# Silliest Foodie Item, Idea, or Trend? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 16, 2013, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533 "2013-02-16T20:04:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**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:** [February 20, 2013, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/201 "2013-02-20T19:35:01Z")
> [@NIKI50](#): > > “a gourmand often enjoys fine food, but is fully capable of appreciating lowbrow fare,” I like this… I think I’ll use it, it fits. Ditto, except **Inner Stickler** has already tagged me as a “foodster.” 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2013, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/202 "2013-02-20T20:06:23Z")
I named no names. ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2013, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/203 "2013-02-20T20:10:51Z")
Is “kopi luwak” still hot? It is coffee beans processed through the intestines of an animal-said to add a distinctive flavor to the coffee. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2013, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/204 "2013-02-20T20:13:53Z")
> [@Inner\_Stickler](#): > > Goddammit, now all I can think about is sea salt caramel frosted cupcakes. You suck and when I make them this weekend, I’m not sharing any with you. Don’t skimp on the iodine. ---
**Author:** ![GargoyleWB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gargoylewb/32/199_2.png) [@GargoyleWB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GargoyleWB)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2013, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/205 "2013-02-20T20:29:54Z")
> [@VinylTurnip](#): > > I concur with **guizot** , not necessarily because they fall apart but because even an intact cupcake is in a shape designed to resist being eaten… Pish posh. A modern cafe cupcake is intentionally designed to instill a sense of anarchic whimsy into the otherwise drab and snobby world of adult cuisine. Colors, frosting, and decoration should be pushed to their structural limit. A good cupcake should straighten the mustaches and burst the corsets of everyone at your garden party. When finished, naked tittering feathered-fan dancers should be frolicking with goat fur-legged dandies among the stray crumbs. And yes, they should all have suffered a bit of frosting in their noses. ---
**Author:** ![Lukeinva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lukeinva/32/17872_2.png) [@Lukeinva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lukeinva)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2013, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/206 "2013-02-20T20:31:14Z")
Maldon brand sal de mer or French fleur de sel are absolutely much better than regular old Morton’s and if you can’t taste the difference you probably consider Appleby’s and Long John Silver fine dining. The main difference is that you will use less of the big sea salt flakes and get more taste of the food, but then get a nice salty crunchy bite when you encounter a piece of the rock. Balsamic vinegar has been produced in Italy since the middle ages and is very expensive, and very good. Most if not all of what is called balsamic vinegar in stores is red wine vinegar with grape must added. Avoid that stuff. Can’t believe there are so many posters in this thread hating on food trends, styles, habits, chefs, pho, sriracha, etc etc. Obviously there are a lot of unrefined palates here. ---
**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:** [February 20, 2013, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/207 "2013-02-20T20:37:32Z")
Riiiiiight. It’s us. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2013, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/208 "2013-02-20T20:42:41Z")
> [@jz78817](#): > > Yeah, it irritates me that egg cartons say “vegetarian fed hens” like it’s a good thing. Then again, it also means they’re not being fed ground-up remains of useless-to-egg-production male chicks. So there’s that. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2013, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/209 "2013-02-20T22:21:14Z")
The problem is people elevating mundane items to luxury status and thinking that by doing so they somehow are expressing their own elevated good taste. Real Greek yoghurt is standard stuff to the Greeks. Properly roasted and finely ground espresso coffee is just standard to the Italians, Excellent quality French baguettes and croissants are unremarkable in any French household. Sea-salt is just salt with an interesting texture. Sriracha, properly brewed soy sauce, balsamic vinegar etc. etc. etc. None of them are “special” and shouldn’t be treated as such (though some of them are expensive that isn’t the same as special) . As the world gets smaller it is just easier for us to expand our store cupboards and find out what the rest of the world has been treating as normal for the previous centuries. It is rather silly to get snobby about something that a Vietnamese peasant would roll their eyes at and say “duh!” (in Vietnamese) ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2013, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/210 "2013-02-20T22:30:19Z")
> [@bobot](#): > > I nominate the incredibly small portions that are popular at the fancy places. The plate looks so visibly empty, that the chef has to artfully dribble lines of sauce onto it, to fill up all the empty real estate. And then you’re faced with the choice of letting the sauce go to waste or asking the waiter to bring a privacy screen so you can pick up the plate and lick it off. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2013, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/211 "2013-02-20T22:53:06Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > The problem is people elevating mundane items to luxury status and thinking that by doing so they somehow are expressing their own elevated good taste. > > Real Greek yoghurt is standard stuff to the Greeks. Properly roasted and finely ground espresso coffee is just standard to the Italians, Excellent quality French baguettes and croissants are unremarkable in any French household. Sea-salt is just salt with an interesting texture. Sriracha, properly brewed soy sauce, balsamic vinegar etc. etc. etc. > None of them are “special” and shouldn’t be treated as such (though some of them are expensive that isn’t the same as special) . As the world gets smaller it is just easier for us to expand our store cupboards and find out what the rest of the world has been treating as normal for the previous centuries. It is rather silly to get snobby about something that a Vietnamese peasant would roll their eyes at and say “duh!” (in Vietnamese) You’re correct on most counts but there are certainly “special” variants of sea salt (truffle salt) and aged balsamic vinegars that while are incredibly expensive due to scarcity because of how long they are aged. Like this stuff, which is older than I am: [http://www.markys.com/caviar/customer/italian-balsamic-vinegar-of-modena-white-seal-25-years-old-3.5-oz..html?gclid=CPeu-9z7xbUCFe4-MgodPF4AoQ#googlebase](http://www.markys.com/caviar/customer/italian-balsamic-vinegar-of-modena-white-seal-25-years-old-3.5-oz..html?gclid=CPeu-9z7xbUCFe4-MgodPF4AoQ#googlebase) I have had the opportunity to taste a very small amount of this stuff and it is so incredibly concentrated in flavor due to ageing. And a very small amount goes an incredibly long way. It is worth noting however that some (all?) of these aged vinegars are not 100% as old as may be claimed on the bottle due to evaporation in barrel ageing and topping up of the barrels. Still, there’s a distinct difference between the richly concentrated, mellowly acidic flavor of an aged balsamic when compared to a run-of-the-mill young vinegar that has a harsher flavor. ---
**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:** [February 20, 2013, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/212 "2013-02-20T22:57:11Z")
Just for everybody’s pool of knowledge - “Duh!” in Vietnamese is “Duh!” ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2013, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/213 "2013-02-20T23:20:11Z")
> [@Lukeinva](#): > > Maldon brand sal de mer or French fleur de sel are absolutely much better than regular old Morton’s and if you can’t taste the difference you probably consider Appleby’s and Long John Silver fine dining. The main difference is that you will use less of the big sea salt flakes and get more taste of the food, but then get a nice salty crunchy bite when you encounter a piece of the rock. > > Balsamic vinegar has been produced in Italy since the middle ages and is very expensive, and very good. Most if not all of what is called balsamic vinegar in stores is red wine vinegar with grape must added. Avoid that stuff. > > Can’t believe there are so many posters in this thread hating on food trends, styles, habits, chefs, pho, sriracha, etc etc. Obviously there are a lot of unrefined palates here. Well, so much for me crusading against the SDMB anti-“foodie hipster” meme. I guess I was wrong, guys. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2013, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/214 "2013-02-20T23:29:44Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > Well, so much for me crusading against the SDMB anti-“foodie hipster” meme. I guess I was wrong, guys. I have tasted a variety of these so-called specialty sea salts, and I do detect a minerality in some of them that isn’t present in regular old table salt, but for the most part, yeah…it’s an overblown trend and mostly these salts are used by serious chefs because of their texture, or as a color additive. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2013, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/215 "2013-02-20T23:48:15Z")
> [@FoieGrasIsEvil](#): > > I have tasted a variety of these so-called specialty sea salts, and I do detect a minerality in some of them that isn’t present in regular old table salt, but for the most part, yeah…it’s an overblown trend and mostly these salts are used by serious chefs because of their texture, or as a color additive. It’s not really that part of the post I was responding to. More like the very last sentence. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2013, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/216 "2013-02-21T00:25:32Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **Lukeinva** : > > Maldon brand sal de mer or French fleur de sel are absolutely much better than regular old Morton’s and if you can’t taste the difference you probably consider Appleby’s and Long John Silver fine dining. The main difference is that you will use less of the big sea salt flakes and get more taste of the food, but then get a nice salty crunchy bite when you encounter a piece of the rock. Heck, I can use plain ordinary Morton’s and just use less of it, too. What’s so special about the sea salts? ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2013, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/217 "2013-02-21T00:29:29Z")
> [@](#): > > Maldon brand sal de mer or French fleur de sel are absolutely much better than regular old Morton’s and if you can’t taste the difference you probably consider Appleby’s and Long John Silver fine dining Oh, yeah, that sentence, too. Fuck. Foodies like that really do exist. Fuckity fuck. ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2013, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/218 "2013-02-21T01:03:55Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > Well, so much for me crusading against the SDMB anti-“foodie hipster” meme. I guess I was wrong, guys. I guess there really **does** have to be an exception that proves the rule. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2013, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/219 "2013-02-21T01:09:37Z")
First of all, Long John Silver rocks. I don’t care what anyone says. It’s head-of-class as far as fast food goes. Second of all, it’s just food. I mean, come on. I like having playful arguments about food. “Playful” being the key word here. But, at the end of the day, it’s just food, and we all have our attachments to certain flavors and customs and whatnot. ---
**Author:** ![MrSquishy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b9e5f3/32.png) [@MrSquishy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrSquishy)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2013, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533/220 "2013-02-21T18:34:40Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > I think the whole “foodie who looks down on what others eat” is a bit of a strawman. I’m sure they exist, but I really can’t think of a time I’ve encountered them. They exist on this board for sure. Just do a search for “hotdogs and ketchup” or “well done steak”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silliest-foodie-item-idea-or-trend/650533.md?page=12)