Worst Quality Crab – Détails, épisodes et analyse

On this episode we’re talking to author Ellie Yang Camp about her new book Louder Than The Lies: Asian American Identity, Solidarity, and Self-Love, and just as importantly, we talk about soups!! Yes, not one, but two family soups: beef noodle soup made by her dad, and chicken broth made by her mom. 

We talk about growing up Taiwanese American in not-so-Asian California suburbs, chasing taste memories, and passing on culture through food (our fave!)

Of course we dive into Louder Than The Lies, which we can’t recommend enough. We love how it succinctly articulates so much of what we’ve been feeling about being Asian in America. Ellie reminds us that the fight for equity requires practice and stamina, and offers us a way forward, which we’ll probably need now more than ever.

Plus the scurry-and-hide method of cooking, lightly dunking on Dr. Oz, and dismantling systems of oppression while being a full-time introvert parent!

In true Asian parent form, we have no exact recipe, but we have it on good authority that Clarissa Wei’s recipe for beef noodle soup hits exactly right for many Taiwanese families, which you can find in her book Made in Taiwan.

On this post-election one we present our first ever disliked dish, because apparently there are no rules anymore. This was meant to be a revenge episode with Eli Beutel, but instead of raging against this German Christmas dish, stollen, they were the consummate food and alcohol historian—and still funny! 

We talk about the history of this dish, why they hate it, and why it’s still important to share family recipes, even not so great ones.

Plus flavor profiles as identity, accidentally becoming an expert in Hittite bee law, and a dip into tiki culture.

• Eli recommends their mentor Dawn Bohulano Mabalon's book Little Manila Is in the Heart: The Making of the Filipina/o American Community in Stockton, California
• If you're curious about stollen, Eli recommends trying it first before diving into making your own loaf. Here's a couple places you can purchase it:
  • World Market
  • Dresden Stollen Bakers (this year's batch is sold out but you can sign up for a reminder to buy next year's)

It’s finally happened!! This episode we have our first dessert! On this one we’re joined by Lorraine Esturas-Pierson as she talks about her favorite childhood dessert, halo-halo, a Filipino dish that means mix mix. We talk about why halo-halo might be the most equitable and inclusive of all group desserts and how that was a huge benefit growing up in a LARGE household. 

We talk about the inevitability of too much food at parties, the clean plate club, the lasting trauma of snow peas, and the power of cousins in numbers.

Plus, what makes something fancy, and teaching kids to cook for themselves, or better yet, you! 

No recipe for this one. Just make your way to a Seafood City, Manila Market, or something similar and pick out a slew of jellys and beans of your choice, to go alongside your shave ice, vanilla ice cream and condensed milk. Lorraine is partial to agar agar and jackfruit.

We’ve talked a lot about Chinese restaurants in past episodes. On this one we’re getting a look into the kitchen from our guest and former restaurant kid Julia Louie. We hear what it’s like to grow up in a Chinese restaurant, the privileges and obligations of the owner’s kid, and code/mode-switching between family work life and outside life. 

We talk about Americanized Chinese food and try to figure out what the dividing line is between Americanized and not, how to fake Chinese “enoughness” when you don’t speak the language, and the foibles of being first a design student and then a real life design professional in a place where design is not a high priority. Plus sleeping at the restaurant in a snowstorm and the betrayal of Tall Guy!

This episode we’re joined by Vincent Beck, Bay Area creative and street photographer, and it is eggs-cellent! Fluffy eggs-cellent to be exact! He shares his mom’s recipe for iritamago, a sweet and fluffy egg dish served over rice. 

We talk about growing up a bi-racial military kid, hometown vs home, and making up for lost time with culture and connection. Plus a few potentially hot takes on Japantown and the gimmickiness–or not– of viral food trends in Japan (looking at you Totoro cream puffs!)

Valentine’s Day might be behind us but we’re here telling the love story between our guest Nicole Lugtu and her fave dish tinola. Or maybe more accurately, the love between Nicole and chicken. Listen in as Nicole and Sam talk about their shared love of chicken and the myriad ways that manifests in life: as a personality trait, red flags and relationship dealbreakers, familial dividing lines.

We talk a lot about eating out: as a family activity, being equally important to cooking, and even long-held go-to Chinese restaurant orders (naturally, crispy chicken was an all around favorite and on all of our menus!) Be sure to have a snack on hand when Nicole talks about her family recipe project and Lola Baker’s cooking school and cake recipes. Plus food as a shortcut to identity and connection, and a hyper local review of some fave chicken spots in San Francisco. 

We’re baaaack!! Wooo! We did not mean to be away for so long but cold and flu season absolutely wrecked all of December. But we’re back with a follow up to our SPAM episode and we’re joined by special guest Jaime Sunwoo, creator of Specially Processed American Me.

In this special second edition spam-isode, we talk about Jaime’s performance film, the signature dishes of what she calls the Spam Diaspora, and we dig into the Hormel Girls.  Plus food as an entry point to unpacking family history, and the adorable way that Jaime’s mom served (serves??) spam fried rice.

Links of interest as discussed on the show:

• The Kitchen Studio: Culinary Creations by Artists
• Lisa Friedman - Fake Food Factory

We’re forever celebrating the everyday dishes, but we just couldn’t help ourselves getting in on a little holiday cheer! This episode we’re joined by Ken Cho, bringing us his favorite holiday dish, Mom’s Thanksgiving Stuffing. We talk about growing up “All-American” in the 80s, canned soups on everything, and raising hapa kids. 

We dig into what it’s like to go from shame and disgust of Korean food to housing spicy soondubu and banchan, “cool Asians,” and the great Asian unifier: SPAM (we seriously can’t get enough of it on this show). Plus a new merch idea and gamifying the podcast!

You can find a recipe to Mom’s Thanksgiving Stuffing on our site and take a peek at the book Mostly Me, especially for the hapas and parents of hapas out there.  

This episode we’re joined by Neha Gautam, filmmaker, photographer, educator and writer director of Passenger Seat, bringing us paratha, or more specifically her childhood version of paneer stuffed paratha with ketchup because kid palette. 

We talk about “Indian pizza” as a specific and universal tactic for feeding kids, classic 90s kid lunches (fold over sandwich bags anyone??), and roti as a symbol of oppression.

Plus we talk about what it’s like to grow up in NYC and Alaska, mix tapes and cassette technology, and cut fruit as an Asian love language. 

In this episode we’re joined by Shaun Garcia, husband, father and noodle soup connoisseur about his fave soup and classic Filipino dish, Sinigang, which doesn’t happen to have noodles, in case you’re wondering! We talk about growing up in the clean plate club, feeding a toddler what you’re eating (hopefully!), and inventing a dish in high school that was really not a unique invention in any way shape or form.

Plus, we talk about the signs of true love and we crack (part of) the code on not feeling shame or embarrassment when messing up our cultural dishes. Spoiler: it’s failure! Yikes!! Jk, we love it!