# Foods you prefer cooked "wrong" **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** food-cooking\ **Created:** [March 13, 2024, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787 "2024-03-13T03:32:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/121 "2024-03-14T16:09:44Z")
> [@Pardel-Lux](#): > > the serials Surely this can’t be a spelling error. I’ve seen too many serials improperly prepared. Half-baked, a lot of them. ---
**Author:** ![echoreply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/echoreply/32/3641_2.png) [@echoreply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/echoreply)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/122 "2024-03-14T16:44:48Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > Frying with olive oil is another one There is an episode or YouTube video from America’s Test Kitchen/Cook’s Country where they ask all the chefs if they just use olive oil at home regardless of what the recipe calls for, and there answers were pretty much, yes, they all do that. I used to do that until recently when the price of olive oil has gone up so much. I’ll use vegetable oil in places where a neutral oil is good enough. > [@Spoons](#): > > my ham and cheese sandwich had butter This made me think of some lunches I was served in the Netherlands, where the ham and “cheese” turned out to be ham and very thick slices of butter. All of the sandwiches had thick slices of butter. It was strange, and good, but I’ve never bothered to recreate it at home. > [@CairoCarol](#): > > traditional Dutch celebratory treat of buttered bread topped with licorice-flavored jimmies And then you mention this weird Dutch treat. Definitely a country with thoughts about butter. Recently at breakfast the waiter asked one of my companions how she wanted her eggs poached, to which she replied, “soft, if I wanted hard boiled eggs on my Benedict, that’s what I’d’ve ordered.” Obviously they ask because people have different preferences, but I thought that was a good answer. I like my tea “wrong.” I’ll heat the water in the microwave, with the tea bag in it, and I’ll leave the bag in the cup the entire time I’m drinking it. This is probably because for the bagged up tea dust, even in premium brands, there is barely any difference between “right” and “ruined.” ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/123 "2024-03-14T16:48:25Z")
> [@Spoons](#): > > my ham and cheese sandwich had butter, One of the best sandwiches I ever had was from a little deli type place in Paris. I don’t speak French, but I recognized Jambon Fromage, and ordered that. Nice baguette, thick cut ham, slab of cheese, and butter, which really tied the whole sandwich together. ---
**Author:** ![CairoCarol](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cairocarol/32/3825_2.png) [@CairoCarol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CairoCarol)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/124 "2024-03-14T17:03:58Z")
> [@echoreply](#): > > I like my tea “wrong.” I’ll heat the water in the microwave, with the tea bag in it, and I’ll leave the bag in the cup the entire time I’m drinking it. This is probably because for the bagged up tea dust, even in premium brands, there is barely any difference between “right” and “ruined.” I do it that way too! But I have learned not to do it in front of houseguests. I’ve horrified witnesses a couple of times. ---
**Author:** ![Eclipse\_Chaser](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@Eclipse\_Chaser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eclipse_Chaser)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/125 "2024-03-14T17:38:09Z")
I don’t eat breakfast cereal now but when my mother insisted I ate breakfast, I always had cornflakes or frosties dry. She couldn’t understand it but I hated them soggy. I was however lucky that she didn’t force me to eat the porridge she cooked for my father and brother. Can’t stand the lumpy slimy texture. ---
**Author:** ![xtenkfarpl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/c2a13f/32.png) [@xtenkfarpl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xtenkfarpl)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/126 "2024-03-14T17:40:44Z")
> [@Larry\_Borgia](#): > > If you are curious about Malort, I’d recommend having a shot at a bar. That way if you hate it, you won’t have a bottle taking up space in your liquor cabinet. Then if you’re in Greece and want to, er, ‘surprise’ a companion, order some retsina! Actually I don’t mind a glass now and again, but my wife hated it… ---
**Author:** ![Eclipse\_Chaser](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@Eclipse\_Chaser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eclipse_Chaser)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/127 "2024-03-14T17:42:33Z")
Not just poor households here in England! My mum used to save the beef dripping and on Sunday evenings, that would be a suppertime treat, the scrapings off the bottom of the solidified dripping, on hot toast. I can taste it now … ---
**Author:** ![xtenkfarpl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/c2a13f/32.png) [@xtenkfarpl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xtenkfarpl)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/128 "2024-03-14T17:48:21Z")
> [@Eclipse\_Chaser](#): > > My mum used to save the beef dripping and on Sunday evenings, that would be a suppertime treat, the scrapings off the bottom of the solidified dripping, on hot toast. So did mine. You can use the dripping fat to fry the bread too… yum! Heart attack on a plate, I suppose, but it was rib-sticking good… ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/129 "2024-03-14T17:55:10Z")
> [@CairoCarol](#): > > I’m reminded of some comments from Paul Prudhomme in one of his cookbooks - he flat-out stated that he wants his vegetables thoroughly cooked, none of this slightly-raw-crispiness for him! I’m with the fat man. Cook the damn broccoli, don’t just warm it up a little! > [@Seanette](#): > > I can’t stand ground beef at any less than well-done. The texture is icky. Agreed, which is funny because I adore tartar and order my steaks still mooing. But the burger had better be completely cooked thru or its going back. Also with the group that demands rubbery scrambled eggs. Any runny egg anywhere near my food gets the whole plate dumped into the trash. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/130 "2024-03-14T18:23:10Z")
> [@echoreply](#): > > There is an episode or YouTube video from America’s Test Kitchen/Cook’s Country where they ask all the chefs if they just use olive oil at home regardless of what the recipe calls for, and there answers were pretty much, yes, they all do that. Yeah, olive oil has fruity and vegetal notes - if you like it, it goes with a lot of things people say it shouldn’t. Cookery is often a massive circle-jerk. All it takes is for some TV chef (Alton Brown and Gordon Ramsay seem to be the figureheads) to assert a thing and it just gets repeated until everyone treats it as a fact, then the more zealous types go out of their way to shove it in the faces of anyone who is doing anything even slightly different. It’s not just a cuisine thing, it’s got a streak of toxic masculinity running through it too. ---
**Author:** ![Aspenglow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspenglow/32/76_2.png) [@Aspenglow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspenglow)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/131 "2024-03-14T19:43:59Z")
> [@CairoCarol](#): > > My dad made baloney and butter sandwiches for an outing once when I was a kid. My mother usually prepped all the food, but for some reason he did it that one time. It was a memorably awful culinary experience that I hope never to repeat. LOL, this reminded me of a Dad experience I had when I was a young kid. I had been invited by a little friend to lunch and we were served tuna salad sandwiches made with celery and some other things. This addition of cool vegetables to tuna was revelatory to me, so I asked my Dad, who was in charge of packing the daily lunches for we kids, to put some celery in with the tuna mixture. My sandwich that day consisted of tuna mixed with mayo and 3 celery sticks placed atop the tuna mixture. Not a food prepared “wrong” that I prefer. ---
**Author:** ![Treppenwitz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treppenwitz/32/3445_2.png) [@Treppenwitz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Treppenwitz)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/132 "2024-03-14T19:44:00Z")
> [@kitap](#): > > I eat my cereal dry. Milk poured over cereal makes it all soft and gross. Tried yogurt instead of milk? Actually, the only “cereal” I routinely eat these days is granola, and I have never had it with milk - but my reason is that I don’t like milk. (Black coffee, no sugar thank you.) Anyway, granola doesn’t go soggy in yogurt. It does go soggy in stewed (or tinned) fruit, but I’m fine with that. j ---
**Author:** ![Bill\_Door](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@Bill\_Door](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_Door)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/133 "2024-03-14T19:49:59Z")
> [@xtenkfarpl](#): > > That’s far too overdone. Just wave it in the general direction of the kitchen for a couple of seconds… I like the “Break the horns off, wipe his ass, and trot that sumbitch out here.” cooking instructions. ---
**Author:** ![echoreply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/echoreply/32/3641_2.png) [@echoreply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/echoreply)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/134 "2024-03-14T19:51:48Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > All it takes is for some TV chef (Alton Brown and Gordon Ramsay seem to be the figureheads) to assert a thing and it just gets repeated until everyone treats it as a fact, then the more zealous types go out of their way to shove it in the faces of anyone who is doing anything even slightly different I learned a huge amount about cooking from the original run of _Good Eats_, where one of the primary themes was separating well known “food facts” into fiction, suggestions, and truths. Of course this generated new “food facts,” but I guess I’m not too surprised people took those as dogma about cooking, not starting points for cooking. I’ve barely followed Alton Brown in the 20+ years since, and I’d be disappointed to learn he’s gone down some sort of toxic masculinity path about food rights and wrongs. The original _Good Eats_ was so liberating from the prior generations of cooking shows, which were often at best little more than video recipes, and at worst were proscriptive commandments about cooking. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/135 "2024-03-14T19:52:47Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > Cookery is often a massive circle-jerk. All it takes is for some TV chef (Alton Brown and Gordon Ramsay seem to be the figureheads) to assert a thing and it just gets repeated until everyone treats it as a fact, then the more zealous types go out of their way to shove it in the faces of anyone who is doing anything even slightly different. It’s not just a cuisine thing, it’s got a streak of toxic masculinity running through it too. I prefer to read things by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, as he includes the science behind what he is recommending; sometimes in excruciating detail. ---
**Author:** ![Treppenwitz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treppenwitz/32/3445_2.png) [@Treppenwitz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Treppenwitz)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/136 "2024-03-14T20:02:37Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > …But i kinda like my vegetables fully cooked. Especially green beans… One person’s overcooked vegetable is another person’s junk food… [Fried Fava Beans (Habas Fritas), approx. 1/3 lb.: The Spanish Table](https://spanishtable.com/products/fried-fava-beans-habas-fritas-approx-1-3-lb#:~:text=Crunchy%20fried%20favas%20are%20a,a%20most%20excellent%20hiking%20snack). If fava beans cooked til they’re crunchy isn’t overdoing it, I don’t know what is. If you don’t know them, they’re more-ish in the way that heroin is reputed to be. j ---
**Author:** ![carrps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carrps/32/2957_2.png) [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/137 "2024-03-14T20:22:36Z")
> [@CairoCarol](#): > > I think that what you read assumes that the American palate wants French-palate scrambled eggs. AFAIK, the perfect scrambled eggs in France are creamy (or what we cloddish Americans would think of as runny.) Yeah, over the years, the show _Top Chef_ would occasionally do a French omelet. Like it was the only way an omelet _should_ be made. It always looked under-cooked and slimy to me. Unappetizing. I like my omelets with a little brown on the outside. Horrors! ---
**Author:** ![Pardel-Lux](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pardel-lux/32/20182_2.png) [@Pardel-Lux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pardel-Lux)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/138 "2024-03-14T21:01:13Z")
Maybe the thing with the runniness or not of omelets and scrambled eggs has something to do with the different aproach that the USA and Europe adopt for preventing salmonella infections. The EU tries to avoid salmonella at the source, keeping the birds free from the bacterium as far as possible, while the US tries to eliminate them afterwards (this is a bit simplified, granted). With US eggs it is better not to risk undercooking, with European eggs the risk is negligible. That, with time, changes the acquired tastes and the recipes. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/139 "2024-03-14T21:03:02Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > I prefer to read things by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, as he includes the science behind what he is recommending; sometimes in excruciating detail. He also often tests various methods and shows you the results of those tests. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2024, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787/140 "2024-03-14T21:23:35Z")
It’s possible that the safety of eggs is a factor but I get the distinct impression that part of the reason the classic French omelette is the way it is, is because its rather difficult to get it exactly right. A little too much heat and you get browning. Fold it a little to early and it tears - a little too late and it cracks, or folds too flat. Despite the simplicity of the ingredients and the end result, it’s a thing that takes a disproportionate amount of skill and care. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foods-you-prefer-cooked-wrong/998787.md?page=8)