Defending Seed Oil: Salad Spinner Year In Review

It’s time for our Salad Spinner Year In Review! On today’s show, we discuss the strangest and most surprising food stories from the past year with Joe Yonan from The Washington Post and Nikita Richardson from The New York Times. We share some of the biggest food trends of 2024—the ones we want to see more of, and the ones we wish would go away—and later, the best things we ate this year.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Dan Pashman?

  Make holiday hosting effortless with Boars Head Sweet Slice Uncured Ham. It's the perfect centerpiece for gathering family and friends around the holiday table. Hand-packed into netting, Sweet Slice Uncured Ham has the look of a traditional holiday ham with rich flavor worth savoring. Slow-roasted and delicately smoked, boneless Sweet Slice Uncured Ham delivers classic bone-in flavor made for the moments that bring everyone together. Find Sweet Slice Uncured Ham at your nearest Boars Head deli. And for holiday entertaining inspiration, recipes, and more, visit boarshed.com. I grew up on Lando Lakes cheese. I still remember going to the supermarket deli counter with my mom and her ordering Lando Lakes American cheese. And now, Lando Lakes cheese and butter are a huge part of my home.

• 0:42Dan Pashman?

  There are so many easy weeknight recipes using Lando Lakes cheese and butter that bring delicious restaurant taste right to your table. From chicken parm to weeknight shrimp pad Thai, Lando Lakes has plenty of quick dishes that'll have the whole dinner table talking. Visit landolakes.com/reцепes/collection for easy weeknight dinners.

• 1:03Speaker 01

  People who bring ice are the foundation of celebrations. All right? It seems like such a small job, but it is the job that keeps the party going because you know what people in America love? Cold drinks. We're obsessed with it. Americans love ice more than like any other country in the world. This is a fact.

• 1:22Dan Pashman?

  Yeah.

• 1:23Speaker 02

  And the worst thing is when you assign the ice to somebody who's never on time.

• 1:28Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:32Dan Pashman?

  This is the Sporkful. It's not for foodies, it's for eaters. I'm Dan Pashman. Each week on our show, we obsess about food to learn more about people. And welcome to our salad spinner year in review edition. Get ready for a rapid-fire roundtable discussion of the biggest, strangest, and most surprising food stories from this past year. 2024 was the year when Japanese sake was added to UNESCO's list of the intangible cultural heritage of humanity. And NFL players consumed an estimated 80,000 Uncrustables, a treat that, if you ask me, should also be on that UNESCO list. In politics, Donald Trump had a photo op slinging french fries at McDonald's and rooting Giuliani announced he would start hocking his own brand of coffee.

• 2:13Dan Pashman?

  Then on social media, we saw the rise of dirty soda, the TikTok cucumber salad and much more. Of course, that's just the tip of the iceberg wedge. There's a lot more that happened. We've got a lot to cover. Today's salad spinner will talk about some of the biggest food trends of 2024, the ones we want to see more of, and the ones we wish would go away. Then later, some of the best things we ate this year. Now, I can't cover all these big topics on my own. Joining me in the spinner today to help our two very special guests, first up in Washington DC, we have Joe Yonan. He's the food and dining editor at the Washington Post and also just released his latest cookbook, Mastering the Art of Plant-Based Cooking. Hello, Joe.

• 2:49Speaker 02

  Thank you. So glad to be here. This is gonna be fun.

• 2:52Dan Pashman?

  And here in New York with me in the studio, returning to the show, we have Nikita Richardson, an editor at the New York Times Food Section, who also created the Where to Eat newsletter at the Times. Hey, Nikita.

• 3:01Speaker 01

  Hello, happy to be here.

• 3:03Dan Pashman?

  It's great to see both of you. Now, before we get into the salad spinner part of the show, let's just spend a little time and catch up, all right? Nikita, you're gonna start us off on the right foot here because you brought us some homemade cookies. Joe, you're in DC, so I'm sorry you're gonna have to watch us eat them over Zoom. Wish we could share with you.

• 3:17Speaker 02

  This is unfair.

• 3:18Speaker 01

  I've had a lot of them already today, so I'm just gonna give it to you. But they are miso walnut cookies that are made in kind of a way that I think people wouldn't expect a cookie to start out, which is with marin and miso and sugar. And they come from the cookbook Sift by Nicola Lam.

• 3:36Dan Pashman?

  That is delightful.

• 3:37Speaker 02

  I can't believe you're eating cookies.

• 3:39Speaker 01

  I know. I gave them to my barista. I gave them to my friend Clancy, who I ran into at the coffee shop. And everyone loved them.

• 3:48Dan Pashman?

  I feel like cookies and desserts in general have been getting dangerously close to being too salty.

• 3:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. They literally start out like one of my favorite New York Times recipes, which is, this is not a plug. It's like Martha Rose Schulman's miso glazed fish. Starts out the exact same way.

• 4:03Dan Pashman?

  Oh, yeah.

• 4:03Speaker 01

  With sugar, marin and white miso. And then you just pour it over the fish, but then this one you put in way more sugar. And so, and then it goes into the cookie. And I was like, wow, this is a genius cookie.

• 4:15Dan Pashman?

  Well, these are delicious. Thank you for bringing them in, Nikita.

• 4:17Speaker 01

  You're welcome.

• 4:18Dan Pashman?

  You're gonna get invited back now. Since the last time we hung out, you created and launched the Where to Eat newsletter at the New York Times, which I love. I read it every week and I don't read many newsletters.

• 4:27Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 4:27Dan Pashman?

  But I love the kind of quirky, like it's not your run-of-the-mill restaurant recommendations. There's often sort of very specific themes, like if you're gonna be in this neighborhood, here's where to eat. If you're looking for the best french fries, here's where to eat.

• 4:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, it's like a mixture. I think like it's on us to kind of find the spot, the trend that's out there. But overall, the point of the newsletter has been to give people who are not reading, like aren't keeping up with all the hot restaurants and all that stuff, but wanna know more than the average person. And so if you read this once a week, you probably know more about dining in New York City than like your friends who don't really read anything at all. And also hopefully find some good recommendations along the way. I think that what people want is they're not seeking perfection in restaurants. They're seeking like really good, reliable places.

• 5:20Dan Pashman?

  Well, it's a great newsletter. Everyone should check it out. Let me turn to Joe, because Joe, you already had a big success with your book, Cool Beans.

• 5:27Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 5:28Dan Pashman?

  Which was all beans. And it was such a success that for your second cookbook, your publisher was like, can you make a book that's much bigger and more vast?

• 5:37Speaker 02

  Right.

• 5:37Dan Pashman?

  And really like a magnum opus of vegetarian cooking.

• 5:40Speaker 02

  Right.

• 5:41Dan Pashman?

  So tell us about mastering the art of plant-based cooking.

• 5:44Speaker 02

  Well, yeah, it started because I got tired of any time you hear people talking about plant-based cooking, it always ends up being about the argument about who's better. Is it better to be vegetarian, or better to be vegan, or is it better to eat everything, or flexitarian? And I just started getting tired of not hearing more about how to cook the actual food. And it just struck me that, that there's been such a history of this kind of cooking, and it's come so far, that it's now a cuisine unto itself. And I wanted to treat it that way. So to show people that there are specific techniques, there are tricks, there are strategies, and, and, and anybody can be interested in it, whether you label yourself as vegan or vegetarian or not.

• 6:25Dan Pashman?

  I mean, it's a phenomenal book.

• 6:26Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 6:26Dan Pashman?

  And what I love about it, I'm not a vegan or a vegetarian, but I like vegetables. And sometimes I'm tired of the same old vegetable recipes that I have. I want to learn, like, you know, roasting carrots. Like, there's a whole art form to roasting carrots and how long you're going to roast them for, where you're going to put them on. They go through all different kinds of incredible evolutions as they sit in the oven. And I feel like I needed a book like yours to be able to understand things like that.

• 6:48Speaker 01

  I need it too, so I don't buy vegetables and let them rot in the fridge. That's my biggest problem.

• 6:54Dan Pashman?

  That being said, Joe, you got a little upset on Instagram last night as we record this. You seem like a pretty, pretty even keel, mild-mannered kind of guy, but you were pretty fired up on Instagram last night.

• 7:06Speaker 02

  I'm good until you really cross me, Danny.

• 7:12Speaker 02

  No, you know, you know, all cookbook authors, all authors, you know, we're at the mercy of reviews, of online reviews. I got a one-star review from a guy who said that he was so upset because I use oil in the book. And it's because there's a subset of plant-based eaters who follow what they call whole foods, plant-based cooking, that it's so whole foods oriented that oil is not acceptable because oil is not a whole food. So they, they left this review, one-star review, saying, you know, I returned the book, this book, this guy doesn't know what he's talking about. I mean, needs that, one of the things, I have a cousin who cooks this way. One of the things that they do is they, they saute, quote unquote, with water.

• 7:57Speaker 01

  Ooh, whoa.

• 8:02Speaker 02

  I would say that that's steaming, right?

• 8:03Speaker 01

  Yeah. I'm sorry, but water's not capable of doing that.

• 8:08Speaker 02

  You know, her, her daughter and her husband, they're vegan and they, and they cook this way at home. And I've had them over for dinner and I said to her, you know, Laura, I'm not gonna, I'm gonna use oil for the food that I'm gonna cook for you. I hope it's okay. And she's like, no, no, it's fine. We'll flex. And her husband and daughter are always like, why is your food so much more delicious than the food that we get from home? And I'm like, I think I have an idea. I think I have an idea.

• 8:35Dan Pashman?

  Today in the Salad Spinner, we're gonna cover a mix of stories from substantive to silly that caught our attention this year. Both of you buckled in, let's crank up the Salad Spinner.

• 8:47Dan Pashman?

  Earlier this year, New York Times restaurant critic Pete Wells stepped down from his role after 12 years reviewing restaurants for The Times. In his farewell column, he talked about technology in restaurants. He wrote, "In my first two years in the job, I thought of restaurants as one of the few places left where our experiences were completely human. No machine could drink rosé for us, or chew lamb chops, or flirt, fight, and make up. And at every critical point in the meal, there were people there to guide us. From the moment we walked in, we talked with hosts, bartenders, captains, runners, and bussers. Being served in a restaurant wasn't passive. We had to participate. Many of the little routines of dining that we used to handle by talking to a person now happen on a screen. When we go to Shake Shack, we order and pay for our burger and frozen custard on a screen.

• 9:32Dan Pashman?

  In some places, we enter our names on the waiting list for tables on a screen. We scan QR codes. We can read the menu on a screen. Restaurants are turning into vending machines with chairs." Which is a great Pete Wells burn to that rap.

• 9:46Speaker 01

  Vending machines, he burnt.

• 9:49Dan Pashman?

  Joe, what's your take on this?

• 9:53Speaker 02

  Well, I mean, I certainly think that the trend is upsetting. I'm one of those anti QR code people, and it's because I want to separate from technology to a certain extent when I go to a restaurant. And when I am with friends, I want to be paying attention to what they're saying. I want to be able to have conversation. I don't want to be in conversation on my phone with social media while I'm trying to be in conversation with the people that I actually know and love.

• 10:23Dan Pashman?

  I was just in Italy, and I was at this 17th century, or 16th, I'm always bad at the count of the centuries. I was at this like 18th century farmhouse.

• 10:33Speaker 01

  What, 16th, 17th, 18th? Which one was it?

• 10:36Dan Pashman?

  The 1700s, the 18th century, right?

• 10:39Speaker 01

  1700s, the 18th century.

• 10:40Dan Pashman?

  Yeah, so thank you. So, an 18th century farmhouse that's converted into this like mauserie, and they have this olive groves and whatever, this is incredible. And then you go to the restaurant in this hotel with all this stone and the menu's a QR code. Code because they're like, you know, we're a farm and so we're very environmentally conscious. And so I understand that, but at the same time, like you're in this sort of rustic setting in Italy and they're like, pull out your phone and scan your QR code. It takes away a little bit.

• 11:09Speaker 01

  I think a lot of these things though are born out of necessity. QR codes were born out of let's not touch anything because it's COVID-19. And I think the reason it's stuck around is because menus can change frequently. And rather than having to print out a new menu all the time, you can change a PDF online and put it up. It's still annoying, but it was born out of something practical.

• 11:33Dan Pashman?

  I've been thinking about this a lot lately because I feel like we're at a moment right now at the end of 2024 where COVID is far enough in the distance that we can kind of appraise its effects. Now you remember when when we were all in lockdown, everyone was saying this is going to accelerate all of these impacts that technology has already sent us down. Everyone's going to get food delivered. No one's going to go to restaurants anymore. And there's now studies out that show that that has not proven to be true.

• 12:01Dan Pashman?

  Americans are going out to eat as much or more than they were before COVID. In some cases, some people may be going to less expensive places because they're concerned about inflation. But rest people are going are back going out to eat.

• 12:12Speaker 01

  April 2022 was a wild time. No one could get a reservation. It was like when things finally started opening up again and all people in New York wanted to do was go out to eat.

• 12:23Dan Pashman?

  So that's been debunked. All right. But there are other ways that technology continues to affect us that maybe we hadn't totally anticipated when we were in lockdown. So I want to start with you, Nikita. What's a big way that technology has affected the experience of eating out? That has really come into focus for you.

• 12:42Speaker 01

  This is kind of maybe a little bit, I don't know, around the way, but like technology, specifically TikTok, has made it so that nothing.

• 12:53Speaker 01

  stays quiet for long anymore. Like, it's popular from day one. Probably the prime example in New York was this place called Eavesdropper, a listening bar in Greenpoint, and they put up a TikTok, I think before they even opened. And from the first day they opened, it went viral in New York TikTok. And from the day they opened, you could not get in.

• 13:14Dan Pashman?

  Wait, I'm sorry, did you say it's a listening bar?

• 13:16Speaker 01

  A listening bar, like, record listening. There's so many of them. This is gonna be a where to eat.

• 13:19Dan Pashman?

  Is there, like, a schedule posted in advance that, like, oh, come at 8 o'clock, and we're gonna play this album?

• 13:24Speaker 01

  I mean, I think it's more just like, hey, here's records. You wanna jam out and have a cocktail and some small bites?

• 13:29Dan Pashman?

  Do you talk? Or you're only supposed to be quiet because you're listening?

• 13:32Speaker 01

  I think you talk quietly. The overall point being that, like, the path from, you know, opening to discovery has never been shorter than it is right now. The minute one influencer, TikTok or whatever, gets their hands on it, it's over. It's game over.

• 13:49Dan Pashman?

  There's some restaurants, clearly, a new restaurant opens, and you can tell they have one dish that they're like, this is gonna be our Instagram TikTok dish.

• 13:56Speaker 02

  Right.

• 13:56Dan Pashman?

  Because it has some sort of presentation element. There's, there's smoke involved or something done at the table to crackle, or something open or poured on top, you know? And they're like, this is the thing we're putting on the menu because people will put it on social media.

• 14:09Speaker 02

  I was just gonna say, it's funny that you brought up TikTok, because of course I was gonna talk about TikTok too, in a slightly different way. And that is, you know, some of the food reviewers on TikTok who have these huge followings are certainly changing the game. Like Keith Lee I'm thinking about. Huge, huge, huge following. But one of the problems is he's eating everything in his car. And so the reality of what a restaurant is actually going to be like is, is sometimes severely compromised, right? So there was a case here in DC where he said some critical things about a Caribbean place, like about this fried fish dish that he had there. And he didn't eat it in any way close to the way that it's served in the restaurant. I mean, a restaurant isn't a big takeout restaurant. It's a sit-down restaurant.

• 14:54Speaker 02

  And they serve this gorgeous fried, uh, whole fried fish. It's a snapper eskevich. And they serve it with all these sauces and toppings. And when you get it at the restaurant, it's this gorgeous thing that you pick pieces off and you're dipping and everything. In his review, he pulled the fish, the plain fried fish, out of the bag and he bit into it with nothing on it, nothing, no sauce, no, nothing. And then he talked about how it was disappointing that it didn't actually have, that it was a nicely fried piece of fish, but that it didn't actually have that much going on. Well, guess what?

• 15:34Dan Pashman?

  You forgot the sauce.

• 15:35Speaker 02

  You didn't experience anything.

• 15:37Dan Pashman?

  Also, ordering any fried food to go and putting it into any kind of sealed container where condensation is going to reduce the fried crispiness and then trying to appraise that piece of food, I mean, that should be a cancelable offense.

• 15:50Speaker 01

  No, the condensation.

• 15:50Speaker 02

  That's right.

• 15:54Dan Pashman?

  Coming up, we'll debate what the most annoying food trend of 2024 was and Joe and Nikita will reveal their New Year's food resolutions. Plus, you two brought picks for last minute gift recommendations. We'll have those. Stick around.

• 16:13Speaker 03

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• 16:20Dan Pashman?

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• 17:03Dan Pashman?

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• 17:49Dan Pashman?

  There's nothing quite like Aruba. The white sand beaches are truly unlike anything you've seen. But what really stands out is the food. Because Aruba's not like other Caribbean islands. French pastries, Spanish paella, Peruvian barbecue, papardelle that has no business being that good that far from Florence. Not to mention the local fair. Aruba's food scene pulls you in with its astonishing variety of cuisines and beyond satisfies you with its unexpected flavors. So plan your escape to culinary delight at aruba.com. Your taste buds will thank you. For a long time, I did not understand the point of vests. Like, why not just have a jacket? That covers your arms, too. But something clicked for me. I think I got gifted a vest, and now I am obsessed with vests.

• 18:33Dan Pashman?

  And it just adds that little bit of toastiness. And I got this new Quince Packable Puffer Vest. I love that you can just squish it up and shove it in the bottom of your bag. That way, you have it with you all day. If it gets a little chilly, break out the vest. I also got a Quince Down Quilted Vest. It is so soft and cozy. They make them for men and women. And as with everything you get at Quince, they focus on high-quality staples made with premium materials like 100% Mongolian cashmere, 14-karat gold, and Italian leather. These are all timeless, versatile pieces that feel special to unwrap and become everyday favorites long after the holidays. Give the gift of quality this holiday season. Download the Quince app for app-exclusive offers or go to quince.com. Get free shipping on your order and 365-day returns, now available in Canada and the

• 19:18Dan Pashman?

  UK, too. And when Quince asks where you heard about them, let them know it was the Spork Fault. It's the best way to support the show.

• 19:28Dan Pashman?

  Welcome back to The Sporkful. I'm Dan Pashman. Memphis, Memphis. I'm coming to see you. We're doing a live Sporkful in Memphis in January. Special guest is Memphis food legend Karen Blockman Carrier. Get your tickets now at sporkful.com/events. In the meantime, listen to some more episodes of The Sporkful, like last week's show, where I talked with Christina Cho and Brian Ford, two cookbook authors who have a lot in common. They're both children of immigrants, third culture kids who got into food not through restaurants, but by launching their own blogs. Christina got obsessed with food at an early age, not just eating food, but building with it to see how she could create bites that maximize deliciousness.

• 20:05Speaker 04

  My mom would prepare us like wonton soup with like, oh, a bowl of rice and vegetables on the side, and then shrimp chips. I would put a little bit of rice in the shrimp chip, then dunk it in the soup so that the shrimp chip like softens for like one second. And then you take a whole bite and it's like crispy, soft and chewy. And like you get the flavor of the soup. I was already like thinking of textures.

• 20:30Dan Pashman?

  Christina's first career was in architecture before she switched to food and cooking. And Brian Ford, he followed a similar path. He spent years as an accountant before leaving it behind to become a full-time baker. This fall, they've each released their second cookbooks where they're getting more personal and more in-depth about the subjects that matter most to them. These are two great conversations. That episode's up now. Check it out. One last quick important announcement. If you want to give that special eater in your life my cookbook and pasta gift set from Sfolini, you gotta order soon. The gift set is one box each of all three of my pasta shapes, cascatelli, quattratini, and Vesuvio, plus a copy of my cookbook, Anything's Possible. Place your orders now at sfolini.com. That's S-F-O-G-L-I-N-I.com. Of course, you can also buy Anything's Possible on its own wherever books are sold.

• 21:14Dan Pashman?

  All right, back to our salad spinner year in review edition. I'm joined once again by Joe Yonan, food and dining editor at The Washington Post, and Nikita Richardson, an editor at the New York Times Food Section. Hello to both of you.

• 21:25Speaker 01

  Hello, hello.

• 21:26Dan Pashman?

  Hello. All right, let's get back into the salad spinner. You ready?

• 21:29Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 21:30Speaker 02

  Ready.

• 21:32Dan Pashman?

  Nikita, we'll start with you. What's been the most annoying food trend of 2024?

• 21:37Speaker 01

  It's not maybe specific 2024, but it has been like it's been grinding my gears that when you go into a restaurant where you have a reservation, some of them will be like, is your full party here? And you're like, no, they're gonna be here soon. We can't seat you. Seat me! The table is already set aside. This is not like walking in. I know that you have on your tablet that this booth is gonna be my booth. So why can't I sit at it early?

• 22:05Dan Pashman?

  What's your thought on this, Joe?

• 22:06Speaker 02

  Well, I agree. I mean, I think if you've got a reservation for a certain time, then you should be able to sit down. I mean, I know that at restaurants, of course, if people are super late and it's a huge party and all of that, it can be disruptive. But I don't know. What else are they gonna do at that table exactly?

• 22:23Speaker 01

  I wonder if it's like seating the sphere that like the guests will suddenly not show up, but no one is making plans for a restaurant without confirming that everyone's going to be there hours and hours and hours before.

• 22:34Dan Pashman?

  Well, yes, I look, I, I agree that I find that annoying, but I'll play devil's advocate a little bit, which is that, you know, every seat in a restaurant is valuable. An empty seat is lost business in a business that's already tough. If you make a reservation for, let's say, three people, they're gonna give you a table for four. So they're already not thrilled.

• 22:54Speaker 01

  Not always, like somebody once told me.

• 22:56Dan Pashman?

  Right, yeah, but like most of the time, if you show up by yourself, what if one of the two people doesn't show? And now you're only a party of two?

• 23:08Speaker 01

  That's not gonna happen, guys.

• 23:11Speaker 01

  I'm sorry. Maybe it's just me. No one has ever not come to dinner with me, ever. Like, if it's like, if, like, if we said there was gonna be three, there are going to be three of us.

• 23:23Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 23:23Speaker 01

  It is guaranteed. Like, when you walk in, that is when I'm like, ooh, who knows if your whole party's gonna come? You just walked in and the rest of your people aren't here. But if someone made a reservation, we have made a promise. We've entered a social contract with you. We're all gonna be here and we are all gonna be the number of people that you were expecting.

• 23:42Dan Pashman?

  Joe, most annoying food trend of 2024?

• 23:45Speaker 02

  It's the seed oil thing, Dan.

• 23:48Dan Pashman?

  Bringing it back around.

• 23:49Speaker 02

  It's the seed oil thing.

• 23:51Dan Pashman?

  Talk to me.

• 23:52Speaker 02

  Earlier, I was talking about just oils oils. And this is not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the people who say and think that there's something particularly harmful about quote unquote, "seed oils." And they're all over TikTok. And the science is really just not there. If there's really this problem with seed oils, if they're toxic and so inflammatory, then how is it that millions of people who live in parts of the world that have eaten sesame oil, for instance, for millennia? How is it that those people are some of the healthiest, longest living people on the planet? But these seed oil people are so, the no seed oil people are so vocal that it filters down to everything. We have a teenage son. And I was cooking a couple of months ago.

• 24:37Speaker 02

  And he came in and he was like, "Are you using a seed oil?" And I was like, "Don't talk to me about the seed oil thing."

• 24:43Dan Pashman?

  Teenage boys used to be interested in way different things.

• 24:47Speaker 02

  Right. But he's on TikTok. And I mean, who knows who he saw, like, said something about seed oils that, you know, they're whatever, that they cause immune problems or whatever. And it's just, you know, you look into the science of it and the studies, and they're based on all these little tiny studies that are with animals. But, you know, all these big studies with humans that have been peer reviewed and everything shows that there is absolutely nothing to this argument.

• 25:14Dan Pashman?

  All right, on to the next topic. Let's spin the spinner.

• 25:19Dan Pashman?

  Joe, what is a food trend you hope takes off in 2025?

• 25:24Speaker 02

  Salsa matcha.

• 25:25Dan Pashman?

  Oh, okay. Go on, elaborate.

• 25:28Speaker 02

  For the listeners who don't know what it is, it's like, I mean, I hate to reduce it to this, but the easiest way to talk about it is that it's the Mexican chili crisp. You know, it's one of those crunchy, spicy oil condiments. And it's in salsa matcha particularly has a lot of seeds in it, which is so great. Seeds and nuts and seeds in it. It's just incredible. And I, I mean, I love chili crisp, of course. But I just feel like salsa matcha hasn't gotten its, like, moment that it deserves. I think it's, it's just an incredible condiment. It likes chili crisp. Once you try it, you want to put it on everything. You want to eat on everything. It's good on ice cream. It's good on eggs. It's good on potatoes. It's good on everything, everything, everything. Tacos, anything.

• 26:12Dan Pashman?

  What is this spicing agent?

• 26:14Speaker 02

  Spicy. Chili's.

• 26:16Dan Pashman?

  But what kind?

• 26:17Speaker 02

  Spicinging.

• 26:17Dan Pashman?

  Okay.

• 26:18Speaker 02

  Spicinging, Dan. Spicinging. Well, it can be different ones. I think I see a lot with morita chilies, which are got a little sweetness to them, which is kind of nice. Yeah, it's just delicious.

• 26:32Dan Pashman?

  Nikita, what's a food trend you hope takes off in 2025?

• 26:35Speaker 01

  Here's the thing. Oh, mine was kind of related as well to this. It's not even a trend. I just, I was gonna say, I want things to be spicy, like not enough restaurants dare to go into the, into spicy territory. They want to make everything, not milky toast, but like so vastly approachable to everyone that they do it at the cost of flavor. I think that restaurants have become so afraid of difficult flavors, especially popular restaurants have become very like they're afraid to challenge their diners with like food that like with things that they might not be familiar with because they don't want that one star review, right?

• 27:13Dan Pashman?

  You know, it hadn't crystallized in my head until you said it just now, Nikita. But I think in this past year, I have had an alarming number of meals at restaurants that were just bland.

• 27:23Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 27:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 27:24Dan Pashman?

  I feel like they're using less salt also.

• 27:26Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 27:26Dan Pashman?

  So more heavy handed with the spices at restaurants in 2025, says Nikita. For my food trend for next year, I'm gonna say salt in beer. Blue Point has a beer that adds salt, back home beer. Out of Brooklyn, we did a show about them a couple of years back.

• 27:41Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 27:41Dan Pashman?

  Uh, Persian style lager. They have one with salt in it. Micheladas had their moment.

• 27:45Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 27:46Dan Pashman?

  I just think that there's more to be done with beer and, and salt and other flavors being added to beer.

• 27:51Speaker 01

  This year I brought a recipe to the Times that came from a bar in Brooklyn called, uh, Pine Box Rock Shop, and it's a pickle brine margarita.

• 28:01Dan Pashman?

  Oh.

• 28:02Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, yum.

• 28:03Speaker 01

  It would change your life. Maybe that's what I should have brought. Sorry, cookies. But maybe I should have been bringing pickle brine margaritas batched because you know what I found out? That is what has been missing from drinks, pickle brine. I love a good margarita, but this makes it like better than whatever margarita you imagine. It has this like briny delicious taste. And I was like, this is, this is what should be in cocktails. And everyone who tried it was like, I was skeptical, but you're right. This is amazing.

• 28:33Dan Pashman?

  I, I don't know if he's been spinning the spinner every time. Let's go ahead and spin the spinner. Make sure you keep it spinning.

• 28:38Speaker 02

  Spin it.

• 28:41Dan Pashman?

  Nikita, you're up first this round. What is the best thing you ate this year?

• 28:45Speaker 01

  Okay, so I did a big sandwich package this year and about like 57 sandwiches at Define New York City. And one of my favorite places, I started going to this place called Salty Lunch Lady's Little Luncheonette. It's out in Ridgewood, Queens. And it's this woman who is just very passionate about sandwiches. Every time I am in Queens, I go there to get a sandwich and she makes this incredible, it's like a dill turkey sandwich. But then I went back another time and she turned it into a dill tuna sandwich. She goes hard on the dill. I love dill. It's like grass that you can eat. And I, and there's so, and it's so delicious.

• 29:24Speaker 01

  And it was a, I swear to God, like this is a sandwich that makes you like appreciate and love the art of sandwiches.

• 29:31Dan Pashman?

  Joe, best thing you ate this year?

• 29:34Speaker 02

  I think the best thing I ate this year was pita. It was this pita at this restaurant, Metternich Restaurant in San Francisco called Delita, which is a fairly new place in the Presidio. And it's a gorgeous restaurant and they just have the most amazing pita. They call it chubby pita and it, it, it comes out and it's like puffed and it's like super soft. And it's just incredible. And of course it comes out with all the, you know, the muamara and the hummus and all the dips and pickled vegetables and everything. But you want to break it open and just shove your entire face into it and wrap it around your, wrap it around your head and like go to sleep while you're eating it. I don't know.

• 30:18Speaker 02

  It's, it's just, it's just unbelievable.

• 30:21Dan Pashman?

  It sounds really good. Oh, man. Well, mine's gonna sound fancy in relation to yours. So I, I just got back from Italy. Part of my time there, I was leading a food tour of people retracing the steps of the research trip that I did for my cookbook. I was in Rome. I went to this restaurant called Armando Alpanteone, Armando at the Pantheon, which I talked about. I did pasta research there two years ago. I went back there. I had this spaghetti alla grecia again, which is amazing again. But then I ordered the carpaccio. It was, first of all, it was, it was carpaccio with salsa tonata, tuna sauce. Which if you're not familiar, like, so it's, it doesn't taste like tuna. The sauce tastes more like a briny Dijonaise.

• 31:01Dan Pashman?

  And there's the the beefiest, most perfectly flavorful carpaccio. And then sprinkled over the top, they had like thin slices of like extra big capers.

• 31:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:14Dan Pashman?

  Little, little, yeah, caper berries, yes. Little bits of lemon.

• 31:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:20Dan Pashman?

  And then like flaky salt, like you'd have the beef and you had the tuna sauce. And then you would have one bite the head, this big, bright citrus lemon pop. And then you'd have a big briny caper pop. And then you'd have a salty, salt flake.

• 31:33Speaker 01

  You're in your briny era.

• 31:34Dan Pashman?

  I am. And it was absolutely majestic.

• 31:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:40Dan Pashman?

  And I'm sad that I can't eat it right now.

• 31:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:43Dan Pashman?

  But anyway.

• 31:44Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:44Dan Pashman?

  Beef carpaccio, Armando Panteo, best thing I ate this year. Last minute gift recommendations. One gift recommendation from each of you, please, Joe.

• 31:53Speaker 02

  I'm sure you've had that halva and tahini from Seed and Mill in New York. Seed and Mill, incredible halva place. You've had the halva, right?

• 32:00Dan Pashman?

  I haven't, I haven't. For our listeners who don't know it, halva is one of my all time favorite desserts. I love all sesame desserts. It's made with tahini, it's not super sweet. It's got a crumbly, almost fudgy, but a little bit sandy kind of a texture. I just, I'm excited about this, Joe. I gotta, I gotta try this one out.

• 32:16Speaker 02

  This is a different level of halva.

• 32:18Dan Pashman?

  This is sticking on your, on your pro seed stance that you've staked down here.

• 32:22Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 32:23Dan Pashman?

  Throughout the episode, Joe.

• 32:24Speaker 02

  Seed, seed.

• 32:25Dan Pashman?

  We're looking for a theme.

• 32:26Speaker 02

  Very sesame heavy, very sesame heavy episode. Um, so they make this incredible halva. They do it in a really fun flavors. If you haven't had it, you've got to try it because it's just, I didn't even realize how much I liked halva until I had theirs. It reminds me of that Spanish candy tirone, you know, which is the almonds and honey. But at Seed and Mill, they do things like there's a cardamom one, there's a, there's a sour cherry one that's incredible. But then I just saw that they've got halva covered pecans.

• 32:59Dan Pashman?

  Hmm.

• 32:59Speaker 02

  I mean, come on.

• 33:00Dan Pashman?

  Wow.

• 33:00Speaker 02

  That's gotta be incredible. And then I saw that there, they now started selling entire cakes and it's a big halva cake. It's, that serves, yeah. And you cut it into slices and I just thought, I want that. I haven't had that yet. And I was like, I want somebody to give, maybe this is what I want other people to give me.

• 33:22Dan Pashman?

  Yeah.

• 33:25Speaker 02

  I want a halva cake from Seed and Mill.

• 33:28Dan Pashman?

  So if anyone needs a last minute gift idea for Joe, please get him the halva from Seed and Mill. All right, Nikita, last minute gift recommendation.

• 33:35Speaker 01

  Okay, um, I had four, but I'll give you one. Um, so I did a newsletter about like afternoon tea. And here in the city, there's a place called Te Company and they're a Taiwanese tea shop and bakery and they have, they're very famous for their pineapple Linsor cookies, um, which is like a pineapple curd in between two very thin but crispy Linsor cookies. And you can buy them by the pack. You can buy them to go. You can, you can give them to your friends and family. And I think they're like a perfect holiday gift personally.

• 34:10Speaker 02

  Can I mail them?

• 34:12Speaker 01

  Yes, I think you can. I don't quote me on that, but I think maybe you can.

• 34:17Dan Pashman?

  I just checked and yes, Te Company does ship nationwide. That's Te, T E with an accent on the E. So Joe, you're in luck. For me though, I'd actually bring a gift idea instead. I have a hot take on gifting that I want to share. Because in the holiday season, a lot of us are invited to other people's houses. And of course, when you're invited to someone's house for any kind of a meal or gathering, you want to bring something, right? You're supposed to bring something. So there's two ways this goes. One is that, you know, you get invited and you say, what can I bring? And the host assigns you a dish. In that case, great, bring the thing that you were assigned. If they say, no, no, no, don't bring anything, or it's not the kind of thing where you would,

• 34:57Dan Pashman?

  where it would be appropriate to offer to bring something, but you still want to bring a gift. Or if you feel like what you've been assigned is not enough and you want to bring more. This is my pet peeve. You should be bringing something that you do not expect the host to serve. Cause the host has a plan.

• 35:15Speaker 02

  That's right.

• 35:16Dan Pashman?

  The host has planned out the courses and the order and the thing. And there's, there's some thought, thought and effort has been put into it. They've selected the desserts they're going to serve or whatever. They've selected the appetizers and the entrees. Don't show up with like.

• 35:28Speaker 01

  Potato salad with raisins in it.

• 35:30Dan Pashman?

  Right, right. You know, don't show.

• 35:31Speaker 02

  Or a halva cake? What if I showed up with a halva cake? I mean. Surely they want a hava cake.

• 35:35Speaker 01

  I think dessert, I think dessert is something different. I think bringing a sweet treat is very different. Like something that's savory entree, like they've planned that out. But I think like you can't hurt someone like bring some cookies.

• 35:46Speaker 02

  I agree with you though, that it should be a gift for the, it's a gift for the host.

• 35:50Dan Pashman?

  Right, it's not to serve, because Nikita, let's say, I said, Nikita, can you please bring an appetizer? And you thought, but you know, Dan's going to such trouble to host this event, this beautiful dinner he's invited me to, and I don't feel like this is enough, and I'm baking some cookies anyway, so I'm gonna bring cookies too. But I told Joe to bring dessert, and I told someone else to bring dessert. Now Joe has put a lot of thought and effort into the dessert he's bringing. And now they're excited to serve their desserts, and now in comes Nikita with cookies no one asked for.

• 36:15Speaker 01

  Well, the cookies are for you.

• 36:17Dan Pashman?

  Well, that's fine then, that's fine. Then you bring them like in a bag and say, these are not for right now, put them away, these are for you, these are my treat that I made for you, snack on them later. That's fine, or bring a gift for the household, or, or a bottle of olive oil for them to put away. But, but unless you have been assigned to bring a specific dish,

• 36:33Speaker 02

  Agreed.

• 36:34Dan Pashman?

  you should not bring something to a party that you expect to have served at the party you're going to. I'm off my high horse. Last question, you ready? Here we go. So here on the Sporkful, we have a tradition that for our year end episode, we do New Year's food resolutions, where listeners call in and they tell us what food they resolved to eat more of in the new year and why. And I also grade myself on the past year and, and reveal mine for the following year. So I'm not gonna reveal mine right now, that will be revealed next week. I want to remind our listeners that they have two more days to get your New Year's food resolutions in. We need them by the end of the day, December 18th. If you want to have any chance of getting included in our year end episode, send us a voice memo to [email protected].

• 37:15Dan Pashman?

  Tell us your name, where you are, and what food you resolved to eat more of in the new year and why. But while we have our esteemed guests here to whet our appetites for next week's show, Joe, you first, what food do you resolve to eat more of in the new year and why?

• 37:29Speaker 02

  Tamales.

• 37:31Dan Pashman?

  Oh, that's a good one, and why?

• 37:33Speaker 02

  Because they're amazing and because I've loved them pretty much my entire life. And I seem to have gone, for some reason, I seem to have gone a while this year and maybe the last couple of years without eating very many of them. And I think it's partly because there's a lot of really great Mexican food in DC, but DC's not really a hotbed of tamales. And so I don't know if this is something I need to be working on mail order or just making more of them at home. But I just, I just absolutely love tamales and, and I just miss them. I miss them. So I want to eat more of them and maybe with salsa matcha, of course, because I already talked about salsa matcha.

• 38:16Dan Pashman?

  There you go. All right, Nikita, New Year's food resolution.

• 38:18Speaker 01

  I would like to eat more food that I made myself. I go out to eat a ton for work mostly, but also I, I live alone, so I'm very, I don't like to make things all the time because I'm like, oh, I don't want to make, I don't want, I get tired of leftovers and I don't want to buy, like I said, vegetables and then let them go rotten in my fridge. But then, like, you guys are, you're, well, not you, sorry, but, you know, Dan is enjoying the, you know, the spoils of my having to test cookbooks this week. And yesterday I was like in my kitchen blasting Christmas music and baking and cooking. And I was like, I love this. I never do it anymore.

• 39:03Speaker 01

  I rarely do it. I love cooking for other people. So maybe like the goal is to like have a few like dinner party things or like small ones where no one can bring anything else.

• 39:12Dan Pashman?

  That's right. My thanks to Nikita Richardson of the New York Times Food Section. You can check out the newsletter that she writes. It's called Where to Eat, along with the New York Times other wonderful newsletters. And then my thanks to Joe Yonan of the Washington Post Food and Dining Section. Check out Joe's latest book, Mastering the Art of Plant-Based Cooking. Make sure you go on Amazon and give it a really good review. It's available wherever books are sold. Thank you, Joe and Nikita.

• 39:38Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 39:39Speaker 02

  Thanks for having me.

• 39:40Speaker 01

  Happy holidays.

• 39:42Dan Pashman?

  Next week on the show, it's our New Year's Food Resolution episode. And as I said earlier, I want to hear from you. Record a voice memo with your name, location, and then tell me what food you resolved to eat more of in the new year and why. Send it to me at hello at sporkful.com. By the end of the day, Wednesday, December 18th, and you may hear your resolution in our year end episode. Meanwhile, if you're looking for more Sporkful episodes to listen to, check out last week's show where I talked with cookbook authors Christina Cho and Brian Ford about changing careers to pursue cooking and why their second cookbooks were the ones they felt they were meant to write. And hey, did you know you can listen to the Sporkful on the Sirius XM app? Yes, the Sirius XM app, it has all your favorite podcasts, plus over 200 ad-free music channels curated by genre and era, plus live sports

• 40:26Dan Pashman?

  coverage. Does your podcasting app have that? And there's interviews with A-list stars and so much more. It's everything you want in a podcast app and music app all rolled into one. And right now, Sporkful listeners can get three months free of the Sirius XM app by going to siriusxm.com/sporkful.

• 40:43Dan Pashman?

  This episode was produced by me along with managing producer

• 40:45Speaker 03

  Emma Morgenstern.

• 40:46Dan Pashman?

  and senior producer

• 40:47Speaker 05

  Andres O'Hara.

• 40:48Dan Pashman?

  It was edited by

• 40:49Speaker 03

  Nora Ritchie.

• 40:50Dan Pashman?

  Our engineer is

• 40:51Speaker 06

  Jared O'Connell.

• 40:52Dan Pashman?

  And our intern is Julia Leo. Music help from Black Label Music. The Sporkful is a production of Stitcher Studios. Our executive producers are Nora Ritchie and Colin Anderson. Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman.

• 41:02Speaker 07

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• 41:52Dan Pashman?

  Hey, it's Dan here. Thank you so much, first of all, for tuning into the Sporkful every week. We really appreciate it. And I want to let you know, if you want to hear new episodes ad-free, subscribe to Sirius XM Podcasts Plus on Apple Podcasts, or visit siriusxm.com/podcastsplus to listen with Spotify or another app of your choice. Thanks.