And The Award Goes To...(Also goodbye)

Recently I was asked what my best dish is. I've often been asked what my favorite thing to cook is...but my best? I really don't know. Do I even have a best? How does one choose the most impressive of various feats of mediocrity?

I started looking back through my posts and realize there's a lot of crap in there...lot of stuff that people shouldn't find interesting, and some rare occasions where I managed to plate something okay-looking. I figured I had enough to put together a "best of my blog." It's like the time honored Television tradition of the clip show. I can generate a new post without generating actual content.

I realize this is pretty ridiculous. It'd be like if each TV network or movie studio held a specific awards show for the stuff they made. (Spoiler Alert: At the USA originals awards, Royal Pains and White Collar clean up. White Collar wins the coveted "Most blatant use of green screen and cutaways in order to unsuccessfully hide the fact that the chick who played Kelly Kapowski is nowhere near the rest of the cast" award).

First up is Achievement in a Television Cooking Competition-Style Dish

I'm actually quite proud of this one. This was from my first Fourth of July after graduating college. I had some people over for grilling, and I hadn't planned on anything more than ice cream sandwiches for dessert. My friends brought over some blueberries and strawberries, but they weren't quite ripe. I threw together the berries with some fresh squeezed orange and lime juice, a dash of balsamic vinegar, and a seeded jalapeno. I had to send people to the gas station to buy sugar because I hadn't stocked my pantry yet. The compote and a toasted marshmallow with the ice cream sandwich ended up being a pretty good combination. Absolutely no planning, a random assortment of ingredients, some acquired from a gas station...it was like a Quickfire...except my ass would've been cut for running out of time.

Next award is for Best Variation of a Classic Food Item, Made for Non-prostitution Purposes

These sweet potato tots were the real deal. Sweet potato tots that I've had at restaurants have been fakers...usually just a battered or breaded chunk of sweet potato. Tots gotta be grated hash style or it don't count (*cough*Richard Blais*cough*).









And logically, next is Best Variation of a Classic Food Item, Made for Prostitution Purposes

Two hot girls pooled their money and bought my ass for $75. I cooked them a meal based on their favorite movies. This was the West Side Story inspired Puerto Rico Roll. Fried plantain, avocado, and chicken wrapped in sofrito seasoned sushi rice. I undercooked the sofrito a little bit to preserve the nice green color.







The award for Best Food Item I Ripped Off of a Real Chef goes to

Laurent Tourondel's gruyere popovers from BLT Steak. I made about a million of these for a dinner party once. They got rave reviews, but it took about six hours of straight baking, and the temperature in my apartment hit 85 degrees (it was winter). My gas bill was quadruple what it normally runs. These are now reserved for special occasions/special people only.






Best dish that my sister will never make as well as I do

This is an important category, because this blog was initially started to make fun of my sister's blog. Sorry Jungjoo. Your Kimbap will never live up to mine.










Best photo that never made it onto the blog

Tie: In n' Out and Truffles




And finally...Best Dish


This porcini mushroom risotto is probably the finest dish I can consistently make. On this particular instance I had made it with a rich homemade chicken stock and fine dried porcinis as well as white truffle butter brought home from Florence. As I said in the original post, it was and still is the best dish I ever made.

Well that's it. The best of what my blog has offered in its five year history. For five years, I guess I really haven't achieved much, but I feel it's time to put this particular one to rest. Five years ago I started this to make fun of my sister's blog and food blogging in general. I'm afraid that the target has become too easy...everyone who gets Food network and has enough money to go to an expensive restaurant considers themselves a sophisticated foodie (a word that older foodies now think of as a derogatory term for the johnny-come-lately foodies...even though the only difference is that those who look down on new foodies have just been pretending longer). I don't consider myself a foodie...just someone who likes to eat and knows their way around a kitchen.

Food blogs in general have changed too. The web is saturated with hundreds of thousands of them...some are certainly worth your time, but that's a small percentage. My blog never really escaped all the noise that's out there, but at least it sounded a bit different. Now it's just another one in the pile.

Also I've softened in my old age...I need more sleep, my metabolism is slowing down, I spend a lot of time having to study and junk. The youthful punk who started "I like food, I don't like you," has matured into someone who says "I like food, and you're alright as long as you're not a complete idiot." That'd be a bit too wordy though. My content and my calmer demeanor don't quite match up to my blog's title (and lengthy URL). It's time for a new project with a different feel.

So that's it for ol' foodrulesyousuck.blogspot.com. It'll stay up as an archive, and I'm now looking into other blogging avenues but don't have anything to announce just yet.

Thanks for reading these past five years...it's been a lot of fun and I hope you enjoyed it.

Take care y'all.