creations such as the Quesarito or Crunchwrap Supreme; they’re not going to overpower the other components of these delicious delights, but they will enhance them. Fried to perfection, the potatoes’ crispy exterior gives way to warm, fluffy insides will make your mouth water. But the culinary mastery of these spuds goes beyond size and texture, the seasoning similar to that of the classic seasoned beef. Unlike the beef, however, the potatoes’ crispy outsides lock in the signature spices that scream Taco Bell, making a delightful surprise out of the burst of flavor that rushes forth... like a savory Gusher.

Fast food typically has a fairly short window of time to be consumed at top quality, a window these noble taters have widened ever so slightly. Lacking the juiciness of beef or beans, they protect the tortilla, allowing you to leisurely stroll back to your apartment without risking a sloppy tortilla mess. The potatoes might lose some integrity during the journey, but in a brave act of self sacrifice, they will not ruin the meal.

Taco Bell’s potatoes are the building blocks to a number of scrumptious, underrated concoctions. Most notable are the aforementioned Cheesy Fiesta Potatoes, a mound of potatoes topped with the TBell nacho cheese sauce and a dollop of reduced fat sour cream. Add a final touch of either Mild, Hot, or Fire Taco Bell sauce and voila, you have a tiny Mount Everest of taste just waiting to be avalanched into your mouth. The potatoes become the ideal vehicle for hot sauce, and cheese.

Along with giving diners a break from the typical TBell selections, potatoes provide functional value for vegetarians, allowing them to explore beyond a standard cheese quesadilla: ground beef can be swapped for beans or potatoes in almost anything. That means vegetarians can also experience the joy of biting into an amended Crunchwrap Supreme or altered Quesarito.

Taco Bell’s potatoes are the ponytail-and-glasses girl from the teen rom-com. In the past, you were maybe too distracted by Seasoned Beef, the menu’s prom queen, even though she — the potatoes — has been there the whole time, quietly believing in you as you defy your parents wishes and apply to the University of Full Bellies’ elite stoner food program. By the end of the movie, the choice is clear: It’s potatoes. It’s always been potatoes.

Perhaps this all seems hyperbolic, but I am not the only one who has realized this. A quick search through Twitter and you can see other potato evangelists proclaiming their power. One fan educates, “If you haven’t had a cheesy potato griller from taco bell ur missin out bc that shit slaaaaps!!!!” A fellow potato head from Montana revealed on the condition of anonymity that she was once so desperate for Cheesy Fiesta that she and a co-worker at ski resort once borrowed (without asking) a company maintenance truck to drive an hour to the nearest Taco Bell.

“The cheesy fiesta potatoes and the potato soft taco are both extremely underrated. I think it’s because they’re always overpowered by more popular items (Crunchwrap, beefy five layer, Doritos tacos, etc. (which are also stellar items),” she tells me via Twitter DM. “I get the cheesy potatoes every single time I go to TBell. they’re cheap, delicious, and reliable. I became a vegetarian this June and Taco Bell is my fast food hack. They have the most diverse menu for meatless fast food items. Any meat can be replaced by beans/potatoes.”

It is not just a privilege, but a responsibility, to explore all that Taco Bell has to offer. So take our word for it and next time you’re there, go for the Crunchwrap with potatoes or indulge in the Cheesy Fiesta Potatoes and Spicy Potato Soft Taco. Or don’t. The potatoes will still be there waiting for you once you finally find your way.

Gabe Bergado is currently the Entertainment Features Editor at Teen Vogue. He lives in New York City. You can follow him at @gabebergado.

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How a delightful combination of sponge cake, whipped topping, and fresh fruit ended up on dessert menus all over Asia and the United States

“Not too sweet,” my pickiest aunt says with a hint of approval, cutting into a slice of Paris Baguette’s strawberry soft cream cake No. 3. It’s my 24th birthday dinner, and in our sprawling Chinese-Filipino family, I’m one of the youngest — the only American-born one with an international taste in sweets, which is why I’ve insisted on a cake from one of the six Los Angeles locations of Paris Baguette, the popular French-influenced South Korean bakery chain.

Within minutes of blowing out the candles, I’ve inhaled a whole slice of the soft vanilla sponge cake, its texture light as a cloud, the flavor of strawberry and raspberry intermingling with a whipped topping reminiscent of Cool Whip and dotted with freshly sliced strawberries. The cake’s subtle sweetness is a welcome relief from heavy, American-style birthday cakes popularized by bakeries like Christina Tosi’s Milk Bar and SusieCakes, a chain in Southern California. Instead, Paris Baguette’s treat is one of the countless iterations of a dessert universally beloved among East Asians in the West: the Asian fruit cream cake.

Considered a Western-style bakery treat in Asia, the fruit cream cake, also known as the Chinese bakery fruit cake, is ubiquitous in East Asian immigrant communities, and the dessert is popular in some Vietnamese and Filipino immigrant communities as well. It also comes in Japanese and Korean iterations, and can be found everywhere from North America to Australia to Mauritius, a small island nation off the coast of Africa. In Chinese, it’s known as shuiguo dangao, meaning “fresh fruit cake.” The Korean analogue is saengkeulim keikeu, an eye-catching fresh cream cake topped with strawberries popular on birthdays and at other big-ticket celebrations.

For Chinese-Australian Wilhelmina Zhang, the fruit cream cake is pure nostalgia. “It was at every birthday dinner, every gathering in my childhood,” she says. “If no one could decide on a birthday cake, my mum would just go out and grab one.” Growing up in the predominantly Chinese Vancouver suburb of Burnaby, Filipino-Canadian Angelina Lagunzad says she’s been eating Asian fruit cream cake as far back as she can remember. When it came time for her and her sisters to plan their traditional Filipino debuts, an 18th birthday coming-of-age celebration, the cream cake was their natural go-to. “The part that we like the most about it is that it’s really light,” Lagunzad says. “We don’t like cakes that are super heavy.”

Unlike a strawberry shortcake, which originated from a sweet English biscuit recipe and is crumbly and heavier in texture, the Asian fruit cream cake typically uses a traditional lighter sponge cake base, which distinguishes itself from the similar-tasting French genoise in that it contains no added fat such as butter or oil. Both batter types, however, require separation of the whites and yolks; the whites are folded into the batter after they’re turned into a fluffy meringue. A few Chinese bakeries, like New York City’s Fay Da, prefer to use a chiffon base, which calls for oil or butter to increase the moistness of the finished product. The whipped topping that ices and fills the cake, in most cases, consists of a vegetable oil base similar to Cool Whip in lieu of heavier traditional whipping cream. Often adorned with strawberries, fruit cream cakes might also be topped with kiwis, peaches, mango or even the pungent-smelling durian, depending on the season and the bakery’s geographic region.

Matthew Kang/Eater

For first-generation and immigrant Asians in the West, the cake harks back to childhood birthdays with parents who scorned sugary, confetti-soaked buttercream confections in favor of something more subtle; it also represents a departure from Asian desserts like Chinese cruller donuts, sweet rice cakes, stuffed pastries, and moon cakes. The love for the cake has inspired memes garnering thousands of likes on Subtle Asian Traits, a Facebook group and meme page with over 1.6 million members. Founded by a group of young Chinese Australians, the page has grown to include Asians of every stripe online, albeit with a strong East and Southeast Asian slant. A March 2019 image and text post by Vancouver-based Chinese American Alyssa Therrien captioned “ok but why isn’t anyone talking about the deliciousness of Chinese fruit cakes” received over 11,000 likes; Therrien says she loves the cake so much that she plans to have it at her wedding.

Chinese-Canadian Virginia Su, who’s never known a birthday in her family without the cake, says it reflects the general lack of aggressive sweetness in Chinese desserts. “I don’t know why, but in Chinese culture, a good dessert is one that isn’t overpowering,” Su says. “It’s something that you can enjoy after your meal that doesn’t overpower and override what you had.”

The Asian fruit cream cake has no singular origin story — when asked, several experts in food history, Chinese-American food, and East Asian Studies were stumped — although all guesses point to historical influences from the West. Irene Yoo of Food52 has chronicled its enduring popularity as a Christmas treat in South Korea, linking the festive cake to the Christian holiday. According to Frida Lee, a Wordpress blogger with a degree in East Asian Studies, Chinese people began baking Western-style pastries, breads, and cakes in Taiwan and Hong Kong. Taiwanese bakers learned to make Western-style goods during Japanese occupation in the late 1930s in the Meiji period — a time when the emperor adopted Western industrial advances and resulting cultural influences. In Hong Kong, over a century and a half of British colonization left a legacy of European culinary technique in local cuisine, one reflected in dim sum egg tarts as well as fruit cream cake.

However, even this broad explanation can’t account for the convergent evolution of iterations like Los Angeles-based Phoenix Bakery’s strawberry cake. Located in LA’s Chinatown, Phoenix Bakery is run by the Chan family, who have been baking their signature cake — made of sponge cake, filled with fresh strawberries, and coated with almond slivers — since the bakery opened in 1938. According to Ken Chan, son of founder Fung Chow Chan, his uncle Lun brought over his recipe from mainland China. “None of us really know how [the cake recipe] came about,” says Youlen Chan, Lun’s son. The bakery struggled to sell the cake until the 1960s, he says, when it became a household name in greater Los Angeles.

New York-based Taiwanese bakery Fay Da, on the other hand, traces its recipe to Taiwan. According to general manager Chi Chou, her father, Han Chou, developed the bakery’s recipe — which uses a slightly drier chiffon base instead of sponge, which produces a lighter and fluffier texture — in the United States after apprenticing under a chef at a U.S. Army base in Taiwan. Chou says that according to her father, the fruit cream cake already existed in some form in 1960s Taiwan, although improvements in flour processing have made today’s version much smoother in texture.

That fruit cream cake is still seen as Western-style baking in Asia reflects the dual nature of the delicate dessert — on one continent, it’s an indulgent meal-finisher that owes its existence to European and American colonization; on others, it’s a slice of respite from buttercream-laden birthday cakes that’s loved by a few communities but largely overlooked by the general population. In essence, the Asian fruit cream cake is both happy byproduct and fallout from globalization. Its popularity strengthens cultural ties to places that members of the Asian diaspora may have never visited, but it’s also an example of the gulfs between Asians in the West, people from Asia, and everyone else.

“[W]hile [East Asian bakeries] certainly serve as a delicious tether for visitors and immigrants on either side of the Pacific, their greatest treat may be the sense of community they foster for immigrant communities outside of their origin nations,” Lilian (now Lio) Min wrote at MyRecipes’ Extra Crispy section, referring to Paris Baguette and Taiwanese chain 85 Degrees. Whenever Asian Americans like me or Min write about foods that tug immigrant and first-generation heartstrings, we invariably run into one large stumbling block — that our entire framework is defined by the otherness of Asians in the Western world.

Though Min doesn’t specifically mention the fruit cream cake in their piece, they hint at an inherent tension in discussing Asian food in English-language media, even among writers of Asian descent — that these dishes have an entirely different significance and cultural context in non-English corners of the internet, media outlets, and the world at large. “While I’ve been cavalierly referring to East Asian bakeries as, well, East Asian bakeries, this is only true in the West,” Min wrote.

Until I saw a fruit cream cake meme in Subtle Asian Traits a little over a year ago, I had no idea that it had such widespread cultural resonance. On any given evening, thousands of people who will likely never meet will sit at tables around the world, blowing out the candles on near-identical cakes. Though clearly less iconic than boba milk tea in constructing Asian-American identity, the fruit cream cake seems to signify an even larger universal Asian experience in the West. It’s an unsung childhood treat for immigrant and first-generation Chinese, Taiwanese, Vietnamese and Filipino kids in the United States, Canada, and Australia that can make thousands around the world smash that Facebook like button.

At the same time, acknowledgement of the fruit cream cake’s universality rings somewhat hollow. In Jenny Zhang’s Eater piece on pearl milk tea and boba liberalism, she makes it clear that the link between Asian-American identity and boba indicates the fraught condition of an Asian diaspora searching for home and finding it, in a problematic way, in food-as-identity politics. Applying the same tropes of identity construction over shared experience to the Asian fruit cream cake would not only oversimplify its narrative, but also obscure the other ways the cake is significant, such as in how it unintentionally lends credence to the stereotype that Asians prefer milder desserts. (In two independent studies in the journal Food Quality and Preference studying differences in sweetness preference between white Australians versus Malaysian and Japanese consumers, neither group of researchers found compelling evidence to suggest either Asian ethnic group preferred foods that are less sweet.)

In addition, the Asian fruit cream cake serves as a quiet reminder of bidirectional culinary influence between colonizing nations and the places over which they have historically held power. Although the debates over cultural appropriation in American food writing today might imply that “borrowing” culinary styles is a recent, one-way phenomenon committed again people of color, plenty of much-beloved dishes demonstrate the long legacy of Asian cultures co-opting Western ingredients and technique to create dishes entirely their own. From the Asian fruit cream cake to Korean budaejjigae to the entire subcategory of Japanese yoshoku, the annals of Asian cooking are littered with examples of how globalization has shaped the foods that people from Asian immigrant households are so intimately familiar with. Foods like these, and like the fruit cream cake, are easy fodder for many Asians in the West looking to invoke nostalgia for their immigrant upbringings, but this sentimental approach disregards the violent colonial history from which these dishes emerged.

It would be too easy to pigeonhole the Asian fruit cream cake as an even larger global cultural touchpoint for the Asian diaspora in the West. In truth, the Paris Baguette cream cake I ate last fall is more than that — underneath the elegant simplicity of cake, fruit, and cream lies a complex web of tensions between Asians in the West and the East, untidy origin stories, and Western colonization. To me, however, the taste is still sweet. Not too sweet.

Patricia Kelly Yeo is a freelance food, health, and culture journalist in Los Angeles.

From the Editor: Everything you missed in food news last week

This post originally appeared on February 1, 2020 in Amanda Kludt’s newsletter “From the Editor,” a roundup of the most vital news and stories in the food world each week. Read the archives and subscribe now.

This week we got to hold a very fun party at the Manhattan restaurant Chinese Tuxedo to celebrate this editorial package put out by Eater New York. The guest list included longtime established restaurateurs, up-and-coming power players, and all manner of other fun people who like good food and drink.

The editorial package examines what power means now in New York City dining and how it’s shifted over the last decade or so. Who are the secret power brokers behind the scenes? Does PR matter? How much does it cost to open something these days? Who is the new guard and what does the Establishment have to say about it and their legacy? Where are the uber-rich dining these days? (Spoiler: sushi bars and members-only restaurants.) Are there even celebrity chefs anymore?

This week, The Spotted Pig closed and Daniel Humm exited the NoMad. They are very different stories but both signal an end of a certain era. It was a fitting coincidence for me in a week where we celebrated this new wave of influence. I’m very much looking forward to the restaurants, projects, and talent the new decade will bring.

On Eater

• Intel: The restaurant community mourned the passing of artist Jason Polan; The NoMad Hotel group officially split from chef Daniel Humm; Chef Pim Techamuanvivit voiced her annoyance at delivery platforms that made it seem like her Michelin-starred restaurant Kin Khao was offering delivery; the Spotted Pig closed, and its closure (not the events leading to it) was “the saddest thing” owner Ken Friedman had to face in his professional life; Danny Meyer opened a rooftop restaurant with views of D.C’s Nationals Park called Anchovy Social; no one asked for a Chicago baseball hat with a deep dish pizza on it and yet here we are; superstar London chef Clare Smyth will open a destination restaurant in a giant development in Sydney; and Brett Kavanaugh brought crappy pizza to the Supreme Court cafeteria.
• Sometimes you just need to do something stupid. Say hello to Bowl Bowl.
• The Move: always go to the local grocery stores when traveling.
• Inside the one diner in New Hampshire that every single candidate has to visit.
• Christina Tosi is my idol so this Ryan Sutton review of the new flagship Milk Bar location is a true testament to the editorial freedom we allow the restaurant critics.
• The coronavirus is reigniting old strains of racism and xenophobia that frame Chinese people as uncivilized diners.

Off Eater

• The next frontier in interior makeovers: Playhouse flippers. [Curbed]
• Say hello to Wellness Barbie. [The Cut]
• On the hotdish beat this week: The Omaha World-Herald and The New York Times.
• How appliances and cookware became markers of stability and sophistication. [The Atlantic]

Plus, Wuhan noodles have become a symbol of solidarity, and more news to start your day

Stanley Tucci set to star in new culinary documentary series about Italy and food

Internet boyfriend and Big Night star/co-director Stanley Tucci is taking a culinary tour across Italy in CNN’s latest original series, Deadline reports. The upcoming four-part documentary, called Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy, will take Tucci to Rome, Sicily, Milan, Florence, and other regions of Italy, where he’ll take a deeper look at the country’s history, culture, and people through food and drink.

Tucci, whose family has roots in the region of Calabria, is a noted fan of Italy and its cuisine. In addition to his aforementioned role in Big Night, a film about two Italian immigrant brothers running a restaurant on the New Jersey Shore, Tucci spent a year living in Florence with his family in the 1970s, and has published his own cookbooks.

“I wanted to do this series because I am fascinated by the diversity of Italian cuisine and set out to gain a better understanding of the country’s rich history and culture,” Tucci told Deadline. “This was a passion project and love letter to the place where my family is from.”

And in other news…

• Grubhub doubled its restaurant options in Q4 of 2019 by adding 150,000 “non-partner” restaurants — which basically means adding menus from restaurants without permission, a questionable tactic that has earned the ire of restaurateurs. [NRN]
• Amid coronavirus panic, Wuhan noodles — fiery hot, springy, coated in toasted sesame paste — have become a symbol of solidarity with the residents of the quarantined city. [Washington Post]
• Lesser-known restaurant brands like Bar Louie are going out of business, as competition to get customers through the door heats up. “There are too many restaurants,” explains one senior restaurant analyst. [Bloomberg News]
• In a weird Valentine’s Day/Birds of Prey promotion, select Burger King stores will give you a free Whopper in exchange for a printed photo of your ex. [Yahoo! Lifestyle]
• In-N-Out made shoes that “look like you’ve shoved your feet into two of its cups.” [Vice]
• The Good Place, in menu form. [Slate]

• All AM Intel Coverage [E]

According to Chinese Merchants Association spokesperson Edward Siu, foot traffic in the area has dropped by 50 percent since coronavirus hit local headlines

The unlikely hybrid comes to the South Bay from China by way of TikTok

The Mexican influence starts and ends with the fact that they’re served with tortillas