Chef explains why white people don't season their food 

As an Indian who likes spicy food, I don't like it when people deride "white people's food." Yes, it's not for everyone's palate, but making fun of minimally seasoned food as "white people's food" is just as bad as people saying that curries smell bad. It may not be suited to your tastes and senses, but don't ridicule it.

In addition to properly using salt, I will add that acid is often missing in home cooking. Even if it's just a drop, a bit of citrus or vinegar can totally open up a dish. Salt, fat, sugar, and acid. That's the core of good food.

There's also the fact that European cultures tend to incorporate more fermented foods such as a huge variety of cheeses, sausages, etc. in their cuisines, which adds more variation in flavors overall. There's other creative ways to add flavors than the use of herbs and spices.

Some other points: 1. There are plenty of non-European cultures that use minimal or subtle seasoning. Japanese is good example - A lot of modern Japanese cuisine emphasizes freshness and uses subtle ingredients like soy sauce, mirin, sake, miso, spring onions, bonito flakes, shiitake mushrooms, perilla leaf, various seaweeds, citruses, etc. There are exceptions but no more or less than there are exceptions in European cuisines - Japan like their version of curry just like British like their version of curry; Japanese have wasabi just like British people have hot mustard and horseradish, Japanese have togarashi shichimi just like many Western kitchens stock Cayenne powder, etc. Other non-European cuisines to think about are traditional Mongolian food and other cuisines of traditionally northern, nomadic, pastoral, or subsistence-farming cultures such as indigenous peoples of North America and Siberia. 2. "Seasoned" is not a black-and-white concept, it's a spectrum. My Persian coworker raves about her native cuisine which uses spices like saffron, sumac, cardamom, cinnamon, cumin, coriander, turmeric, black lime, etc. One day she recommended her favorite Persian restaurant to a client originally from southern India who then told her he'd tried that restaurant before and found it the taste too mild for his taste. 3. There's a huge difference between traditional European cuisine made by old grandmothers from farming villages using fresh, locally-sourced ingredients, and the "white Midwestern homemaker" cuisine that was born from the 1940's onward with the advent of widespread home refrigeration and cookbooks of "convenience" teaching people shortcuts with canned, jarred, and shelf-stable ingredients and factory-farmed meat from a sterile supermarket.

Framing things as "white vs non-white" is such an American and ridiculous way of seeing the world...

I come from a tiny Nordic country in the middle of nowhere where fish and sheep are abundant. My grandfather was and my father is a fisherman as well as rearing sheep and growing potatoes. As a kid I would get fresh fish, potatoes and some melted butter for dinner at least 3 times a week. I could see how some would call it bland food, but man, that fish just melted on your tongue.

I always found this stereotype super funny. I'm from the southern united states, and we season our food REAL good. I even started a hot sauce company with my own recipes. When people say "white people don't season their food' they mean people from the northern united states, or people who never learned how to cook for themselves. I guarantee if you come to a BBQ with my family you will never ONCE think the food needs more flavor.

A lot of people also form a border around “European” food that doesn’t exist in real life. Like Pirogi or Chebureki is not that much different than a Chinese dumpling and both are flavorful. Aioli is pretty much the same as Toum. Tzatziki is present in dishes all the way to Nepal just with different names and variations in aromatics. Look at how many names we have for Kofta (or köfte or kofte) or shakshuka (or chakchuka or shakshouka)

The Great Depression and convenience culture are huge influences too. Poverty can knock pricy ingredients out of a generation’s nostalgic comfort foods. We also work ourselves to death over here and our mega corporations are glad to toss frozen fish sticks at our exhausted bodies.

Northern Europe is not a desolate wasteland without plants, we have many native spices/herbs but they are maybe milder or unfamiliar to other cultures

I’m from Argentina and we tend to only salt and pepper beef because the meat, when properly cooked, is so flavourful that it doesn’t need anything else. But I love an Indian curry or a Mexican Birria. I think it’s a matter of balance: I wouldn’t want to eat “bland” food everyday but I wouldn’t want everything to be spicy.

Spices are not just used to COVER UP ROTTEN MEAT. They are natural preservatives, like hops. Using spices like garlic, ginger, chili/pepper and salt creates a harder environment for bacteria to live in. Mexicans and Indians etc do not just SEASON their food - they marinade it, they coat it in preservative spices before cooking.

Onion and garlic powder are so useful in the kitchen, and the power of salt is underestimated so often.

I am German and I season food all the time, we have a lot of native spices/herbs parsley, thyme, laurel, chives, black pepper, juniper berries, nutmeg, and caraway. All of those are, and have been used for ever. Also we use things like honey or barries to flavor meats and so on.

I think it also comes from a fundamental misunderstanding of what costitutes a spice, garlic and onion as you said add flavor yet some people would only acknowledge their powdered forms. I'd argue herbs are Europe's spice rack, but they're disregarded by some. Marjoram, basil, thyme, rosemary all seem like spices to me, they're only there for flavor. Also as others have mentioned it was often a matter of preservation, southern countries used spices to make food last while northern ones used the cold or fermentation. They used what they had.

Er... in medieval Europe, the peasants would not eat potatoes (yet) as they are native to the Americas...

The problem is how americans view spices. If it's exotic then it's a spice. Herbs like mint are a spice, rosemary, garlic and onion. Ir doesn't need to be a spicy chilly to be spicy.

But white people do (generally) season their food. The idea that they dont is mostly just a meme.

As a Romanian, Balkans, the idea of "White people don't season their food" is kind of funny to me. In fries, for example, I usually just throw some salt and garlic, they taste absolutely phenomenal. The key is to just... experiment with different ingredients...? I literally tried omlette seasoned with curry powder one day, it's not bad actually. I'm basically semi-self taught in cooking (watched tutorials, then deviated a little), and while I don't work as a cook, I've never actually heard someone say my food is bland, quite the contrary in fact.

your production, arrangement, narration, typography are really first-rate. thank you!

as a mediterranean who likes to cook, i go by "less is more", a pinch of salt, a touch of olive oil, some rosemary or pennyroyal and a clove of garlic is enough to bring the flavor and essence of well cooked ingredients. I love to feel the natural flavors of fish, or meat, but I am also fortunate to have access to good produce and ingredients. when the food is over seasoned i feel like something is being covered up.

4:30 Northern europeans wouldnt have eaten potatoes in medieval times or earlier, its a new world crop!

Lily white descendant of Northern Europeans here, who immigrated to Asia and loves to douse my food in chili powder, still getting laughed at by SE Asian friends with the "white people don't season their food joke." Funny thing: I live in Japan, where the culinary style has always favored very simple preparations, few ingredients, highlighting the natural flavors of the ingredients, with a focus on seasonal freshness over complex flavoring. And a great number of Japanese people do not prefer spicy food, many find overly spicy food distasteful. So, there are parallels echoed around the world and it's got nothing to do with ethnicity. In Japan, the simplicity of the cuisine evolved out of necessity, because the availability of local nutrition historically skewed heavily toward the salty/herby over the spicy, but even now, when there's a Korean barbecue or Indian curry place on every corner in Tokyo, Japanese people stick to their simple cuisine - and I'm glad, because the Japanese fetishism of fresh, seasonal ingredients has led to a subtlety of flavor that spices bowl right over. Punch me in the mouth with spices or give me the latest very gentle Japanese veggies, everything tastes good in the hands of a chef who really loves, respects, and understands the food.

I went to Sweden, Denmark, and Germany recently and I had some of the most delicious and flavorful dishes there with minimal spices added. I found that it was more about letting the ingredients do the talking instead of covering it them up. I also found that I never felt bloated or weighed down after eating over there.

Traditional Dutch cuisine uses spices like nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon and cumin. But none of these are hot spices. It should also be noted that the Netherlands, like England, has historically been a spice trading nation, which is not the case for places like Germany, Scandinavia and north eastern Europe, so spices may be less common in those places.

I'm sure you realize this but to be clear, at 4:32 you are kinda putting potatoes in Europe before the Columbian exchange. They obviously weren't eating potatoes before potatoes came to Europe.

We conquered the world to get herbs and spices. I think the title needs some work.

From what I gather, people in warmer climates season food to preserve it, in the main, to keep it from going bad, rather than to make rotten food palatable. My family grew up on a farm in southern Italy and they were always jarring food, immersing it in herbs, spices, salt and olive oil. The food wasn't rotten, they do this to keep it from going rotten, as well as add aroma, color, flavor and texture to food, and because it's tradition, a tradition they've kept alive even tho it's no longer necessary since they've urbanized.

As Eastern European I just wanted to add that we add dill, garlic, laurel, parsley and peppers to food :0 As well as horseradish and mustard My great-grandpa would also snack on a whole chilly pepper every time he ate borscht

seasoning is not just spices you can season with other things

Yes! Thank you for finally making this video!

I grew up in a Mexican household. We never had salt or pepper on the the table. My mother and grandmother used very little salt immensely small amounts. Garlic, onion and spices like oregano were what flavored the food. Now lard was used in abundance as well as flour and left over grease. My mother always told us meat, vegetables, etc... already contained a certain amount of salt and to have a salt shaker would compound the amount of salt added to the food. I hate going to Mexican restaurants the reason all I taste is salt in their food.

I'm from Paraguay and our cuisine does not have strong seasonings as well , I can go even a step further saying that picking and preserved food are foreign concepts even for out modern days, the reason might be because our natives did not have harsh winters so food were fresh and abundant, some tribes had their fermented drink made out of mandioca roots but it was fast to make and it was not made with the purpose of preserving or storing food, but more for ritualistic purposes. Foreigners often think that all of south american food are all similar to mexican cuisine but that is totally not the case, we even consider mexican food way too spicy or way too seasoned compared to the paraguayan cuisine and that is not a bad thing. our most liked delicacy is called asado, and it is just sprinkling a bit of salt on big cuts of meat cooked on a fire, as simple as that.

To add saltiness, but also umami, to your food (and not just Asian food), it's possible to use fermented condiments like soy sauce or miso. Also, numerous cultures around the world swear by an MSG-laden bottled brown sauce called Maggi (although it only originated in the 1880s in Switzerland).

"After brutality colonizing the world" Lol got'em

So happy for the creator of this channel. Keep doing your thing!

I think "bland" usually has a context and might not only describe the lack of spices but the overall lack of flavour which points to technique. overly boiled vegetables can taste quite bland since the prolonged cooking destroy the integrity of these veggies, in contrast a cheese toasties isn't bland (a lot of salt and dairy fats). The description in the video isn't factual medieval Scandinavia had somethings that grew in it and was used as seasoning such as horseradish, dill, mustard seeds (still widely used in Scandinavian cuisine(s). Spices were so valued that the Dutch waged wars to acquire them!

I just discovered your channel from the Arthur video and your videos have made me feel something that RU-vid videos have not made me feel for a long time. Your content is incredibly soothing and there I say nourishing. Thanks so much for posting these.

A lot of this seems like arbitrary decisions about spice vs not spice. Salt and Pepper? defined as not-spice, even though pepper, at least, is clearly a spice. Garlic, onions and other herbs? Not-spice. So the short answer is that white people don't spice their food for the same reason white people's dialect is considered "not an accent." We've defined white-people cuisine as the default, so anyone using different ingredients to flavour their cuisine is adding spice.

I love this videos feels like chatting with friends over dinner ❤

As a retired line cook of 20 yrs, I find this theory interesting. My background is mostly Italian and Creole. That said, sometimes I like to go "purist", and focus on the flavor of the ingredients. Anyway, there is a reason why the ancient Romans used salt as currency.

as a foodie, my fav part of travelling is trying the local cuisine. I'm from south east Asia, where spices are abundant, but travelling and living for sometime in europe and other parts of asia, I really like the minimal use of spices. I don't think it's bland, it's just different. and every country has a story told through it's kitchen. travelling from one place to another and noticing the change in people's palate, their eating habit, and the way they present their food is just so amazing to see. hopefully one day I can travel some more.

People who say that underestimate the taste of meat. They also underutilize cooking with butter.

I watch a lot of historical cooking and I find it amazing how much more complex (savory, sweet, and aromatic) food was in the middle ages. On the whole I would say it's better, and it's a shame that we don't use nearly as many herbs and spices as we did then. Nouvelle cuisine certainly has a place - but it has to be as you said: it must use fresh, premium ingredients. It has to be *good* beef, like prime or select, and for chicken it should probably be thighs rather than the easily dried and lean breasts. In my amateur chef opinion, a lot of the accusations of blandness come from the fact that yes, people don't use salt, but they don't work with materials that have much flavor in their own right. At least from the reference frame of pre-modern and early-modern cooking.

I felt like Scandinavians at least didn't season food because they didn't have any. Literally nothing but mushrooms grow there. Salty fish and pickled fish with dill was the most "seasoned" foods I ate.

I always interpreted white people food being "bland" is mostly an American thing. No one who knows a thing or two about cooking is going to say that Italians, French people or Greeks can't cook.

How is the theory that spices were used to cover the taste of spoiled meat racist? Pretty sure Europeans and early Americans had to flavor up their own rancid/stale foods.

The spoiled meat theory has a little more truth to it, and I wouldn’t call it racist. A lot of studies show strong anti microbial and anti fungal properties to common spices along the equator, even capsaicin (the spicy compound in peppers) is a registered insecticide. There is no doubt that spices help in keeping meat fresher for longer. That said it wouldn’t have made spoiled meat edible again, so you ain’t totally wrong :) Great vid tho, keep it up

Cooking is alchemy. It's raw ingredients meeting refined ingredients in various states of entropy and cooked.

I'm sorry, calling the spoilt food theory "racist" and "condescending" is beyond stupid. There is no racism, or even condescention as part of that theory. Also dismissing it by saying "rotton meat makes you die" is completely disingenuous and doesn't represent what the theory is. Food doesn't spoil all at once, and there are many levels of food spoilage. Sometimes its healthy enough to eat food that isn't at its maximum freshness. Especially when you're very hungry and the calories are more important than the bad stuff. And it doesn't necessarily mean meat. It could be any food, vegetables included. Even today, flavors are used to cover up something that would otherwise taste bad. The classic cocktail Old Fasioned was originally created to cover up the taste of bad whiskey for example. This shouldn't be surprising. When people have otherwise good food or drink that has a flaw, doing something to patch the flaw is completely rational and doesn't result in your entire society dying. So if you think the food spoilage theory of spices is indisputably debunked because racism, you might want to check your biases. Obviously people can only use the ingredients found around them. However, the theory is not why people in the east use spices at all, but why they use so much and what they were used for. These theories are not mutually exclusive. You also realize that wealth and privilege mean different things right? Privilege isn't required to get a good cut of meat. Wealth is. I like your video style, but I'm really sick of you mixing in modern social justice warrior speak into these videos about history. It really is off putting. Please try to choose your topics where you insert your politics and rhetoric. I don't know about you, but I didn't brutally colonize anyone. And randomly inserting the idea that white people should just shut the f**k up is incredibly insulting. I'm not insulted by people saying white people food is bland. Hell, I agree in a lot of cases. I certainly don't make bland food. And even if someone thought I did, I don't care, I like my food. But I do care when people like you tell me that my ancestors did some shit and I should accept negative consequences because of it. F**k that noise

oh my god?? i watched this expecting a million subs or something.. you are so talented man. im sharing this with everyone i can

When I lived in the US, I developed techniques of my own that kind of sublates from these two ways of thinking - I was able to keep the taste of the meat in front, with the spices acting as an accompaniment.

Poor people didn't eat "rotten food" they ate less savory food and food that had been stored in less than ideal ways, making it less palatable(or just less tasteful). Spices help with this. This isn't "racist" or "condescending". It's purely logical and it's still a thing. This kind of virtue signalling is really pathetic and shows how incredibly spoiled the creator of this video is lmao.

1) Spices weren't used on spoiled meat, but rather just to make food last longer, because of their antibacterial and antifungal properties, just like other food preservation methods that were popular in Europe such as salting, pickling and fermenting. The only difference is that spices were much more readily available, while salt was quite difficult to produce in the past, and pickled and fermented meat and fish are mostly quite gross (looking at you, surströmming) 2) Scandinavia and Eastern Europe both have native herbs (yes, those count as spices) that are used in their cuisine 3) Scandinavia and Eastern Europe have historically had strong trade relations with East Asia as well as Arabia

I used to help out a bit at a soup kitchen. It was summer and somewhat rural so there was an abundance of fresh garden food. People kept passing up chunked tomatoes. But they were just tomatoes. I took a tray plastic but pretty and made rows of sliced tomatoes that I sprinkled some salt on along with some sugar. Not much of each. I found a bottle of white wine vinegar so added a slight sprinkle of that. Oh, no one will eat that now I was told. Gone and everyone asking for more. Another day we had cucumbers and tomatoes and someone showed me where some herbs were growing so on top of my sliced veggies I put a light sprinkling of Spike and topped with fresh chopped parsley one day and cilantro another adding some crushed coriander as well. Every time gone gone gone. Sometimes I had green onion and put thinly sliced green tops on the tomatoes keeping the trimmed green onions in a glass of ice water with salt shaker next to it. The cook only got paid for 2 hours of work so just didn't have the time but I did and enjoyed it. It's true... I'm white and don't season much relying mostly on salt but I've had dinner guests who ask what seasoning I use to make the food taste so good. Hmmm, salt. But simple foods can taste amazing with a little salt and the love we add when cooking.😁

I’m southern African American married to a euro-Australian and this is the fight we have whenever I cook. He says don’t use too much salt and I don’t think I am. I’m salting the food the way I was taught. When my husband makes Asian food, which is common in Oz, he puts tons of spices and sauces that are loaded with salt in the food. He doesn’t see that as salty because he’s use to the flavor. Ironically if we eat southern food or Mexican in a restaurant the amount of salt in the food isn’t a problem for him. 🤷🏾‍♀️

huh, what i had heard about the cultures closer to the equator had been that they found that foods, meats especially, preserved with spices tended to stay safe longer and not rot as quickly, therefore the heavier use of spices evolved from food preservation techniques, not trying to cover up spoiled meat

White is a veeeery broad term. I am Greek and our food has heavily influenced and been influenced by the Persian and Ottoman empires. We might not use chilli traditionally, but we use a lot of other spices and herbs. That said, I am only 1min into the video, and may have jumped on this bandwagon a bit prematurely, lets see!

Those in Northern Europe had access to rosemary, savory, salt, etc. Using just a little salt goes a long way.

I don’t really agree with disregarding the first theory. It’s still a fair possibility like how people take spices to get over illness or we use acid with raw seafood.

While not used to mask rotting food, spices can kill microbes so they kinda do help prevent food related disease in warmer climates where those are more common.

“White people don’t season their food” Bro have you been to the southern part of the US???????

FWIW as an Asian person I think you should at least have a spine about it. Yelling about white people not seasoning their food does not materially address colonialism and is not a meaningful blowoff valve for racial tension, it's just insensate lashing-out. You might not think it's worth sticking your neck out to argue with poc about it but the alternative is letting a generation grow up thinking certain cuisines are entirely meritless.

like you said - you have to find the right chefs/restaurants!

The only explanation for me is that I want to taste the food itself

wow! super interesting video, both for the content AND the form! So much beautiful art was displayed, where does it come from? And kudos for the editing skills, it made the video both super interesting to hear AND to see : )

White guy here who was raised by a food-seasoning family. This video is just incorrect. We also have seasoned bbq & everything else in my family.

It's an USAnian meme far removed from objective reality. Nobody outside of their bubble think like that. Hell, rest of the planet doesn't really know what "white people food" even means, since European cuisine is diverse.

I disagree with the premise that spices were not used to hide the taste of rotten meat. Personally, as a young soldier in the Australian army we were shown that if you cook rotten meat long enough by boiling it, i the bacteria and toxins are neutralised and the meat is safe to eat - even though it doesn't taste great. It totally makes sense to me that whenever you can it's nice to disguise the 'off' flavour of meat that has gone 'off' in the tropics with spices - spicy curries cooked for a long time are great and so popular in the tropics, particularly in SE Asia where I have travelled extensively for many years. Encourage you to rethink that one.

Great content, and also i love the thumbnail ❤

Perhaps spices helped preserve meat alongside salt? Only for the flavor to be beloved later on? What of spearmint too? The illusion of coldness might have been if not is a necessity in some climates.

Good point about the salt - there is a reason it was historically one of the most important if not the most important ingredient here in northern Europe (contrary to pepper which I actually would consider a "spice" by your definition too.) Traditionally different kinds of onions as well as brassicaceae like mustard would have been the much more common way to add hot, "spicy" notes to a dish, since they are naturally abundant and I do very much like to add those to pretty much anything. I did also use to cook with curry powder a lot for a time as well, but found that (aside from feeling very wasteful) it gets very boring very quickly and you can appreciate the taste a lot more if it's reserved to special occasions or certain dishes. I think, especially once you get used to something so complex and intense as your standard of flavour, you really start losing your sense for appreciating simpler flavours and a wider range of nuances in flavour after a while

As an Indian from south africa who is dating a white person, let me just say I was SHOCKED to discover how good his family's food is! This is coming from someone who uses alot of spices (I often cook really tasty dishes myself) however when we eat bland food we both giggle and say "ewww, this is white people food" just because it's funny and to play on the stereotype even though we know it's not really true😂😂 It's really not that deep. Sometimes he teases me and accuses me of always eating curry (just bc I'm Indian) even if it's a cheese sandwich 🌝 love him sm

I sure wish this had been my experience. My parents and grandparents and everyone else in my family will season whatever their eating with whatever they could get their hands on. I remembered they even ordered some kind of special spice only found in Montana called alpine touch, which is actually pretty good but all the other stuff they used was too much

Just discovered you yesterday with the Arthur vid. Now binging your whole portfolio. It’s the perfect mix of three RU-vidrs I love: Jon Bois, BostWiki and Johnny Harris. Thank you for your content!

My new favorite channel.

The Chad Butter, Garlic, Parsley vs. The Tyrone bucket of lawry's in the pot

I love the production quality of your videos. The sound, pacing, and texture are all there and really working well. Thank you!

This was a good video. Me and my boys at UGA are learning some very important things about cooking and history.

Enjoyed the video and contents. If I can focus on an analogous spice, I really enjoyed the graphics.

they do season their food

It's a stereotype.

Spices helped prevent meat spoiling, like how we Americans give food a longer shelf life with salt. But yeah, a lot of it is simply most spices grow closer to the equator.

I use these videos to fall asleep to. Nothing against them, I watch them later too and they're great! But your voice just is so relaxing 😴

Being vegetarian also adds to the need for spice I also feel as someone needs to turn a bowl of uninspired Lentils into something I want to eat. But yeah it's so much down the person cooking it. Got someone's whole spice cabinet recently and had a flatmate from New Delhi and we cooked up storms together.

Now maybe a firefighter could explain why black people don't change their smoke alarm batteries.

Well I'm light brown, and my people don't season their foods much either(mostly cause we lived in cold mountain valley's)

Down south white people use spices. As someone whose traveled quite a bit within the US i think thats more of a thing in the midwest.

.....what white person DOSNT SEASON THEIR FOOD? Literally everyone I've ever met has seasoned it somehow

I thought you were going to bring up how middle aged white people are/were terrified of high blood pressure, leading to using no salt. I was hoping the discussion would delve deeper into certain aspects

I’m a white American with northern/eastern European roots and my partner is a naturalized American from Guatemala. I normally cook with less spices and also prefer far less salt than he does. He mentioned once that spiced meat lasts longer than unspiced meat, and I think that’s a factor that can’t be overlooked. It’s not so much about covering up bad meat as it is about keeping the meat from going bad.

For me it really just depends on what I'm cooking. If I'm following a recipe, I'll add whatever spices it calls for. If it's a dish where I'm improvising, I tend to add a minimal amount of the appropriate spices because I can always add more once it's on my plate. The more I cook, the more I get a feel for how much of each spice is appropriate.

i think that some people use the words "season" and "spice" to mean HOT. ie. chilis. while others simply mean salt.

it's racist still, and no self-hatred over "muh colonization" should justify people being harassed over "whyte ppl dont season they food" crap, it's not a joke anymore, i seen people be attacked over this, it's racism

I love how you ended the video with jacques pepin. I didnt grow up watching him on pbs but watching him cook a meal with such ease is so satisfying and inspiring. Tells me everything i don't know lmao

Beautiful images!

Him: “Saying they spice their meat because it’s rotten is racist” Also him: “it’s ok if we are the butt of a joke because colonization”

I thought the idea was to use spices to marinate meats in warmer climates where food would likely spoil faster so that they are less prone to becoming rotten, not that you chuck on spices after the food is already rotten to cover up the taste. The first is plausible. The second sounds absurd.

You did a really great job of explaining the nuances and being respectful of all cultures. Food is such an important part of identity and it’s fascinating to know the cultural origins!

As an old white guy, I season the fuck outta my food. But I am from the Southern US. We put hot sauce on everything. Hell, we put hot sauce on hot sauce. My dad was German, and is the one that inspired me to want to learn to cook. I am not a chef, but I have worked with a few chefs. In fact, I am currently working at a chef owned restaurant. Ironically, he's from Pennsylvania, so mayonnaise is spicy for him. But Southern folks love spicy food.