The Anti-Mayonnaise Activists Are Becoming Emboldened

Mayonnaise is one of the world’s greatest condiments. It goes perfectly with almost any sandwich, goes great with burgers, and if you are feeling sophisticated, can be easily mixed with garlic to make aioli sauce. Every burger joint and sandwich shop goes through gallons of the stuff every day, yet if you listen to some people on Twitter you would think that it was some disgusting sludge with which unsophisticated gluttons desecrate their food.

Everyone who has ever worked in an offices knows of that one person who hates mayo and always requests that whenever sandwiches are being ordered for a working lunch that there be some sandwiches ordered without mayonnaise. For most of human history the common practice was to tell such people to pack their own lunch if they want to be so picky. The person would then be forced sit starving at the end of the table gnawing on carrot and celery sticks and feeling like an outcast. Everything worked perfectly until the Internet and social media came along.

Now that we live in an age where several billion people have access to social media, it is now possible for people with even the most extreme views, be it justifying terror attacks on civilians or hating mayonnaise, to easily find thousands of people who agree with them. Now that the anti-mayo crowd are connecting with likeminded culinary deviants they are becoming emboldened and have started conscripting the anti-egg yolk crowd into their cause even though most anti-mayo crusaders eat eggs with yolks all the time.

Part of me thinks that it is best to just ignore these fringe lunatics and take comfort in the fact that mayonnaise is as ubiquitous as it has ever been, but as recent events have shown, a lunatic fringe left unchecked can spiral out of control with disastrous consequences. It is time for the silent pro-mayo majority to find its voice and start standing up to the anti-mayos before their movement reaches a critical mass.

Don’t Tell Me Not to Fully Cook My Pork Chops

Every time I watch a video or TV show of a chef making some kind of pork recipe I’m invariably forced to listen to him or her badger me about how I shouldn’t cook it all the way through, but should instead leave it a little pink in the middle. Their story being that once upon a time it was necessary for safety reasons to cook pork all the way though like chicken, but at some point in recent years there was some vague yet magical development in pig slaughtering so now there is no need to worry about eating half raw pork. Based on their complaints about people continuing to overcook pork it would seem that few home cooks are listening to them so maybe they might want to consider getting over themselves and just letting us fully cook our pork chops.

Chefs love nothing more than to complain about people overcooking food. Tell any chef you prefer your steak well done and he’ll look at you like you told him you prefer your Veuve Clicquot mixed with equal parts 7up. I feel some chefs are particularly vocal about undercooking everything to increase their credibility with other chefs. I suspect the first person to suggest leaving pork pink in the middle was thinking more about his culinary street cred than advances in food safety. Mark it down, it is only a matter of time before you start hearing people tell you that you don’t need to cook chicken all the way through.

In any case, does it really make that much difference to the taste and texture if the middle of a pork chop is not entirely cooked? It’s not like fully cooked pork is like trying to eat shoe leather, and if you want truly tender pork you can easily find a couple thousand slow cooked or smoked recipes to choose from.  If you want to undercook your pork, go right ahead; it probably won’t hurt you. But do it because you like it and not because some TV chef feels the need to tell you what to do.