No Substitutions, Please

The Florida Keys: bright sun, blue waves, warm sand, haunted dolls—all things that go perfectly with the cool, refreshing taste of key lime juice swathed in rich condensed milk. (We're assuming here. Neither of us have been.) Noah and Louisa tell you about their agreed-upon favorite pie, and the occasions where it might be served.

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Noah: @elderrumbao on Twitter, @[email protected] on Mastodon.

Our theme is Street Food, by FASSounds, and is governed by the Simplified Pixabay License.

Our cover art includes work by artist Kirsty Pargeter.

If the Sirens had sung of sweet tomatoes, glistening with rich olive oil, paired with refreshing cucumber, and scattered with pearl-white feta, to the illustrious Odysseus, he would have never returned to his rocky island home.

Fortunately, it would be several millennia before all of those things came together in a salad bowl—which means it was several millennia and a few years before people started ruining it. Noah and Louisa fill you in.

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Noah: @elderrumbao on Twitter, @[email protected] on Mastodon.

Our theme is Street Food, by FASSounds, and is governed by the Simplified Pixabay License.

Our cover art includes work by artist Kirsty Pargeter.

As we all know, food is at its most delicious when it is served in triangles. This salad, with its bacon and chives and its creamy blue cheese dressing, conjures the fantasy of eating an entire head of lettuce. (You can't make Noah mention the tomatoes.) It's our third episode of Salad Days. You know the deal: people are going to absolutely ruin this thing.

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Noah: @elderrumbao on Twitter, @[email protected] on Mastodon.

Our theme is Street Food, by FASSounds, and is governed by the Simplified Pixabay License.

Our cover art includes work by artist Kirsty Pargeter.

Basil. Cheese. Tomato. Oil. Long ago, the four ingredients sat together in harmony. Then everything changed when a bunch of people chucked some balsamic vinegar in there for some reason. Noah and Louisa investigate why people can't just leave well enough alone.

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Noah: @elderrumbao on Twitter, @[email protected] on Mastodon.

Our theme is Street Food, by FASSounds, and is governed by the Simplified Pixabay License.

Our cover art includes work by artist Kirsty Pargeter.

The only thing Noah likes less than cherry tomatoes and hard-boiled eggs in his salads are people who supposedly like those things finding ways to get around the fact that they're key ingredients. So, for the first episode of our Salad Days, he and Louisa talk about all the different ways people try to get around a very simple recipe.

Follow us:

Noah: @elderrumbao on Twitter, @[email protected] on Mastodon.

Our theme is Street Food, by FASSounds, and is governed by the Simplified Pixabay License.

Our cover art includes work by artist Kirsty Pargeter.

It's the king of custards, the despot of desserts, the envy of every other meal-ender—and, as Louisa and Noah discover, the bane of a lot of cooks cursed by iffy ovens or too willing to cut corners.

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Noah: @elderrumbao on Twitter, @[email protected] on Mastodon.

Our theme is Street Food, by FASSounds, and is governed by the Simplified Pixabay License.

Our cover art includes work by artist Kirsty Pargeter.

Let's welcome spring into our lives with a tribute to one of the greenest vegetables around—and, we think you'll agree, one of the most variegated episodes we've ever done. Noah and Louisa discover that there are some people who just shouldn't be allowed near a produce section.

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Noah: @nsmckinnon.bsky.social on BlueSky, @[email protected] on Mastodon.

If you should find any outlandish recipe comments you'd like us to discuss, send them our way at [email protected].

Our theme is Street Food, by FASSounds, and is governed by the Simplified Pixabay License.

Anchors aweigh! Noah and Louisa cast off to take on these treasure-laden galleons of the sandwich fleet—or, more accurately, some of their worst captains. Do they land a broadside?

Follow us:

Noah: @nsmckinnon.bsky.social on BlueSky, @[email protected] on Mastodon.

If you should find any outlandish recipe comments you'd like us to discuss, send them our way at [email protected].

Our theme is Street Food, by FASSounds, and is governed by the Simplified Pixabay License.

Whether at a cocktail party or a down-home family picnic, these little vessels for mayonnaise and paprika are the picture of midcentury elegance. Noah and Louisa take on the most ovoid, and therefore most seasonally appropriate, of Easter foods.

Follow us:

Noah: @nsmckinnon.bsky.social on BlueSky, @[email protected] on Mastodon.

If you should find any outlandish recipe comments you'd like us to discuss, send them our way at [email protected].

Our theme is Street Food, by FASSounds, and is governed by the Simplified Pixabay License.

We know what you're thinking. You're thinking we all know how blueberry muffins are made.

Well, would that it were so simple. Noah and Louisa talk about how, for some people, there is no recipe so easy or so forgiving that it can't be turned into a quick-bread quagmire.

Follow us:

Noah: @nsmckinnon.bsky.social on BlueSky, @[email protected] on Mastodon.

If you should find any outlandish recipe comments you'd like us to discuss, send them our way at [email protected].

Our theme is Street Food, by FASSounds, and is governed by the Simplified Pixabay License.