Samin Nosrat And Hrishikesh Hirway Are Just Here For The Cookies (Reheat)

In 2020, Samin Nosrat, author of the bestselling cookbook Salt Fat Acid Heat, and Hrishikesh Hirway, host of the podcast and Netflix show Song Exploder, teamed up to create Home Cooking, a podcast where they answer listeners’ cooking questions, make lots of bad puns, and share their passion for cookies, among other foods. They join Dan this week and accept a challenge: How much time can the three of them spend analyzing the most minute details of cookies?

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

• 0:00Dan Pashman?

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• 0:42Dan Pashman?

  The mini golf alone is probably worth, it's like the mini golf capital of the country. They have the most incredible elaborate mini golf courses. They also have more than 80 championship, full-size golf courses, plus 60 miles of beautiful coastline, all-season sunshine. Of course, you can relax by the beach or the pool. There's also jet skiing, fishing charters, paddle boarding, and of course, food. Oh, man, did we eat well in Myrtle Beach. From fresh local seafood to craft burgers and craft beers to kebabs on the boardwalk. With more than 2,000 restaurants to choose from, from legendary no-frill seafood shacks to chef-driven dining, Myrtle Beach has it all. Plus, live entertainment at the beach, there's always something epic going on. So, summer may be winding down, but in Myrtle Beach, you're gonna find the coastal vacation of your dreams all year long.

• 1:27Dan Pashman?

  Start planning your ultimate beach vacation and visit myrtlebeach.com.

• 1:34Dan Pashman?

  Hey, everyone, Dan here with another Sporkful reheat for you. And if you are in the mood to smile, laugh, and think deeply about cookies, I have the episode for you. This one was recorded with my friends and occasional collaborators, Samin Nosrat and Rishi K. Sherway, who you may know from their respective Netflix shows and podcasts and a lot of other creative projects. Now, the three of us spoke deep in the pandemic doldrums of fall 2020. Rather than focus on the negative, we decided we're gonna do this episode about pure cookie-related escapism. And boy, did we have fun making this one. As always, if there's an episode of the Sporkful you'd like us to pull out of the deep freezer, please let us know. Send me an email or voice memo to [email protected]. Don't forget to include your first name, location, which episode you'd like us to

• 2:19Dan Pashman?

  reheat, and why. Thanks so much, and enjoy my conversation with Samin and Rishi.

• 2:25Dan Pashman?

  Now, we've got a few different things to cover here, but I think first, we're gonna clear the air here a little bit, Samin.

• 2:30Speaker 01

  What?

• 2:31Dan Pashman?

  Because I-

• 2:32Speaker 01

  Have I wronged you?

• 2:33Dan Pashman?

  Well, I, I sent a question into your podcast.

• 2:36Speaker 01

  Oh, that's right. I can't remember. I just remember I was rude to you.

• 2:41Speaker 02

  Yeah, even though the question was about olives, you two have beef.

• 2:44Speaker 01

  Uh-oh, you're already start- you're doing it to his podcast now?

• 2:57Dan Pashman?

  This is The Sporkful. It is not for foodies, it is for eaters. I'm Dan Pashman. Each week on our show, we obsess about food to learn more about people. Now, you know that we sometimes get into pretty heavy topics here. But I'm gonna tell you right off the top, this is not gonna be one of those episodes. We are going for pure escapism. Here we go. Samin Nosrat and Rishi Kesh Hirway are friends, creators, and food lovers. Samin was on our show before, after the release of her cookbook, Salt, Fat, Acid: Heat, which went on to become a hit Netflix docu-series. Rishi is best known as the host of the music podcast Song Exploder, which I love, and which also recently became a Netflix series. But as you'll hear, he's got plenty to say about food.

• 3:41Dan Pashman?

  Earlier this year, when everyone was sheltering in place, Samin and Rishi came together to launch the podcast Home Cooking. They answer listener questions about food and cooking, they laugh a lot, and Rishi tortures Samin with his puns. It was originally supposed to be a four-episode limited run, but as the pandemic drags on, they're now up to episode 11 of their four-episode run. So, let's get into it. First, Samin and I have to get past this olive beef, right? Now, here's what happened. A while back, I submitted a question to Home Cooking. And let's just say, the response was less than satisfying. My question was, does having the pit in the olive make it taste better? Because there's a perception that, like, fancier olives are typically sold with a pit in,

• 4:25Dan Pashman?

  and pitted olives feel sort of like more lowbrow. And your first answer was, "I could have Googled it."

• 4:41Dan Pashman?

  Which, you know, hate to break it to you, Simi, but if that's gonna be your answer, you're not gonna have much of a podcast left.

• 4:51Dan Pashman?

  But then, then your, your more, your more legit answer is basically like, as a chef, we are trained to, you know, you want, you want to get all your ingredients in their most untampered with state.

• 5:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 5:01Dan Pashman?

  Which, which is a good answer from a chef's perspective, but my perspective, I'm not a chef, and my perspective is more the perspective of, you know, Joe Eater, who's gonna buy a jar of olives in the supermarket and like eat them right out of the jar after my kids have gone to bed when I'm having a cocktail, or like chop them up to throw them on my pizza, and I find the pit irritating. Because like, like the pit detracts from the eating experience. Like you, you bite into it, you hit this rock in the center, it's unpleasant, and then you spend most of the eating experience just like trying not to choke, or trying not to look totally disgusting to anyone who might be looking at you. And then the olive, by the time you dealt with the pit, the other, the rest of the olive is gone. You swallowed it without noticing. Is the pit doing anything good to, is it contributing flavor?

• 5:46Dan Pashman?

  Is it preserving freshness? Is it doing something that counteracts all the crap that it brings to the table?

• 5:53Speaker 01

  Dan, do you have an idea of like how many months it's been since you sent this question and I gave you that frustrating answer? It's probably been like at least four months, right? So the fact that like, you're still frustrated, and then this has been frustrating you for however long before that, I think, to me, it points to something else. I will say like, once, once you pit it, there's just like more oxidation that can happen. There's more, you know, there's more sort of space.

• 6:22Dan Pashman?

  More degradation.

• 6:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, degradation can happen, exactly. But what I will say is what, what I'm left with even more than like the specifics of like what percentage degradation in the taste, is, is listening to how frustrated you are and like looking on your face and feeling that. If dealing with the pit is so frustrating to you that it's costing you pleasure, then I think you should probably stick to pit at olives, you know? And not feel bad about it.

• 6:55Dan Pashman?

  Okay, I will buy pitted olives and not feel bad about it. I think we can consider the matter resolved. I guess it's time for me to let this one go.

• 7:06Dan Pashman?

  Okay, let's move on. On home cooking, Samin and Rishi answer questions like mine. But before they became real life friends and co-hosts, they were Twitter friends with a shared appreciation for each other's work, passion for bad jokes, and a love of good food. As you'll hear, for a time they hung out I R L, cookies were involved. These two love cookies. Well, mostly Rishi. He is obsessed. All right, let's talk about cookies.

• 7:34Speaker 02

  Bring it.

• 7:35Dan Pashman?

  This is really the thing I'm most excited to talk to you guys about. I almost feel like I want to take it as a challenge to see how much, in how much detail and how much time can we spend analyzing cookies?

• 7:48Speaker 01

  We're gonna be here for a long time.

• 7:49Speaker 02

  This is my dream interview.

• 7:53Dan Pashman?

  Rishi, I want to start with you because I know this is, this is really, this is right in your sweet spot. Wah wah.

• 7:58Speaker 01

  Wah wah. You got him, you got him, you got him.

• 8:02Dan Pashman?

  That wasn't even intentional, it's contagious.

• 8:06Dan Pashman?

  But like, you know, a quick scan of your Instagram, you know, you've got a wide variety of cookies. Chocolate mint chip cookies. You had oatmeal coconut chocolate raisin pecan cookies, like in, you know, everything in the pantry cookie. Chocolate chili pistachio cookies, salted cardamom chocolate chip, ginger molasses, chocolate cookies with coconut and almonds and dark chocolate chunks and sea salt. You, you, and you tweeted years ago, I know you as a person who, when you travel to new cities, you go out on cookie hunts.

• 8:37Speaker 02

  That's right.

• 8:38Speaker 01

  That's how, that was how Rishi and I spent our first in-person day together, was a cookie expedition, a cookie adventure.

• 8:45Speaker 02

  Here in LA.

• 8:46Dan Pashman?

  Well, Samin, I want to hear your, in a minute, I want to hear your characterization of that process. But Rishi, just first off, what is it about cookies?

• 8:54Speaker 02

  I mean, they're just the perfect amount of joy in this little package. You know, it's just. It's not a huge commitment to eat or to make. And as a format, you know, I really like formats and it's a really great format for combining all kinds of delightful flavors.

• 9:15Dan Pashman?

  Right. Well, it's interesting to me the way you think about it. It strikes me that you're a person who appreciates good editing.

• 9:24Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 9:25Dan Pashman?

  In all of its forms, like your podcast Songsbloater is very tightly edited, very precisely put together. So there's something about the cookie that it's very compact. It doesn't have anything extraneous.

• 9:37Speaker 02

  Exactly. It travels well. You can get them individually. I think a lot of it does stem from that experience of traveling. You know, like if you're going to go to a place, it's a lot easier to kind of seek out a cookie, get one, eat it, or get one from a few different places and have a sampling of things in a city. Whereas other things like cake or ice cream, it makes it harder to sort of sample in that same way.

• 10:06Dan Pashman?

  Samin, tell me about going out on a cookie hunt with Rishi. What just, what's that like?

• 10:10Speaker 01

  My experience of Rishi is that he, like his brain version of a Google map is all the bakeries of a city. And so he's like, oh, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here. So that day we went, it was the first time we hung out in person after a few years of sort of corresponding online. And I can't remember how many places we went to. I'm sure he could tell you right now, but we went in search of a bunch of, did we eat them all as we went or did we collect them and then eat them all at the end? I can't remember.

• 10:42Speaker 02

  Both.

• 10:42Speaker 01

  No, we went, we ate them as we went.

• 10:43Speaker 02

  We ate them as we went and we also had, we saved some for later.

• 10:46Speaker 01

  Yeah. And then, and there was also the errant empanada. And then, but then also like as we were going, he was like, oh, and then there's the most amazing cookie, but it's actually not even from a storefront.

• 11:04Speaker 01

  And so then there was this like, kind of like, secret furtive phone call to a baker to see if she could like custom bake us some cookies.

• 11:13Dan Pashman?

  Oh my god, you're a guy to hang out with.

• 11:15Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was really amazing. It was really, really amazing. And then we pulled up and you know, we had to go and like knock on the secret door and she did it. And it was just, it was a, it was a really fun way to get to know somebody. It's a really fun way to get to know, you know, a neighborhood or a part of a city that you're not super familiar with. I have always sort of identified with that Chow Hound mentality of like, oh yeah, I'll travel across a city or a town to eat anything, you know, I'll eat all the tacos, I'll eat all the whatever. But my eyes are bigger than my stomach. And so I often like, just I'm sick to my stomach by like 4pm, you know? Cookies because they are sort of compact. Or like, if you want to just take a bite and

• 11:59Speaker 01

  put the rest back in the bag and put it back in your backpack or whatever you can, and you can kind of care. And then it's like 10pm and you're so excited because you found the cookie in your bag later.

• 12:07Dan Pashman?

  Ooh, backpack cookies.

• 12:09Speaker 02

  I think there's also an element to it that is just, you know, being able to stay connected to the joy that a cookie brought you when you were a kid. I think I'm always trying to stay connected to that feeling in everything in life. And I think hanging out with Samin for that first time, it was a really great way, I think, for us to get to know each other. It sort of felt like it was a great way for me to introduce her to the way that I think and think about food. And it set the tone for our friendship, I think.

• 12:51Dan Pashman?

  Ahead of this conversation, I put the call out to you, asking for your questions about cookies. Coming up, I'll put those questions to Samin and Rishi. How crunchy or chewy should a cookie be? Which is better, chocolate chips or chocolate chunks? If this episode itself is a cookie, we have only just begun nibbling at the perimeter. Stick around.

• 13:19Speaker 03

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• 13:26Dan Pashman?

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• 14:07Dan Pashman?

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• 14:50Dan Pashman?

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• 15:24Dan Pashman?

  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. 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.

• 16:08Dan Pashman?

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• 16:32Dan Pashman?

  Welcome back to another Sporkful Reheat. I'm Dan Pashman. Now, as you may recall, in our New Year's resolutions episode last year, I resolved to eat more fish this year. Well, coming up in the 2024 Year-End episode, I will be grading myself on how well I did and revealing my New Year's food resolution for 2025. Of course, that means I also want to hear yours. So please, record a voice memo with your name, location, and then tell me what food do you resolve to eat more of in the new year and why. And you may hear yourself in our year-end spectacular. Send that voice memo to me at [email protected]. One more very important note. This January, I am coming to Memphis. First-ever live Sporkful show in Memphis at the Buckman Art Center Thursday, January 16.

• 17:16Dan Pashman?

  I'll be joined by local food legend Karen Blockman Carrier, owner of The Beauty Shop and lots of other local food businesses. This is a beautiful theater. It's gonna be a great night. And I want to see all you Sporkful fans in Memphis, January 16. For tickets and more info, go to sporkful.com/events. Thanks so much. See you there. Now, back to my conversation with Samin Nosrat and Rishi Hirway. So I put the call out to Sporkful listeners on Instagram. Questions for both of you. I specifically prompted for cookie-related questions. So that was a lot of them. Meg on Instagram writes, "Where do you stand on chewy versus crispy versus caky for cookies? Personally, I think crispy cookies are garbage, but I'd like to hear the experts."

• 18:00Speaker 01

  I defer to Rishi.

• 18:02Speaker 02

  Ideal texture is a little bit crispy on the outside, but then softer on the inside and still, you know, with a good chew.

• 18:13Dan Pashman?

  I don't think that any cookie, if you want to be a great cookie, it should not be monotextural.

• 18:19Speaker 01

  Oh, I would, I think I agree with that. I think I agree with that. Except for things like, um, no, I think I agree with that. I was gonna say, except for like, say, an Oreo, but even an Oreo has multiple textures.

• 18:31Dan Pashman?

  Right. It's just once you bite it and it starts breaking, you get creamier bits, you get, right. I even apply that, like, you know, I love the Girl Scouts, but the Girl Scout cookies, I think this is a problem with their cookies is too many are monotextural. This is why the Samoas or Caramel Delight is they're called in some parts of the country. I think are the best ones, because they're the only ones with textural variation.

• 18:49Speaker 02

  You are right. They are the best ones.

• 18:51Speaker 01

  Interesting. Texture is also a really important part of flavor. Texture also, just to go back to the olive pit, that interruption of the texture of the olive, you know, it's so disruptive to you, which is why you're just like,

• 19:02Dan Pashman?

  But if it was edible, I bet I would like it.

• 19:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:05Dan Pashman?

  What, describe your ideal cookie textures, I mean.

• 19:08Speaker 01

  Well, I, one of my very favorite chocolate chip cookies is the, um, the Sarah Kiefer chocolate chip cookie that comes as a result of the pan bang, the pan bang. Have you made that one, Dan?

• 19:20Dan Pashman?

  No, but I've seen the video, like you start off with a big ball of cookie dough and it starts to cook and then you take the baking sheet out every few minutes and bang it on the counter. So it kind of settles and ripples outward and you do that every few minutes. And then so, right, like you end up with these kind of ripples around the perimeter of the cookies. So those areas have more surface area exposed to the heat. They brown more, they turn crispier, and then you have the center part that is kind of flat and stays soft and gooey.

• 19:46Speaker 01

  Exactly. And so you really get the full spectrum of textures, which is to me so deeply enjoyable. I love that. I really love that. That I feel like that, as far as a cookie that I myself have baked, has been the apotheosis of cookie texture.

• 20:05Dan Pashman?

  That's quite an endorsement. I'm gonna have to look into that. I think of cookies as like, if you're looking at a cookie from the top, what I want is like concentric circles of cookie cook-iness. Like picture like a target. You got a target of the rings on the cookie. And you have your your outer perimeter should be crispy. Then as you move towards the center, you want chewy. When you get right into the bullseye, you want gooey.

• 20:36Speaker 01

  Ooh.

• 20:37Speaker 02

  The Pan-Bang cookie really is aimed at that kind of experience, I think.

• 20:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 20:44Dan Pashman?

  I'm gonna have to try it. And then sprinkled throughout, though, I want chocolate chips, or nuts, or fruits, other like sort of surprise pieces of crunch and chew. So you're getting like crispy, chewy, gooey, crunchy.

• 20:57Speaker 02

  I think that one cookie that you mentioned, the pecan raisin chocolate chip coconut oatmeal cookie that I made is maybe the best cookie that I've made. And I think it's because of the heterogeneity of the texture in it. It was every single bite was a little bit different. And it was always a surprise.

• 21:18Speaker 01

  Yeah. I think going back to my eyes being hungrier than my stomach, I always am like, ooh, I want to add more chocolate. But then when I'm eating the cookie, I'm always like, I want less chocolate. I want more cookie. Because it's like, um, not not less chocolate. Trust me, I want plenty of chocolate. I know, I saw the shock on your face. I just don't like it when it's too chocolatey. I don't like it when there's not enough cookie. Do you know what I mean? Like, I don't like it.

• 21:46Dan Pashman?

  Well, because it's like.

• 21:47Speaker 01

  Rishi's totally not okay with this. I want the chocolate chip to feel precious. Like, I want the chocolate to feel precious.

• 21:53Dan Pashman?

  And you want what a sensory scientist would call dynamic contrast.

• 21:57Speaker 01

  Oh, yes, I love dynamic contrast.

• 21:59Dan Pashman?

  Yeah, right, right, right. Rishi, do you want to argue this point? What does it mean? Is there such a thing as too many chocolate chips in a chocolate chip cookie?

• 22:05Speaker 02

  Who's to say what counts as too many or not enough chocolate chips? Really, everybody has their own sense of what the ideal ratio is. So it means it might be.

• 22:15Speaker 01

  I'm so stressed right now. I'm sweating. I have like major armpit stains in my t-shirt because this is the most stressful conversation.

• 22:31Dan Pashman?

  Last time you came on, Samin, I think we spent the first 15 minutes talking about toast.

• 22:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:35Dan Pashman?

  So, you know, the sportful brings the hard hitting questions.

• 22:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 22:41Dan Pashman?

  Next, next listener question, Eric writes, what is the best chocolate chip to use in a chocolate chip cookie?

• 22:46Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 22:47Dan Pashman?

  Semi-sweet, milk, dark, white, combo? But I'm interested to hear your take on chocolate chips versus chocolate chunks.

• 22:55Speaker 01

  Oh, yes, I have full opinions on this. I'm not a fan of the chocolate chip. I mean, I love eating them, but I like having chocolate that you chop because I like the surprise of sometimes you get a little piece, sometimes you get a big piece, sometimes there's a big melty pocket, sometimes it's just like a tiny little thing. So I like having hand chopped chocolate in a cookie. I also think that for most, at most grocery stores, the selection of chocolate bars offers, you know, better chocolate options than the chocolate chip selection.

• 23:32Dan Pashman?

  Higher quality.

• 23:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, higher quality. And I will say, like, I do like in my chocolate chip cookies, I do like a semi-sweet, but I do think, like, having variety is nice because, again, it's like that contrast, it's a little bit of surprise. So I like having sort of something in the 60s range and then something a little bit higher and or a little bit lower. Yeah, in the percentages. But, but also, like, I fully have just gone through my cabinet and just used whatever I have.

• 24:01Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 24:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:03Dan Pashman?

  Rishi, chocolate chips or chocolate chunks?

• 24:05Speaker 02

  The best results I've gotten is actually a combination of the two. The chopped chocolate bar gives you all that variety that Samin was talking about, but it also melts, even the bigger pieces melt in a different way than chocolate chips melt. Chocolate chips might have a little bit of a different density. So I think for my money, the best cookie is made with a combination of chopped dark chocolate in the, you know, high 60s or low 70s, mixed with Semi-sweet chocolate chips. You don't just get the difference in the sweetness of the chocolate. You also get a difference in how melty different things are.

• 24:43Speaker 01

  I would, I would, I would go with that.

• 24:44Dan Pashman?

  That's a fair point. I, I think we're all roughly on the same page. I like, um, you know, you know, the Talenti ice creams? One of my, one of my criticisms of, of them is that the ones that they have there like chocolate chips. They have like sort of a, a thousand flecks of chocolate.

• 24:59Speaker 01

  It's just shavings. Yeah.

• 25:01Dan Pashman?

  It's just shavings and it's monotextial. Every bite is the same. When you have the first bite of it, you're like, ooh, that's kind of nice. And then by the third or fourth bite, you're like, meh. You know, like I, I want a pint of ice cream to feel like a scavenger hunt. You know, and then, and then when you, when you find that gigantic chunk of whatever.

• 25:16Speaker 01

  Oh, it's amazing.

• 25:17Dan Pashman?

  You know, right? Exactly. But you know, but in order for that experience to exist, there have to be other bites that don't have any. You know, and that's life.

• 25:24Speaker 02

  Dan, have you had the, um, everything but the ice cream from Ben and Jerry's?

• 25:29Dan Pashman?

  I don't know if I've had that one. I've eaten a lot of Ben and Jerry's in my day.

• 25:33Speaker 02

  That one might be my favorite and it is exactly for this reason. It does feel like a scavenger hunt. There's so many different elements in it. Um, there are toffee pieces and there are little peanut butter cup pieces. And just, I think, white chocolate in there. Every single bite, you're just like, what's, what's going to happen next?

• 25:54Dan Pashman?

  All right, I'm going to try that out. I'm going to try that. Lauren writes, how many seconds should a chocolate chip cookie be warmed in the microwave? Eight seconds is my go-to, but I'm open to suggestions for improvement.

• 26:07Speaker 01

  Ooh.

• 26:08Speaker 02

  Eight seconds sounds great to me. I tend to usually do toaster oven instead of microwave.

• 26:16Dan Pashman?

  This guy's got all the time in the world.

• 26:23Speaker 02

  If you are doing it in the microwave, I would say, put a, uh, a paper towel on top of your cookie.

• 26:29Dan Pashman?

  Do you also put a paper towel underneath? Cause it drives my wife crazy when I put things in the microwave without a paper towel underneath.

• 26:34Speaker 02

  Oh yeah. I mean, we're not barbarians.

• 26:41Dan Pashman?

  I'm gonna get a little controversial here. And look, again, this is a matter of taste. So I am not, if you like your chocolate chip cookies warm, like obviously, there's a lot of people who agree. For me, I would, I think I prefer my cookies room temperature or even a little bit cool.

• 26:56Speaker 01

  Cool?

• 26:57Speaker 02

  There are some cookies that are better cool.

• 26:59Speaker 01

  Cool?

• 27:03Dan Pashman?

  So it means like, wait, it does not compute.

• 27:06Speaker 02

  Wait, wait, wait. We talked about Girl Scout cookies already.

• 27:09Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, okay, okay, okay. You're right. You're right. Okay, okay. I'm with you.

• 27:13Speaker 02

  Yeah. All right, all right. The Thin Mint cookie, I think, is

• 27:15Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, definitely Thin Mints.

• 27:17Speaker 02

  The best example of

• 27:18Speaker 01

  Okay, for sure.

• 27:18Speaker 02

  Cookie where being cold improves it.

• 27:21Dan Pashman?

  Yeah. Well, but, but when you have a cookie that's cold, it solidifies the butter in the cookie, and it makes the cookie more dense.

• 27:28Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 27:28Dan Pashman?

  More tooth sinkable.

• 27:29Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 27:30Dan Pashman?

  And if you have a cookie that's really like gooey, undercooked in the center, it will still be very soft and moist even out of the fridge, and you get more textural contrast.

• 27:38Speaker 01

  Oh, damn, you have really thought about this.

• 27:43Speaker 01

  You guys are way more professional cookie guys than me.

• 27:49Dan Pashman?

  Next question. This one, this one is, had me stumped. Ann writes, chocolate and peanut butter is widely acknowledged to be one of the best flavor combinations known to humankind.

• 27:58Speaker 01

  Hundred percent.

• 27:58Dan Pashman?

  Yes, we can agree on that. Chocolate chip cookies are arguably the most popular cookie ever made. Peanut butter cookies are also delicious.

• 28:06Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 28:06Dan Pashman?

  But I've never seen a peanut butter cookie with chocolate chips.

• 28:10Speaker 02

  No, that's not true. I ate one last night, in fact.

• 28:14Dan Pashman?

  Wow. Okay, debunked. And you just got debunked.

• 28:17Speaker 01

  But I will say, like, to me, preferable to a peanut butter cookie with chocolate chips is the classic peanut butter flour. The peanut butter cookie with a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup in it. I love those.

• 28:29Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 28:30Speaker 01

  I also love the Ohio Buckeye.

• 28:34Dan Pashman?

  Oh, Buckeye. I make those every holiday season. Buckeyes are so good.

• 28:39Speaker 01

  Can you describe those, Dan? Because I don't know that I can describe.

• 28:41Dan Pashman?

  It's basically like, like you take, you mix, you mix peanut butter, peanut butter, sugar, and butter, roll them into balls, like, you know, and then You freeze them and then you dip them in chocolate and then you you and I I like to dip them in a hefty quantity of chocolate, dark chocolate. And then that way, when you lay them on the wax paper and put them in the fridge for the chocolate to solidify, some of it drips down and forms a little puddle along the the bottom, like a little sort of skirt, I like to think of it. And when you bite into it, you not only get the the thin chocolate shell and the the the textural contrast again, when you then you get into the creamy peanut butter, but

• 29:22Dan Pashman?

  then at the acute angle at the bottom of the chocolate where the skirt, the the puddle meets the the globe, so to speak, I don't know if I'm describing this in a way that people who can't see me can understand, but.

• 29:34Speaker 01

  There's like a thicker part.

• 29:36Dan Pashman?

  There's an acute angle, exactly, and there and that is your crunch.

• 29:40Speaker 01

  Uh huh. I I have not seen a lot of chocolate chip peanut butter cookies, but the chocolate and peanut butter baked good, definitely, there's a whole genre that I'm really into. But describe what you had Brett last night, Rishi.

• 29:56Speaker 02

  Well, what I had was a store bought Uncle Eddie's vegan peanut butter chocolate chip cookie, but I made a peanut butter chocolate chip cookie that I thought turned out really well. I think the secret to a good peanut butter chocolate cookie is brown butter. If you can make it with brown butter, the peanut butter and the chocolate chip, I think, intermarry more harmoniously. I used a mixture of peanut butter chips and chocolate chunks.

• 30:23Speaker 01

  Okay, now you're just going cuckoo ball.

• 30:27Dan Pashman?

  That sounds really good.

• 30:28Speaker 01

  I love peanut butter chips.

• 30:30Dan Pashman?

  Yeah. It is strange, though, because I feel like chocolate based cookie with peanut butter chip is pretty common. I feel like I see that.

• 30:36Speaker 01

  I've seen those. I've definitely seen those like in the like in the like variety pack.

• 30:40Dan Pashman?

  Yeah, those are everywhere, but I don't understand, but it is true that the peanut butter base cookie with chocolate chips or chunks seems to be rare, considering how common chocolate peanut butter desserts are. I don't know why that isn't hasn't, you know, gained wider purchase.

• 31:03Dan Pashman?

  After more discussion, you make the educated guess that peanut butter cookies are drier, more crumbly, more like shortbread. So if you put chocolate chips or other big chunks in there, the cookies are more likely to just fall apart. That's our theory as to why you don't see more peanut butter cookies with chocolate chips. So there you have it. We just spent about 25 minutes talking about cookies. If you're a longtime listener, you will recall that this used to be pretty much the whole show. 10 years ago, we spent a whole show analyzing the ideal surface area to volume ratio of ice cubes. You know, like, how fast do you want your ice to melt depending on the beverage and the weather? These are big issues. Anyway, before we wrapped up, I did have a few non-cookie questions for Samin and Rishi. Are you guys ready for the lightning round?

• 31:48Speaker 01

  Always. Except you know how we are with like, we're like, very slow lightning.

• 31:52Dan Pashman?

  Right. The slow motion lightning round?

• 31:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 31:57Dan Pashman?

  All right. We got a question from Mickey Maynard, friend of the show, past guest, who writes for Forbes and other publications. Mickey says, "Would Samin ever go back to the restaurant world or open her own place? If so, what would she do differently compared with her earlier experiences?"

• 32:12Speaker 01

  Never. It's never been my dream. I think I realized a long time ago, the stress involved with it is just not what I, that's not what I want to do. But if we were to talk about like, imaginary cooking world, and what I would want to do, I mean, Rishi and I have our imaginary ice cream parlor, the Emperor of Ice Cream, that we're gonna open.

• 32:33Dan Pashman?

  All the names of the flavors are literary allusions.

• 32:37Speaker 01

  Yes. And then also, my imaginary roast chicken restaurant that I would like to have, my rotisserie chicken place. And then I also would have like, an imaginary lasagna restaurant. Those are my imaginary restaurants that I would like to have.

• 32:52Speaker 01

  With no employees. I think employees and like, I think having employees and having to take care of employees, it's such a huge responsibility that I don't want to undertake. Yeah, so no, thank you.

• 33:06Dan Pashman?

  Audrey on Instagram writes, we need an update on the Samin boyfriend application process. Now, for people who don't listen to home cooking, Rishi, you put out a call for people to apply to be Samin's boyfriend, much to Samin's dismay. I know in a recent episode, you said the effort has borne fruit. Is there anything more you can divulge?

• 33:25Speaker 02

  There's no more that can be divulged.

• 33:28Dan Pashman?

  Can I just, can I ask one question? Rishi, have you met the gentleman?

• 33:33Speaker 01

  Digitally.

• 33:34Speaker 02

  That's true.

• 33:35Dan Pashman?

  Okay, digitally, but not in person?

• 33:37Speaker 02

  No, no, no, no.

• 33:38Speaker 01

  I mean, he lives in-

• 33:39Speaker 02

  I'm not living, I'm not meeting anybody in person.

• 33:41Dan Pashman?

  Well, right, right, okay. I mean, like even distanced.

• 33:44Speaker 02

  No, no, no, I, there's a plexiglass dividing the bed in my home.

• 33:52Speaker 01

  Yesterday on Twitter, I saw some like, um, that you can buy like a pod, like a pod that you can like wear out in the world now, like you can just wear.

• 34:05Speaker 01

  Like you can just wear a pod out on the street. I was, it made me think of you.

• 34:11Dan Pashman?

  Karina writes, I spend a lot of time cooking for my family, but a lot of times I'm just over the food I've made by the time we're ready to eat. I've smelled it and been around it for so long that I'm not interested in eating it anymore. And this is, I really identified with this. I love that they enjoy the food, but how can I cook in a way that I will enjoy sitting down and eating with my family too?

• 34:30Speaker 02

  Get one of those bubbles that Samin was just talking about.

• 34:35Speaker 02

  Keep it on until it's time to eat.

• 34:37Dan Pashman?

  Right, right.

• 34:38Speaker 01

  I'm like, keep a bunch of cookies in the fridge and eat that for dinner.

• 34:44Speaker 01

  I'm like, welcome to the cook's eternal problem. I don't know. This one I don't have an answer for. Maybe recontextualizing what it is that you expect to be having, you know, watching everyone else at the table, maybe eating a whole meal and taking some joy out of that, and maybe having just a small bite yourself. And that might be enough. Like, that's often what I do. I rarely, rarely, rarely, especially on a thing like Thanksgiving, when I've been cooking really for days and I come to the table, like, the last thing I want to do is eat the whole thing. But, um, yeah, I want to taste everything and I enjoy watching other people and have a glass of wine. So I feel you, Karina. Like, it's been my thing since

• 35:26Speaker 01

  the beginning of my career. But I think for me, I've just changed what it is that I want to experience at the table, which is just being with people and having a little taste.

• 35:35Speaker 02

  You know, I worked at McDonald's and I never got sick of eating the food.

• 35:39Dan Pashman?

  Interesting. What did you do at McDonald's?

• 35:41Speaker 02

  I was a cashier.

• 35:43Speaker 01

  You look so good in headphones. I imagine you working the takeout window.

• 35:47Speaker 02

  There was no takeout window. It was in the mall. So we didn't have a drive-through. I worked the cash register and, you know, and did the fries. I was 14, so I wasn't allowed to work in the back.

• 35:57Dan Pashman?

  Okay. And what did you learn from that experience that has informed your life today?

• 36:02Speaker 02

  I'll tell you. There was one day, a kid who might have been my age, or maybe he was 15. He ordered his drink and then, you know, and he got some combo that came with the drink. And I said, what do you want for your drink? And he said, you know what a suicide is? And he was real cool. And, uh, and I was, I said, no, what is that? He's like, it's when you mix all the different sodas. I was like, oh, yeah, that I do all the time. And, uh, and he's like, I'd like that. I was like, okay. And so, you know, special order. So I went and like, did my custom mix of all the different flavors and the ratio that I thought would be right. And then I gave it to him and he took, he took a sip as he was waiting for the rest of his order to come in. Takes a sip and he looks at me and goes, you make them good.

• 36:52Speaker 01

  Wow. You really, really internalized that compliment for the next 40 years.

• 36:59Speaker 02

  That's, that set me on a path to thinking, I might be good at editing.

• 37:16Dan Pashman?

  That's Samin Nosrat and Rishi Hirway. Their podcast, Home Cooking, is available wherever you listen. You can also find Samin's latest writing and recipes in The New York Times. And if you want to hear Rishi's expert editing and action, check out his podcast, Song Exploder, and the Netflix show of the same name, where artists like Alicia Keys, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Ty Dolla Sign, and R.E.M. dissect a song of theirs and tell the story of how it was written. It's really good. Hey, what are you doing on Election Day? Besides voting, of course. My kids are off from school, so I have decided that we're gonna pass the time by making those Pan Bang Chocolate Chip Cookies we talked about earlier in this episode. I will share videos in my Instagram stories. So make sure you're following me on the Gram, where I am at The Sporkful.

• 38:00Dan Pashman?

  In the meantime, check out last week's episode, Spicy Doritos and How Foods Become American. It's up now. This show is produced by me, along with senior producer-

• 38:10Speaker 04

  Emma Morgenstern.

• 38:11Dan Pashman?

  And producers-

• 38:12Speaker 05

  Andre Soeha.

• 38:12Dan Pashman?

  And-

• 38:13Speaker 04

  Tamika Weatherspoon.

• 38:14Dan Pashman?

  Our editor is-

• 38:15Speaker 04

  Tracy Samuelson.

• 38:16Dan Pashman?

  The show is mixed by- Jared O'Connell. Music help from Black Label Music. The Sporkful is a production of Stitcher. Our executive producers are Peter Clowney and Daisy Rosario. Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman.

• 38:28Speaker 06

  And I'm Danielle in Philadelphia, reminding you to eat more, eat better, and eat more better.

• 38:49Dan Pashman?

  This reheat was produced by- Gianna Palmer. The team that produces The Sporkful today includes me, along with managing producer-

• 38:55Speaker 04

  Emma Morgenstern.

• 38:56Dan Pashman?

  And senior producer-

• 38:57Speaker 05

  Andre Soeha.

• 38:58Dan Pashman?

  Our engineer is- Jared O'Connell. The Sporkful is a production of Stitcher Studios. Our executive producers are Nora Ritchie and Colin Anderson. And hey, did you know you can listen to The Sporkful on the SiriusXM app? Yes, the SiriusXM app, it has all your favorite podcasts, plus over 200 ad-free music channels curated by genre and era, plus live sports coverage. Does your podcasting app have that? And there's interviews with A-list stars and so much more. It's everything you want in a podcast app and music app all rolled into one. And right now, Sporkful listeners can get three months free of the SiriusXM app by going to siriusxm.com/sporkful. Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman.

• 39:40Speaker 03

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• 40:40Dan Pashman?

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• 41:04Speaker 05

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