A Hot Dog Is a Sandwich - Ranch vs. Blue Cheese

Episode Date: February 10, 2021

Today, we discuss which is better: Ranch or Blue Cheese To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This, this, this, this is Mythical. In August 2019 at the National Buffalo Wing Festival in Buffalo, New York, Drew Serza, a.k.a. the Wing King of Buffalo, said, we're going to have Hidden Valley Ranch dressing available for all of our out-of-town guests. This inclusion left Buffalonians concerned that the world had no regard for the proper dipping sauce for wings. Were they wrong? Today we discuss ranch or blue cheese. This is a Hot Dog is a Sandwich. Ketchup is a smoothie. Yeah, I put ice in my cereal, so what? That makes no sense. A hot

dog is a sandwich. A hot dog is a sandwich. What? Welcome to our podcast, A Hot Dog is a Sandwich, the show where we break down the world's biggest food debates. I'm your host, Josh Scherer. And I'm your host, Nicole Hendy-Zadit. And today we are asking ranch versus blue cheese. This is maybe the most important, I think, life-changing, life-altering question we've ever asked. I couldn't agree with you more. Not necessarily, but I think this does strike one of those pain points with a regional audience, and it's going to lead to us getting a lot more one stars. Please, please, a disclaimer. If you are from somewhere that

has a preference on your sauces, please do not come for us. We are butt messengers of our crap opinions. No, no, no. You come to us, Buffalo. Stupid Bills mafia breaking table. Actually, I really do love the Buffalo Bills. They're a very fun football team to watch. Yeah. Wasn't

the Buffalo Bills... Oh, no. Nicole's talking sports. Nicole, do it. Dennis Rodman was on the Bulls. Wasn't the Buffalo Bills... Oh no, Nicole's talking sports. Nicole, do it. Dennis Rodman was on the Bulls. That's the Chicago Bulls. I'm so sorry. The Buffalo Bills of football. Golly. Anyways, people from Buffalo will tell you

that blue cheese is the only way to go with chicken wings. However, blue cheese and ranch are both commonly served with wings. When you go to Wingstop, my favorite wing chain, sorry, Buffalo Wild Wings, you got a lot of TVs. Oh my gosh, they have so many TVs. That's why you go. That's why you go.

That's why I do go. I miss going to Buffalo Wild. If there was one experience that I could bring back from quarantine, it'd be Buffalo Wild Wings. Not like hugging people or seeing friends or anything like that. Or going to parties. No, no, no. It would just be sitting at Buffalo Wild Wings alone Not like hugging people or seeing friends or anything like that. Or going to parties. Or going to parties. No, no, no.

It would just be sitting at Buffalo Wild Wings alone drinking a half-flat Coors Light at 11.30 a.m. on a Sunday to watch football. But no, ranch and blue cheese are both commonly eaten, but Buffalo really loves

to claim ownership over the Buffalo wing despite it spreading so far. So where do you stand on this? I love blue cheese all day every day not even as a wing dipping sauce i just like blue cheese dressing i like blue cheese crumbles i like it on a wedge salad i like it you know on the side of you know a steak have one time i made a steak and i made blue cheese compound butter wow what a wonderful experience yum oh that does sound good yeah

yeah i love blue cheese and i think it's versatile and i think people just have a weird aversion to mold you think blue cheese is versatile i think it's so versatile you didn't name a lot of foods that i i didn't necessarily well you kind of just named like wing salad and then steak but steak wouldn't really be blue cheese like would you put blue cheese dressing on a steak because blue cheese dressing right it's like what are we arguing blue cheese dipping sauce well yeah like dipping sauce dressing oh oh I just like blue cheese in general I brought up a list of blue cheeses that I like well no but I mean a lot of people like as a kid I didn't know that blue cheese was a standalone cheese because I only had it in dressing, but I mean, a lot of people, like, as a kid, I didn't know that blue cheese was a standalone cheese, because I only had it

in dressing form, and I'd only had, like, bad dressing form, and I think bad blue cheese dressing is much worse than bad ranch. What is bad blue cheese dressing? Wishbone blue, we're never getting a wishbone. I love wishbone. Wishbone blue cheese dressing, there is no blue cheese in there. It's like a little bit of mold powder. My parents love

wishbone. And then, all parents love wishbone blue cheese dressing. That's why we grew up with it. It's like a little bit of mold powder. My parents love wishbone. All parents love wishbone blue cheese dressing. That's why we grew up with it. Tastes like America. It does. It tastes like corn syrup and chemicals. America. America. French dressing? Wow. I have nothing but, I love wishbone. I love the shape of their bottles. Great. I will, I think

Ken's Steakhouse is way too highfalutin. That's the best blue cheese dressing. It's a good blue cheese dressing. Of all time. I can't bring myself to buy like fancy salad dressings because I'm either buying like Hidden Valley or like a Wishbone equivalent or I'm making my own. I'm like, I ain't spending no $7.49 for Paul Newman. Do you like making your own ranch? Yes. I love making my own ranch.

Is it as good as a bottled ranch? It's not as good as. It's good as a bottled ranch? It's not as good as... As good as Cisco Ranch? We need to offer up a correction here for a previous episode. I don't even know what the heck we were talking about. We mentioned how good Cisco Ranch is. We brought up specifically Outback. Yeah.

Outback makes a ranch in-house. Oh, no! No, but I mean, to me, that's a testament of... I love taking foods that are like really good prefab, like stovetop stuffing, right? Like I love making my own homemade version of stovetop stuffing and trying to make it taste exactly like that. And I love doing that with like Cisco Ranch. For those who don't know what I'm talking about, Cisco is the gigantic food distribution company that delivers like 10-gallon drums of, what's the one? Cattleman's Barbecue Sauce?

There's brands that only exist that go through Cisco and sell in 10-gallon increments. And so every crappy chain across America uses the same barbecue sauce that comes from Cisco. Even small mom and pop restaurants. Even small mom and pops, yeah, they'll source. Cisco does a lot of good things. Like a lot of diners especially that have really big menus and aren't specializing. Very true. Yeah.

Isn't blue cheese dressing just ranch plus blue cheese? That's okay. This comes to a very good point because ranch is the mother sauce. Blue cheese dressing is the variation on the mother sauce. It's like you have hollandaise, then you add shallots and tarragon and you get bernays. You have ranch dressing and you add blue cheese crumbles and you get blue cheese dressing, which is why I think ranch is superior. Escoffier is rolling in his grave right now.

The disrespect that you are giving towards his mother. That's fine. Tear down your French cooking idols. All right. Because the Hidden Valley Corporation made so much more money and made so many more people happy. More money than Escoffier? You don't know that.

Where are your sets? I feel like I know that. Where are your sets? God, I I know that. Where are your sets? God, I don't. Oh, rifle through the papers. No, but actually Hidden Valley is worth a ton of money. They got Top Chef money. They sponsor entire seasons of Top Chef Last Chance Kitchen, which is also one of the most

brilliant digital marketing devices. Last Chance Kitchen? So Top Chef, Hidden Valley would occasionally sponsor like a quick fire challenge on Top Chef where it would literally be like. Those are fun. Yeah. Oh, they're so fun. Yeah.

And they can get all wacky with it. Like their Reynolds Wrap sponsored one one year and they literally had to only cook using Reynolds Wrap as the like equipment. So people were like fashioning like saute pans out of just Reynolds Wrap. Oh, that's so fun. It's so fun. Sign me up. Can I go? What?

On the show? On Top Chef? Can I go? Yeah. I don't think I would win, but I would just be happy to be there. A lot of people are like, Josh, you should go on Top Chef. And I was like, literally, one of the first challenges there is called the prep relay, where it's like you have to perfectly break down or trust chickens.

Oh, no. Yeah, it's a lot of technical stuff that I have no idea. I feel like I could go on Chopped, Cutthroat Kitchen, all the garbage Food Network shows. Yeah. Top Chef is an entirely different level that I could not hack it on. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I would love to be a silly guest judge doing things that like dashi and like make it make the make the flotant or whatever no i can't do that can't do that coquille saint jacques no no what am i gonna do with that don't even say what scoffy but anyways

hidden valley they sponsored an entire series of last chance Kitchen on Top Chef, which is when a contestant gets kicked off Top Chef now, you go to BravoTV.com. This is an ad for Bravo at this point. So funny. You go to BravoTV.com and there's a digital only series where like the last two chefs that got kicked off cook against each other. Oh. And then the person who like runs the table gets back into the competition. Like Ink Master. Probably.

I don't watch Ink Master. That's just tattoo Top Chef. I watch a lot of Ink Master for some reason. Like Ink Master. Probably. I don't watch Ink Master. That's just tattoo Top Chef? I watch a lot of Ink Master for some reason. You watch all those shows. You watch the glass blowing one? Oh my God, they're so good.

I love the glass, Blown Away, what a phenomenal show. I love Ink Master and I love Blown Away, but I don't watch Real Housewives. Oh yeah, well I'll follow any show

that's that structure of Top Chef. Yeah. Where it's like a bunch of contestants get kicked off every week, different challenge. Yeah. Like quick fire for 10 minutes. They absolutely nailed that format. What I'm saying is Hidden Valley in 1970 got bought by the Clorox Corporation.

No way. It's actually a crazy story. That's brilliant. So ranch dressing was invented by a dude who I think he was a plumber. He had a ranch in Los Angeles. Yeah. He literally had. Not in Los Angeles, in California. Sorry. Yeah. It's kind of in the Central Coast. I think the Santa a plumber. He had a ranch in Los Angeles. Yeah, he literally had. Not in Los Angeles, in California.

Sorry. Yeah, it's kind of in the Central Coast. I think the Santa Ynez region. And he literally started a dude ranch, which was really popular back in the day from the movie City Slickers with Billy Crystal. I love him. I watched When Harry Met Sally for the first time recently. Never seen it. Why is the ADD firing so hard today?

I don't know. Did you have a Diet Coke? Oh, I literally have an empty Red Bull next to me. makes sense that makes sense we cracked the code but anyways dude ranch is like really popular back then he starts a ranch for tourists to come in uh and he was like we need a signature food product for our ranch okay uh and so it was originally called something else but then he renamed the ranch hidden valley ranch um eventually but he literally was just like, let's whip up a salad dressing. And they would cook for people and they would make this and people would go, wow, this is the best thing I've ever eaten in my life. And he would send them home with souvenirs with the branded Hidden Valley Ranch jars.

And then they started making the ranch powder because it was very shelf stable. And then it blew up. 1970, got bought by the Clorox Corporation. Went wide of distribution and then in the 90s it surpassed italian dressing as the top selling dressing in all of america wow what an acquisition but how quick that happened it's well it's ranch is delicious i'm not denying that ranch i agree and it's not a great i love to dip my fries in ranch i love to dip my pizza in ranch but blue cheese let me tell you why blue cheese is so good. Because things that are polarizing are my favorite.

Like you either love them or you hate them. Like no one kind of likes blue cheese. You either are obsessed with it, love it, want to slather it on everything, or you absolutely hate it like Maggie. Oh, I thought you meant you absolutely hate it like the way you hate Maggie. No, I love Maggie. I was like, my God, Nicole, she's right. She listens to everything we say. Maggie's the best.

Although she hates blue cheese, but whatever. That's an oversight. But yeah, I think foods that are polarizing like that are my favorite because they have this crazy fan base. And when you try blue cheese with different things, it changes your perspective on food because, you know, it's just mold. You're eating mold. And I have a mold allergy. Wait, you want to hear? I have a mold allergy and I'm lactose intolerant and I still love blue cheese dressing. I don't care if I get sick and die and throw up. I will still enjoy my blue cheese. No one eats more dairy than the lactose intolerant community. It's literally like the forbidden fruit. It's like telling a teen that they can't, it's the prohibition theory.

Exactly. Like you tell someone you can't have something so you want it more. Yeah. Except instead of, you know, getting arrested by the police

for illegally drinking alcohol and you poop your pants. Imagine if you would go to jail for having dairy products. Never that. But yeah, I think ranch is, you know,

just everyone loves ranch. Ranch is accessible. Ranch is friendly. Ranch is like the guy in school that would like let everyone cheat off of his papers. So that's why you liked him. Herbie. Herbie. Herbie in high school.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Go for the third. That's nice. Super nice guy. Liked by everybody. Like, oh my God. Herbie was liked by literally everybody. I copied every single test answer from him in AP Econ senior year.

Yeah. And he was totally cool that he'd like angle the papers in different ways so different people could look at it. Yeah. But Herbie ain't going nowhere in life. No, he's like a really successful engineer.

I know what you're saying. I know what you're saying. My point has to be made regardless. But you know, that annoying theater kid that everyone hated and like had like two friends.

Kyle. Sorry, go ahead. Yeah. Kyle, you know, hated by some, loved by others, doesn't care what other people think, enjoys life for what it is.

That is blue cheese dressing and that's why it's the best. Also, works so well with the spice of a wing. Yeah, he's like an art curator in New York now. Well, Kyle, I appreciate you, Mr. Blue Cheese Man. Kyle is my blue cheese. Someone from my high school is going to listen to this and like DM me on Instagram and be like, hey, it's my best step. My 10-year high school reunion was supposed to be 2020 i was class of 2010 oh i'm sorry i know i wanted to go back and dunk on

everybody yeah you would have totally dunked on everybody i know i like i'm the technically the most famous person for my high school graduating class except for maybe uh kalini fagata for her uh work on 90 day fiancee. So Kalini, shout out. You're a great friend and track and field teammate and I'm very happy for your success. But I'm more popular than you. By a little bit. She's climbing though and I'm falling because of this podcast.

It's so rambling. Let's talk about blue cheese versus ranch specifically. Okay. On a wing. Okay. Well, like what do you think actually works flavor-wise? Because I agree with you that blue cheese is polarizing, which I don't think is necessarily a negative.

I know I talk about populism in foods and that if more people like something, there's wisdom in crowds. As Don DeLillo famously said, the future belongs to crowds. And if that is true, then ranch is the winner in this situation. But I agree with you that these polarizing foods, they're polarizing because they offer a lot. Yes. Like nothing that's inoffensive tasting is polarizing. Blue cheese is, you know, really bold. And I love that flavor.

Absolutely. But on a wing is I think what we should actually be like really determining this on. It's always blue cheese for me. It's always been blue cheese. And I specifically date men who like ranch so uh they don't get in my way of success yes it's true my my favorite thing i i agree with you actually i will almost exclusively go blue like i'm thinking about wing stop right because that's my main frame of reference for wings i go to wing stop i get 20 wings i get 10

buffalo i get five some sort of like sweet one, and then five of like a dry rubbed, you know, kitchen thing. Yeah, that's good. But it's got to be always like 50% buffalo. Buffalo, yeah. And you only, I don't even like the other wings. I just eat them as a palate cleanser to remind me how good the buffalo wings are. That's a good, that's a good point.

Thank you, that's my strategy. Wow, that's actually really smart. Yeah, but if I'm also getting fries, and I don't love Wingstop's fries, but I like having something starchy to go. They put sugar in the seasoning salt on it, and it's just like, meh. It doesn fries, I don't love Wingstop's fries. We like having something starchy to go. They put sugar in the seasoning salt on it, and it's just like, meh. I don't like fries. I just want to be slathered in sauce.

Yeah, I feel that. Just butter me up, baby. Throw me in the vinegar sauce. Sauce on the face. But I like to dip my – I prefer fries with ranch, but I do prefer buffalo wings with blue cheese. I think there's something about how – But didn't you just say we're arguing the wings? I know.

We are. We are. We are for now. But I mean, like, I think we should go wing argument and then a general argument. Okay. Right? So wings, I do always go blue cheese

because like there's an argument to be made for both, right? Ranch, technically, I don't believe ranch would be the mother sauce for blue cheese because ranch, I think, has the addition of herbs. You just said it though. Yeah, I like to say a lot of things but you just gotta argue in circles are you going back well no base definition of ranch right i think if you if you went with the most basic definition of ranch which would probably include hidden valley then i think that blue cheese would be a derivative of the mother sauce because ranch is pretty much just like a couple different

types of dairy you probably got like sour cream you probably got buttermilk you know you probably got i don't know maybe something else and then uh a lot of times there's a whole milk in there kind of round it out uh and then you have mayonnaise any sort of emulsification of egg and oil and then some sort of vinegar oh but i mean how many herbs are actually in hidden valley ranch green how many green specks like. How many green specks? Like, how many green specks per square milliliter? Four different kinds of green specks. One of them is a dark green that might be black pepper.

I think it's probably the black pepper. Okay. But when I make ranch at home, like, I like it to be really herbaceous, right? Somebody gets a ton of, like, parsley and dill and chives in there. But, like, Hidden Valley Ranch, I think if you add blue cheese to Hidden Valley Ranch, that's just blue cheese dressing. Yeah, I agree with you. Yes, I agree with you.

I don't know where I'm going with this. I don't know what you're saying right now. It's bothering me. Me too. What's wrong? I got the brain fog, man. Do you want to drink water? No, no, Red Bull, Red Bull, Red Bull.

So the value of ranch dressing with buffalo wings would probably come from the freshness of the herbs to offset the fatty spiciness, to the herbs to offset the fatty spiciness either offset or complement the fatty spiciness of the buffalo sauce whereas the blue cheese you get that heavy offensively delicious blue cheese flavor to sort of like um what is it called in fashion power clashing i color blocking it's where you wear like two very different patterns on like your pants

and your jacket. Maybe pattern clashing? Okay, I don't know. I'm not a fashionista. Rhett and Link's assistant, Jenna, was like, Rhett and Link are so great at power clashing.

And I was like, dang, that's a cool word. Yeah. So there's like, you know, that theory where you have two very different things coming together,

but if they're both so strong and so awesome, they create a beautiful harmony inside your mouth or inside your body. That's how I feel with the cheese. Yeah, 100%. I think i might agree with you because i i like big bold guy fieri flavor town flavors for sure yeah i think i would agree that i but i don't think it's

the only in the same way that i get distracting dummy flavors to make my buffalo wings taste better yeah that is how i operate with ranch and blue cheese my buffalo wings as well i go two in the blue cheese one in the ranch to remind me of how good the blue cheese is so what what i do when i eat wings is i one buffalo wing dipped in blue cheese one buffalo wing dipped in ranch one barbecue wing to reset my palate then back to the buffalo wings two in the two in the blue cheese then back to like, like, you know, the Korean dry rub. Is this, like, how people map out, like, football games? Yeah, yeah. This is me, like, game, like, diagramming out.

Are you gamifying eating wings right now? You have to. This is so funny. To maximize the pleasure of eating wings, you have to over-diagram it to death. No. Until it's not fun anymore. No, I keep it simple.

You just get the buffalo wings and then you dip them in the blue cheese and then maybe if you really want you can dip the carrot stick in the ranch but that's the only time

because it's a pilot cleanser. Are you supposed to eat the carrot sticks? I always, oh my god, are you kidding me? Some of the, instead of you getting weird

like obtuse, odd flavors of wings, I eat the vegetables on the side. Those aren't even edible. It's like the kale that lines the buffet at the Sizzler. They're totally edible.. I eat the vegetables on the side. Those aren't even edible. It's like the kale that lines the buffet at the Sizzler.

They're totally edible. Do you eat the kale in the Sizzler buffet? No, I don't go to Sizzler buffets. You don't go to Sizzler buffets. That's America. No, so is Wishbone. True.

No, I, instead of me getting more wings on the side that are like weird flavors that I would never eat anyways, actually I would eat them, but whatever. They would muddy my experience

of the buffalo wing. So yeah, I dip the carrot in the ranch to neutralize the intense, delicious, beautiful blue cheese and buffalo flavors. Yeah, I don't like raw carrots. It's got soft teeth. That's okay. You can ask them to blanch it for you.

Can you just drop this carrot in the fryer with the wings? Yeah, just, and then bring it out to you in a mush. And that can be your palate cleanser. That makes sense. So win blue cheese well i don't know let's talk okay because we're talking about ranch ranch versus blue cheese with regards to wings and i i do agree with you that blue cheese are better blue cheese are i do agree with you that blue cheese is better with specifically buffalo wings however if there's no buffalo sauce involved on wings, because buffalo wing, right? Like buffalo wings specifically to me at least mean some sort of vinegary hot sauce mixed with, could be butter, it could be some sort of chemically emulsified fat thing. But it's like vinegar-based hot sauce mixed with some sort of fat on the wings. But like,

I don't know, do like lemon pepper dry wings count as buffalo wings or are those just wings? I think those are just wings. So it's got to be specifically buffalo. I agree that buffalo and blue cheese is the best combination. I think there is a reason that people have eaten that. It is a beautiful power clash in the mouth. However, like I ranch up most of my food. Yeah, you do.

And I especially ranch up a lot of my chicken. Yeah, you do. Would you put like on just a straight fried naked chicken wing, maybe with a little like dry Cajun spice on it? Would you go ranch or blue cheese on like a dry rubbed wing? I don't enjoy dry rubbed wings enough to say that. When I'm going to a Buffalo Wild Wings or a Wing Sub, whatever, I'm getting Buffalo Wings.

That's what I'm doing. Do you get any other flavors? There's like a moonshot. The mango habaneras are really good. But I'm a purist when it comes to wings. I don't want the Korean chili spice. I don't care for the Rajeon Cajun. I don't care for the lemon pepper.

I just love buffalo sauce so much that I think it muddies my experience. Well, how do you feel about like, I mean, you mentioned Korean, I mean, Korean chicken wings are one of the greatest things in all of the world. I used to live in Koreatown. I lived right next to the prince that had like some of the best chicken wings. Like if I'm going to the prince or the OB bear, that's different. But if I'm going to Buffalo Wild Wings, like I just give me some buffalo wings. Let me pretend to be interested in the football game. Let me drink a beer., give me some Buffalo Wings, let me pretend to be interested in the football game, let me drink a beer,

like, give me some blue cheese, I'm done, you know? I don't need all the, I don't need the extraneous information. You're watching the football game? Pretending,

I said pretending! The person who just said Dennis Rodman played for the Buffalo Bills? I'm sorry, I mixed them up. It happens. He had cool hair

and is friends with Kim Jong-un, O.J. Simpson is the one who played for the Buffalo Bills. Oh. Yeah. You might know him from his work in other things. Yeah. He wrote a book. He's like some sort of a driver? is friends with kim jong oh jay simpson is the one who played for the buffalo bills oh yeah you might know him from his work in other things yeah he wrote a book he's like some sort of a driver yeah he also wrote a book oh yeah he wrote a book called if i did it yeah likes to collect

memorabilia yeah it sure does sure does okay uh okay so now have we decided that blue cheese and buffalo wings are the best let's let's blue cheese and buffalo wings are the best? Blue cheese and buffalo wings, I would agree, are the best. I think Buffalo, love the Bills Mafia, five-star this podcast. We can't stand anymore. 90% of our one-stars are from St. Louis people mad about my take on St. Louis pizza. Correct. And then also people who hate cilantro telling me that I'm prejudiced against them. Which is fine, right?

I love the fact that we pretty much only have five-star reviews and one-star reviews on the podcast. Polarizing. Polarizing. We are the blue cheese. I am the blue cheese of a podcast. I am the hot knife. Nobody's going to get that.

No, so... No one's going to get that. One of our original pitch names for the podcast was, I don't... One of those things where we weren't serious unless people thought it was good, then we were serious, but it was butter into the hot knife. Guess which one I am. I still don't remember.

I'm butter. And I'm the hot knife. That's what we were going to do. So embarrassing. This podcast is just a way to embarrass each other. Yeah. I kind of love it. I kind of love it.

I'm not going to, you can't make me stop eating ranch dressing. You have to come down to my home. If the government wants to come to my home and take the ranch dressing out of my hands, they're gonna be in for it, I'll tell you what. You spent all your stimulus check on ranch, didn't you? Yeah, a little bit. Well, I

bought my own ranch distilling kit. I bought barrels to age my ranch. Aged ranch? One of the most delicious things I ever made, though, was Humboldt Fog Ranch. Oh, my. Humboldt Fog is blue cheese. Humboldt Fog is blue cheese,

but I put a ton of fresh herbs in it that typically would not be in a blue cheese dressing. That's, Nicole, that's what we need. You made... They need to either put blue cheese into an herbaceous ranch or herbs into a moldy ass blue cheese dressing. And then you get the perfect dressing.

Fine. Combine them. Fine. You and I are the same. Fine. Reach across the aisle. Okay. Blue cheese ranch.

We call it. Right in the middle. We call it blranch. Rue cheese. Rue cheese. Rue cheese. Fine. Rue cheese.

Welcome to Rue cheese drag race. I'm sharp cheddar. I'm brie fine fine we will okay let's let's agree blue cheese ranch hybrid at the next wing franchise that we create I agree but we have to

tie it to a random city in New York it can't be Buffalo Albany Albany style Ithaca Ithaca? Ithaca? Ithaca's got a cool lot of colleges there. A lot of college kids. Ithaca. You got ranch in my blue cheese dressing. You got blue cheese in my ranch!

I go to Cornell! I'm saying Ithaca. That's the only thing I know about Ithaca. There's a bunch of giant gorges. What's a gorge? Like a canyon. So we should call the dressing gorge dressing. There's a ton of gorges in Ithaca. We should call it gorge dressing. Okay.

Gorge style roux cheese. Buy it at mythical.com. That sounds great. I think we found a nice happy medium. Yeah. We did it. Amen. Good job.

All right, Nicole, we've heard what you and I have to say Now it's time to find out what other wacky ideas are rattling out there in the Twitterverse It's time for a segment we call Opinions are like casseroles Alright we got Gary Varachi Gordon Ramsay's recipes are bad Yes! Come take down the king.

Junkyard dog. No, no. His beef wellington is good. Not that I've ever made it. I think what he's talking about are like the recipes that Gordon Ramsay might publish on something called like GordonRamsay.com, which is probably just a very like underpaid recipe developer who is very pressed for time and probably is like writing random stuff down, slapping Gordon Ramsay's face on it. Yeah.

So I might agree with that. I don't think his recipes himself are bad. I think that the food media landscape is undervalued and overexploited. Oh, that's real deep. Yeah, yeah. I think that's probably the root of what this person's talking about, right? I don't think so. I just think they think Gordon Ramsay's recipes are bad.

That might make sense too. Yeah, I don't really like Gordon Ramsay's style of food. He's not my thing. I love that people love him. I know that this sounds silly, but I feel like if I was born in England, I would love English food. I love the idea of a Sunday roast with Yorkshire pudding and a beautiful piece of meat and some peas on the side. That sounds like a beautiful dish to me. I just wasn't raised on it.

So I don't eat it as much. I think, I think, I was going to say English food gets a bad rap, but maybe it's, maybe it's deserved, but there's like a lot of really delicious. I mean, one meat pies, steak and kidney pie. Oh my gosh. I love steak and kidney pie. Absolutely delicious.

Toad in a hole. Bangers are a really delicious sausage. What's that place? Old Kingshead in Santa Monica. Yeah, yeah. Oh my God. Their steak and kidney pies are phenomenal.

Utterly delicious. Ain't nothing wrong with some just good stodgy starchy British food. Pasties? Cornish pasties. Pasties? Wait, I only know that

from Harry Potter. It's a real food? Yeah, pasties. I don't know how to say it. You should see the way that Nicole is holding her mouth. She's holding her mouth like an 18th century peasant.

I can't explain it. It's past days. It's wench posture. You want some past days? I do call myself a podcast wench, so that makes sense. Okay, Scott underscore Boudieu. Tuna salad

is made better by adding fennel seeds. Okay. I guess. I love fennel seed in Italian sausage. I love fennel seed all the time. Fennel seed tastes like Mama Celeste pizza to me. That's like the one flavor. That is the one flavor that I have discerned from like an early age is fennel seed in the sausage of the mama celeste supreme pizza on sale for 79 cents

i never got the sausage i would just get pure cheese yeah i'll get pure cheese i'm sorry no pork in the house because i'm like wait a second what are you talking about there's no fennel seeds in the cheese no no the supreme is the same price as the cheese you can't afford not to get the supreme okay okay got it all right fester the jester are quesadillas a sandwich no no they're quesadillas no they're quesadillas I believe a quesadilla is a taco yeah

right and the same way that a grilled cheese is a sandwich I actually don't think quesadillas are tacos I think quesadillas are their own dish

why how are they different from tacos cheese you can put cheeses in many tacos cheese pure cheese melted cheese big cheese

but you can put but you can certainly make a quesadilla in a smaller piece. Large tortilla cheese. And actually, it's really funny. In Mexico, shout out to Bill Esparza

for eliminating this fact, there are quesadillas that do not have cheese in them, which sounds very strange because queso, quesas, like, you know, means cheese in Spanish. What is it then?

I mean, it's just a regional name for a style of taco. Okay, I guess it's a taco now. But no, I believe a sandwich has to be on leavened bread. I think anything. Yeah. No, it doesn't. It absolutely does.

Do you ever put two pieces of lavash between? Have you ever had a lavash sandwich? I don't think. I don't believe that's a sandwich. I believe that is depending on the part of the world you're in. I believe a lavash wrap is a taco. Pita is leavened. Oh, my gosh.

We need to talk about this. But that's tough then. I see what you mean. If a lavash isn't a sandwich, but a pita is or a laffa, that's tough. There has to be a mathematical equation. We'll talk about it on a podcast later. JC M. Hale says, French onion dip is a great sandwich spread,

especially on a ham, turkey, and Colby Jack sub. I made French onion dip for the first time like two weeks ago. Wow, what a revelation. Loved it. It's so good, but you have to let it sit in the fridge for 24 hours. Yeah, I absolutely, and you have to let the onions cool. You're talking about like, yeah, we made this for the Funyun Bloomin' Onion.

Oh, I don't know about that. No, I made it like for the first time with the Lipton, with the Lipton seasoning. Oh, you're talking about that. Yeah, I love that stuff. You just add it to the sour cream? Yeah Lipton, with the Lipton seasoning. Oh, you're talking about that. Yeah, I love that stuff. You just add it to the sour cream? Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. Oh, that stuff's absolutely good. I thought you were talking about the from scratch French onion dip that you made here

where we actually caramelized a bunch of shallots and onions, let them cool and blended it. No, no, no, none of that. No, just the powdered crap. That sounds good too. I love the powdered stuff in sour cream. I would add a little bit of mayonnaise in there. That's really good.

Pop that on a sandwich. I can't believe I've never used it as a sandwich bread. This sounds delicious. Mmm. I do not like plain ruffles, but I love they're the only chip to dip in French onion dip. They are. And I've never done it, but I imagine it in my head right now, and it is the only chip that you...

Yup. You got to flip it upside down to get the French onion dip to be the first thing it touches your palate. Okay. I'm doing it in my mind. You press it with your tongue against the roof of the first thing it touches your palate. Okay. I'm doing it in my mind. You press it with your tongue against the roof of your mouth to shatter the ruffles. And it shatters in such a uniform way because it has the ridges. Wow.

It's just so pleasant. Wow. That was really great. Thank you. At StrongBeard75, salted caramel is overrated. You're overrated. I see what you mean because salted caramel is something that got so hype, right? It was like you could charge $3 more for dessert if you put a sprinkle of salt.

I like it. It's good. There is no such thing as salt in unsalted caramel. There's only seasoned and under seasoned. You should be salting all your caramels. Adding salt to any dessert makes it better. The salty makes the sweet taste sweeter. Yeah, but you can't like, you just want people to not say salted caramel anymore?

I mean, it's like red velvet. It's one of those things. It's a trope like a legit red velvet cake is a really delicious thing. It has a lot of historicity behind it. But now that people are just dying cakes red and then just calling it red velvet. Do you know like the history behind red velvet? Yeah, I do. Of course.

I know that the vinegar and the baking powder or whatever it comes together makes the color and there's cocoa in it. And I know, I know, I understand. Yeah, but it was cocoa used to be processed with alkaline. I'm sorry. Yes. So the vinegar and the baking soda together would make a ruddy color. Yeah, exactly. Totally no.

But what it is, is I still think people put a little bit of cocoa in red velvet. I think sometimes, but I think like a lot of places don't. Like if you go to a normal like grocery section, you know, bakery, and then they just have, you know, you can tell by the color. I don't think they're just dyeing vanilla. I think they're straight dyeing vanilla cakes. No, I think they're adding a little bit of cocoa. Putting cream cheese frosting on it. I think they're adding a little bit of cocoa.

I agree. I disagree. I like salted caramel. Okay, my question is what about like salted chocolate? I like salty chocolate as well, man. You put a little finishing salt on a chocolate bar? Do you think that we should stop doing that? No, I don't think anyone should.

I'm not trying to censor the salted caramel industry. Because you're saying under-seasoned. He's just saying overrated. Okay, I'm sorry. I think it's overrated. I'm sorry. Sam.cube says, Who has time for expensive restaurants whose serving sizes leave people hungry?

This sounds like my dad. One time I took my dad. Sounds like all dads. I don't know if I told, I probably said this story like 15 times. I took my dad to a Michelin star restaurant whenever I was in culinary school because I had an interview there. And it was in Vegas. And then we had it. And it was like really cute and really delicious.

And then he goes, okay, time to go to Nathan's for a hot dog. So like this is a very like common thing. And I agree, but you go to expensive restaurants to have a full experience. You're not going there just for the food. You're going there for the ambiance. You're going there for the service.

You're going there for the bathrooms that are so nice. Have you ever been to like a really nice bathroom in a restaurant? What's that one soap they all have? It's like Apothecary or Apostle. Oh my God, it's no, no, no, no, no, no. There's one fancy soap and it feels nice.

And it's bothering me ASAP. ASAP, yeah, ASAP soap. They all have ASAP soap. I miss fancy restaurants. I, I, I know a garbage person who likes to eat Doritos over the trash. Um, I absolutely love fancy restaurants and like you said, it's very cheap to fill your belly. Yeah. 30 cents of rice, you get a belly full of

carbs that'll keep you sustained for a long time. Right? Uh, and so you go to a fancy restaurant, you might drop, you know, a hundred dollars or more on that. You're doing it to kind of be in service to some sort of art. Of course. Right. Like not to like overstate the importance of food and all that. That's what you're going there for. You're going there for the full experience. It has nothing to do with filling your belly. I don't want to leave a restaurant full, if anything. Like that's not something I look for at all in a restaurant.

If I'm like ordering lunch for the office today, like I plan on ordering Zanku chicken right after this podcast. You are? And I know, yeah. You want in on that order? We all, I talked to V and Trevor. No. Well, I was going to get the big family meal

because for like 48 bucks, you get two whole chickens and six large sides. See, that's when I look for like value is when it's the middle of the day. I'm super hungry, full of Red Bull and podcast energy but if I'm going to a fancy restaurant it is like not for the purpose of filling my belly I will go to a taco truck afterwards

and enjoy both experiences equally amen at seafrance94 are noodles in broth, pho, ramen, etc a noodle dish or a soup dish if it can't be both this is a great question this is a really hard question to answer.

Very hard question. I don't feel like I am the person to answer this. I don't know if that makes sense. You can opt out. You can pass. You get that card. Yeah. I'm not like the authority to talk about this yet. I need to do a little bit more research.

I need to eat a little bit more noodles and eat more soup. And then I will let you eat soup or do you drink soup? It's a noodle dish because soup doesn't exist. That's why I said that's why I said that soup doesn't exist because it makes this problem so much simpler. Right. Like it is simply the noodles exist. There are things on them. And that is all you can be sure about. That is what Descartes said. No, he didn't.

I'm pretty sure he did. Rene Descartes did not say that. Rene Descartes said the noodles exist, therefore they're noodles. Cduperior says, I don't know how to say that. Cduperior? Okay. Cduperior says, in my middle school, I would put honey mustard on school pizza. It was bomb AF and I stand by it.

Yeah, that sounds good because the pizza there was garbage and I know it. Yeah. Honey mustard makes almost everything taste better. Yesterday, I posted a tweet of a meal that I ate, which was eight slices of lunch meat turkey slathered in honey mustard. Turkey. I just wanted, you know, a little protein pick-me-up and I didn't want to put any effort into it.

Yeah. And what a treat that honey mustard was on that turkey. I'm sure. Honey mustard, unbelievable, absolutely delicious. It was like just the grocery on that turkey. I'm sure. Honey mustard unbelievable, absolutely delicious. It was like just the grocery store stuff, which I'm sure is like mostly sugar and some mayonnaise, a little bit of mustard, but it's absolutely delicious. I think we need to break

the red sauce stranglehold on pizza. And so I would even love the idea of using a honey mustard, like barbecue sauce based pizza. Yeah, okay. Delicious. Barbecue chicken pizza. You want to put honey mustard on the base of a pizza? Well little honey mussy ham and gruyere? Come on. Some caramelized onions on there?

That sounds really good to me. It could work. Some freaking chives on it? No. Honey mussy? Come on. Give me the honey mussy. The honey mussy's are.

Come on. Honey mussy's are. Stop saying mussy. I think you're the reason I call it honey mussy. I'm sorry. I created a monster I like honey mussy On my chicken nuggets And it's okay on pizza I'm on your team

Oh no I don't like this one You don't have to say it No I want to say it At Boof Me News I prefer baked chips for texture I find regular chips oily. I eat them with feta, so it's not a health thing. What you want, Boof Minoo's, is Boof Minoo's.

What you want are called crackers. Yeah, I hate baked chips. Which I love. I do not like them. I love, though, like, I mean, a baked pita chip is perfectly fine. Yeah. No, no doubt about that. But like a baked potato chip, like the weird octagonal baked lays.

Stop it. No, to me, it's like, it's very offensive. Again, though, if you prefer it, that's totally fine. And you're just eating it with dry feta? I have a feeling this might be a whipped feta situation, but maybe I'm just thinking too, I think too highly of this person. Bro, the fire feta at what used to be called Daphne's Greek Cafe,

then it turned into Daphne's California Grill, and now it's Yala Mediterranean Grill? That's it. Yeah. But they kept the fire feta through all the name changes. It's like the only item they kept. Maybe the salad dressing too,

but it's just like feta whipped with maybe like yogurt and some sort of chilies. Probably lots of mayonnaise. Oh, probably lots of mayonnaise. Yeah, it's really a lot of mayonnaise, right? Yeah, really good. I would love to dip chips in that. Even if they were baked,

the fire feta would carry it through. Absolutely. BCbrat8150 says, Coco Vaughn is king. Coco Vaughn was king, but I mean like, who has Cocovon nowadays? Who makes Cocovon?

I have made Cocovon once, and I didn't even use a real cook. I just used a kind of chicken. Because you're supposed to use like a poulet a la bresse, maybe? Poulet, maybe? Poulet a la bresse, I think is what it's called. All I know is that it's just a culinary school staple. And yeah, it's good, but it's not king. It's like, I don't know, a duke at most oh god i really i i love

cocomon it's it's not something i would like really it's not something i crave it's like hearty it's like too hearty there's a lot of those like french peasant dishes that are like really good like you're talking about the british food you know it's kind of like just hearty rich food that tastes like pretty fantastic like I love a cassoulet. I was going to say cassoulet is like my ideal French dish because it's just cholent. Yeah, it is cholent. Oh my god.

It's just cholent. Every culture figured out you just make a giant pot of beans and some stuff in it and it's pretty dang good. Yeah. Yams are the Switzerland of Thanksgiving dinner. Also, I love you guys. Aw, thank you at Lindsay Lou Who. Yams are the Switzerland. Let's break this down. Switzerland, I love you guys. Aw, thank you, at Lindsay Lou Who. Yams are the switch. Let's break this down.

Switzerland, policy of non-intervention, neutrality, maybe fudged that one up in World War II. Also didn't give women the right to vote till the 70s,

which is very... Switzerland was like the last country to give... I didn't. Except for, I think, Luxembourg was like 1982, but Luxembourg... Wow, how interesting.

Apparently, I mean, from what I've read, I'm sure the Swiss suffragettes in the movement would disagree. From what I read, though, there was kind of like, a lot of people didn't want it. There's like, ah, we're fine, we're fine. We don't want to rock the boat. Who really cares?

But anyway, Switzerland. Yams, I don't know. I think yams are actually kind of polarizing. Yeah, I don't think yams are. Especially with the marshmallows. Yams are not the Switzerland. I think yams are actually kind of polarizing. Yeah, I don't think yams are. Especially with the marshmallows. Yams are not the Switzerland. I think stuffing is Switzerland. No, I think mashed potatoes is Switzerland.

Oh, mashed potatoes. Because stuffing is at least, stuffing is at least like. No, no, no, you got it. Temporally specific, right? You don't eat that any other time. Mashed potatoes are like, look, if you want to fill your belly, we got mashed potatoes here. You could be eating them on any other night. It's not specific to this meal.

Yeah, yeah. Here's just some white, creamy, and offensive starchy mashed potatoes correct well glad we got glad we solved that problem yeah also love you too lindsey loohoo yeah it feels good it feels good for people yeah you know so many times it's very easy to get stuck on the negative comments like even like the one stars like sure we have little brag here i mean there's like 1700 five star reviews this podcast you read one review that goes like josh sounds like an idiot his voice is dumb and you're like oh and then you kind of ignore the 1700 really positive awesome ones so thank you for saying that you love us i love you too and on that note thank you for listening to a hot dog is a sandwich if you want to hear more from us in

the mythical kitchen we got new episodes for you every wednesday if you want to be featured on opinions are like Casseroles, you can hit us up on Twitter at Mythical Chef or nhandizadeh with the hashtag OpinionCasseroles. And for more Mythical Kitchen, check us out on YouTube where we launch videos every week. And of course, if you want to share pictures of your dishes, hit us up on Instagram at Mythical Kitchen.

We'll see you next time. Come down to where Utica for new Lou Cheese Branch Dressing. No, we settled on Utica. Utica! Utica, not, is Utica even in New York? What is Utica? Isn't there a movie called Utica for new Lou Cheese branch dressing. No, we settled on Ithaca. Is Utica even in New York? What is Utica? Isn't there a movie

called Utica? Uh, no, that's Gattaca. Gattaca? Oh, did we get that on the mic? That's the Red Bull and eggs.