More Tips & Takes on Cooking at Home

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0:00 – Sous vide grammar
0:31 – Wagoo
1:02 – Get Petty
1:43 – Mexican oregano sub
2:14 – No Dishes in the Sink
2:59 – Evercrisp
3:27 – Grow basil this summer
4:04 – Imported vs local
4:50 – Espresso at home
5:15 – Are preservatives bad?
6:56 – Shamed brown-baggers
7:42 – Frozen pineapple leaves
8:08 – Ending the chicken-washing debate
10:21 – Outro
10:35 – Ad for CoPilot Fitness

Sous vide is a french term meaning “under vacuum”. Sous (under)… Vide (vaccuum). When you vacuum-seal a bag full of food and cook it underwater, you’re cooking it sous vide. You do not “sous vide it”. There’s no verb there. That’d be like saying “Can you oven me a cake for my birthday” or “how about I en papillote some fish for dinner tonight?” This is a gripe I wish to share with a big audience, but it’s hardly worth its own spotlight as a standalone video. Thus, I’m doing this thing again, where I hit you with a handful of tips, and takes. I’ll warn you now… it’s a take-heavy sequel. Now that the word “wagyu” has wriggled its way into the American lexicon, we need a moment to examine it. Wagyu is Japanese beef. Even if we ignore the implications and definitions of newer variants like “American Wagyu”, my campaign is as such: Friends don’t let friends say wagoo. Especially since there’s a y right there. Friends certainly don’t let friends pay double for a wagoo cheeseburger. Grinding an expensive hunk of beef that’s prized for its natural marbling makes about as much sense as putting gold flake on a dish you eat blindfolded. Let’s say it’s finally time to splurge on your first really expensive collectible knife. Instead of shopping for a chefs knife just because that’s what you use most often, consider a petty knife. They exist in this nice middle ground that’s a bit bigger than a paring knife, so they can handle nimble tasks as well as small slicing jobs. A fancy dancy petty knife will cost less than a fancy dancy chef’s knife (because it’s smaller), and that smaller blade is ten times easier to sharpen. Even if you spent a thousand dollars on a world-class knife, it is worthless if you don’t keep it sharp. Picking a petty knife as your first foray into the world of fine luxury blades is, in my opinion, the best all-around value for figuring out what matters to you, be it damascus lamination or hand-carved wooden handles. I’ve shared lots of Mexican recipes on this channel, and most of them call for Mexican oregano. It tastes entirely different from regular dried oregano, but I’ve always said you’re free to sub one for the other if you have no other option. That is no longer my opinion. If you need a sub-in for dried Mexican oregano, use dried marjoram. I wasn’t aware that Lippia graveolens is less frequently referred to as Mexican marjoram. If that ingredient is the thing that’s been holding you back from making chicken tinga or pozole, consider yourself unshackled. Get yourself some marjoram. One of my most popular videos explains how to wash the dishes after cooking a meal. But if your problem is that you let dishes pile up, the task often looks insurmountable. Try this… it sounds wacky and counterproductive, but don’t allow any dirty dishes in the sink. Let the bowls and spoons pile up on the countertop so you feel them clogging up your workspace. Look how undeniably cluttered this kitchen is. The reduction of usable workspace forces you to clean up, not just out of necessity, but out of visceral discomfort. I know that for at least some people, sticking dishes in the sink makes it feel like they’re in the right place for now. They’re in a holding pattern. They’re soaking. That’s where dirty dishes go… But if you change your behavior such that the sink is always empty, you’ll always have a wide-open space ready for you to start washing dishes in it. If you’re ever about to fry multiple batches of food for a bunch of people and you’re worried about everything staying crispy long enough for everyone to eat at the same time, pick up a bag of evercrisp online. It’s a modified gluten-free wheat starch that reduces the amount of water that steaming hot fried foods can hold onto, and keeps em perfectly crisp for like 3 hours. If you’ve ever gotten fried chicken from a takeout spot that stays crispy even after its journey to your house in a sealed container, this is probably how they made it happen. Basil is the easiest thing to grow in the summer months. Most of the time, when you’re trying to grow food, you have to put a plant in a place where it gets enough sun, enough shade, and enough warmth but not too much. I can grow basil in full, direct sunlight, even in Phoenix where the highs breach 112. You can kill it with cold weather, but pool and picnic season is when you wanna be pesto-pilled and caprese-maxxing anyway. You don’t even have to go buy seeds if your grocery store sells these hydroponic herb pots. I’ll buy one of these for the first basil-inclusive dish of the spring, then plant it in a pot to have it grow all the way til Christmas. There’s this one specific misunderstanding about what makes certain food good that sometimes feels wacky and backwards. Someone in America might say “The folks in Naples have perfected pizza. In order for me to make great pizza I must import Italian 00 flour, Italian buffalo mozzarella, and Italian san marzano tomatoes.” Lemme just say I use Sonoran flour for my flour tortillas. I understand the pleasure that comes from cooking with a sense of place. But you’ve also gotta be open to the idea that what makes that pizza taste so good is the use of ingredients that were freshly sourced from the local community, not acquired via cargo ship. There’s nothing inherently wrong with using imported ingredients, but don’t trick yourself into thinking anthropologically accurate ingredients automatically taste better than those which are locally sourced. There is a certain romance to imagining life with your own espresso machine at home, but I only recommend it for folks who are done sitting on the fence and know for sure that they want to make espresso every day. If you pull shots infrequently the beans’ll get stale sitting on the counter for weeks at a time. You might waste a shot while dialing it in to account for the staleness, and at that point you might not be saving any time or money making your own. In a perfect world, food would never be preserved or adulterated with any additives. But then again, maybe not, since we wouldn’t have runny nacho cheese without sodium citrate. As with most contentious food issues, there are hardcore opinions at both extremes of the pro or anti additive spectrum, but if I can try to help you think about this issue without TELLING you how to think… this might be a good example for how to frame the issue: apple slices turn brown if they’re exposed to air for more than an hour. You can stop that from happening by coating the apple slices in all-natural citric acid from lime juice… but now you’ve got a little lime flavor on your apple. There are times when that’s fine. If you’re gonna bake em into a pie, the tangy taste of that all-natural preservative isn’t gonna be noticeable. But if you called a bunch of friends over and made a big deal hyping up this beautiful apple-forward fruit platter composed of rare varieties, the tasting might not live up to expectations. Your guests might be disappointed to find all the apples taste limey. I find pre-made megamart corn tortillas to be vile. But in an enchilada scenario, this thing is getting doused in sauce and filled with cheese. I’m not gonna notice the sub-par corn flavor. And everybody has their own line they like to draw in the sand. When I make buffalo sauce, I whisk hot butter into frank’s red hot. Franks Red Hot is a shelf-stable factory-made food item. Someone more hardcore than I would make their own hot sauce instead. Someone less hardcore than I would just buy the pre-made Franks Red Hot Brand buffalo sauce, which is made out of shelf-stable oils that mimic fresh butter. No matter where you stand on the issue with your personal preferences regarding additives and preservatives, it’s good to be honest with yourself about what the tradeoffs are, instead of acting as if everyone has the same priorities as you. This is a highly niche extremely first-world problem, but I know it affects at least some of you out there. You wanna be the type of person who packs their own lunch, but everyone in your office goes out to restaurants on their break, and so sticking a sad-looking brown bag in the office fridge makes you feel like a scrub. Here’s how I used to get around that problem at my office job. You can buy these paper takeout boxes online and pack your lunch in those every day. They’re lined with wax so they don’t soak through, and it makes it appear as if, no this is not a homemade sandwich. I picked up a prosciutto arugula fig jam number on the way into the office. You could rightfully argue that burning through 5 disposable boxes per week is wasteful, but I’d rather recycle some kraft paper than burn cash on $17 salads every weekday. One of my favorite garnishes for a fruity cocktail is a fan of 2 or 3 pineapple leaves splayed out on the glass. But it’s not like I have a fresh pineapple just sitting around all the time. The next time you buy a pineapple, pick all the good-looking leaves off its crown, stick em in a ziploc bag, and leave them in the freezer. The next time you find yourself wishing for a tropical cocktail garnish, you’ve got pineapple fronds ready to go. I use the big ones for highballs and the little ones for short drinks. 13. The science behind chicken-washing is definitively settled. You create more risks than you prevent when you put raw poultry in the sink and splash water all over it. But this is why it’s still a touchy subject: – First, we have the people who don’t believe the science. Someone’s gonna argue “why trust the governing bodies that tell us processed foods and Red40 are safe? By now everybody knows skepticism towards authority is a real thing. – Next, washing chicken is a bit of a misnomer, and not everybody gets that. When most chicken-washers get upset by the discourse, it’s because someone’s acting like they scrub their birds down with soap, rather than lemon juice or salt and vinegar. Those folks aim to wash away poultry-based detritus like pieces of feather and bone, not germs. – Finally, washing chicken is a cultural issue. Caribbeans, for example, perform this act regularly, and being told not to feels insensitive to tradition. My stance on this is that there’s no reason to drive yourself crazy over how other people cook. This guy says washing chicken spreads bacteria. That’s true. But this guy will say “Obviously I clean my workspace afterwards. Then this guy says “well still it’s a waste of time and effort when store-bought meat is already safe to cook and eat as-is” to which the defendant can rightfully respond “what do you care?” I never wash my chicken. I wouldn’t instruct my audience to wash their chicken. see only risk, and zero benefits. But lets say my neighbors told me they all give their burger patties a little smooch before throwing them on the grill as a sign of imbuing the meat with love and care. The most I’m willing to argue against that is “you know that can make you sick, right?”. If that was met with “yeah, but we all really love doing it”, I say go with God. If there’s any art form that should be allowed to forego science in service of lore and tradition, it’s cooking. Demanding everyone to agree with you is psycho behavior. This is not chicken washing apologia. The washers should heed the same advice. Any recipe video featuring a shot of raw poultry is guaranteed to contain at least one unhinged rant about how a non-washer should never be trusted. If my hypothetical burger-smooching neighbor took issue with my point of view shrieking “what do you mean you don’t peck yer patties you uncivilized cretin”, I don’t think I’d wanna be their buddy. Yes, I’ve cracked the code and bridged that gap between shortform brainrot and longform tedium. That’s exactly why I just bought the shlongform.com. The viewers yearn for edutainment synergy. Watch this space. CoPilot Fitness has paid to be mentioned at the end of this video. CoPilot Fitness combines the flexibility of app-based fitness with the personalization and accountability of a real human. You get paired with a virtual trainer who customizes workouts to your goals, schedule, and limitations. Unlike a one size fits all solution, you get someone on the other end asking questions like “do you have any injuries that could affect your ability to perform certain movements.” Every program is tailored to you and then adapted as you continue. Nobody’s gonna be surprised to hear this: I’m a high-maintenence individual. I wanna list every way that my coach Rod altered my plan for me in just two weeks. First, I tried doing workouts in the gym. I like how it shows the proper form for each machine, but I don’t understand gym ettiquette when it comes to waiting for machines that are in use. So I asked for home workouts. Rod set me up with some at-home weightlifting, and left notes like “Do these presses from the floor since you don’t own a bench. The next day I complained about how my Powerblock brand weights take a long time to adjust to each exact prescribed weight. Rod thus changed the prescribed weights so I could get my powerblocks adjusted more easily. Every time I complete a set, I get a little one-tap survey asking if I could have done 3 or more reps. If I answered “yes”, the weights would be adjusted for next time. Rod wanted me to have a maximum of 1 or 2 reps left in the tank at the end of a set. I know I’m dumping a lot of my own personal story on you, but in reality the big game-changer for me was knowing that a real person was gonna see whether I did what I was supposed to do. If I skipped a day, Rod was gonna ask me about it. If I did show up and do every movement, he’d be taking notes on my performance and making adjustments. If you think you’d benefit from CoPilot Fitness, you can visit go.mycopilot.com/InternetShaquille to get 14 days free with your own expert personal trainer. That’s two weeks to try a custom workout plan at go.mycopilot.com/InternetShaquille, and I put a clickable link in the description if you don’t wanna type it all out.