The inexorable rise of identity condiments has led to hard times for the most American of foodstuffs. And that’s a shame.
My son Jake, who’s 25, eats mayo. He’s a practical young man who works in computers and adores macaroni salad. He’s a good son. I also have a daughter. She was a women’s and gender studies major in college. Naturally, she loathes mayonnaise.
newer generations are refusing to meekly fall in line with a culinary heritage that never was theirs. Instead, they’re gobbling up kefir and ajvar and chimichurri and gochujang again.
Red Robin launched a vegan burger. You don’t put mayo on a vegan burger.
McDonald’s has debuted a Signature Sriracha Burger, joining KFC, Wendy’s, and Subway in signing on to the sizzling Thai sauce’s moment in the sun. You didn’t see Huy Fong Foods start a schmear campaign against the cultural appropriation of that.
Some experts say the dislike springs from the fact that mayo jiggles. […] This is bullshit. This attitude comes to you from young people who willingly slurp down eight kazillion kinds of yogurt, not to mention raw fish and pork belly and, yo, detergent pods, so don’t talk to me about mayonnaise. The only reason for this raging mayophobia is a generation’s gut-level renouncement of the Greatest Generation’s condiment of choice.
Besides, I’ve got news: That aioli you’re all so fond of? I hate to break it to you, but that’s just mayonnaise.
Sandy Hingston sounds mad.
Also what? Mayo is still super popular, so what is she even on about? Is she hamming this up because she feels like this is what’s necessary to make it in journalism these days?
Systemic issue in journalism. The actual reporting breaks down to a one liner; “mayonaise less popular with younger generations, increasingly diverse choice of condiments instead”, but that doesn’t generate revenue
I’m sorry, “identity condiments”? The fuck?
I’m pretty sure that’s all tongue-in-cheek. Giving people the benefit of the doubt is a good default setting.
What does Hellman’s have to do with mayonnaise though? That nitrogen-pumped piss is mayo the same way those American individually wrapped slices of milk-plastic is ‘cheese’.
I’m going to continue to die on this hill: American cheese slices typically have cheddar cheese as the very first ingredient. They are made of real cheese, dairy, and an emulsifier. Basically think of a cheese sauce with a higher melt temp but nobody seems to claim fondue is fake cheese
Are they good though? That’s subjective, I think they go great on burgers, grilled cheese, and ramen. Are they plastic or use fake cheese? No. If you want to be accurate while high horsing about it you could call them watered down congealed cheese though
Edit to add: the individually wrapped ones are an ecological nightmare. The deli deluxe ones are higher quality, not individually wrapped, and don’t even cost that much more. Or just buy not Kraft they don’t need the money anyway and other companies make American cheese slices too. You can even find emulsified cheese slices for other types of cheeses if you want variety on your burgers and grilled cheese
but nobody seems to claim fondue is fake cheese
Fondue is literally just shredded cheese. The typical Swiss fondue, la moitié-moitié (half half) is 50% Gruyère and 50% Vacherin + a little bit of potato starch if it’s an industrial one (otherwise it’s only cheese and you add potato starch if you want, it’s only to have a better texture and not mandatory).
Other types are just different cheeses, from a single one up to a mix of 3, varying from regional preferences.
Ingredients of an industrial fondue found in any Swiss supermarket:
You’re responding to someone whose point is really clear but to quote an article on the history of American cheese:
The first step in transforming American cheese into the distinct entity it is today can be traced back to Switzerland in 1911 when Walter Gerber and Fritz Stettler developed the world’s first processed cheese by shredding Emmentaler cheese and heating it with sodium citrate into a firm, unified substance upon its cooling.
This swiss process was then picked up by a canadian by the name of Kraft looking to make a cheese with longer shelf stability for the purpose of being left open at delis for slicing. It was made by melting cheddar chunks together. And stirring.
The term american comes from British snobbiness.
The inability to legally call it cheese comes from the natural cheese lobby. If it matches this criteria it cannot be called cheese:
a stable concoction of natural cheese cheese bits mixed with emulsifying agents [used to make] a homogenous plastic mass.
That having been said american cheese is disgusting and anyone who purposely eats it is insane to me.
So the term “Swiss cheese” for those industrial blocks is legitimate, it’s our fault 😔
American cheese is fine, don’t conflate the real cheese (which is just Swiss without aging or bacteria) with Kraft American Cheese Food product.
I’ve had American cheese that wasn’t the processed thing most people think of, just a cheese made from dairy, like any other cheese.
The problem is in labeling - since American cheese can be anything from real cheese to the processed stuff, people don’t know what they’re getting unless they know the producer.
I am not.
From a “is this edible” standpoint however I will conflate them because neither is edible.
It would probably get much less hate if it was just called “Burger Cheese”
Apparently the name was provided by British aristocrats. What do you think you, a nobody, are doing by sullying the name set by your betters?
Amusingly I decided to see what my local grocery store has and found this:
TIL Sweden calls it hamburger cheese (I just moved here from the US). I’m pretty sure in the US someone would get shot for trying to take America out of the name though
Kraft Singles literally aren’t cheese though. Go back and read the label. They’re not allowed to call it cheese.
It gives American cheese a bad name as there are some great deli cheeses here that are 10000x better than Kraft
Are they good though?
Really depends on the brand. Some of them really make a burger pop with a rich cheddar flavor and creamy texture.
That’s a good point about the plastic waste in your edit though. I don’t eat a lot of cheese because I try to limit animal products, but I feel like they’re usually separated with wax paper here. I’m told there are very high taxes on plastic packaging for the manufacturer.
I can’t find any reference to nitrogen used in Hellman’s mayonnaise. Do you perhaps mean that they fill the airspace at the top of the jar with nitrogen to displace oxygen and increase shelf-life? I believe that’s a very safe and common practice in food packaging.
No, not at all. That I’d have no issue with. Now, Hellman’s makes a number of different variants IIRC, and I can’t tell you which particular one this was as I haven’t bought it since, but: I mean ‘pumped’ as in ‘foamy’ or perhaps a better term would be ‘areated’. Filled with visible bubbles of some gas - I don’t actually know whether it was nitrogen or something else, but nitrogen would make sense due to the same reasons you pointed out. I suspect it was done as a shrinkflation strategy to sell the same apparent volume of product, whilst saving on material production inputs. It certainly did nothing beneficial for the texture. I don’t really want my “mayonnaise” to feel like poorly whipped cream.
I’ve seen the same thing done for some cream cheeses, and likely for the same reason. I don’t buy those more than once either.
Yeah, I’ve seen that kind of whipped cream cheese as well. They’re always trying some new gimmick. Which I guess on one hand is nice because innovation, but mostly I just think they want people to buy it because it’s shiny and new.
Those whipped cream cheeses are easy as fuck to spread on a bagel with the shitty plastic knives they give you. Same stuff, just made spreadable. You can just tear off a chunk and dip it if you want. No change to the taste and the difference in texture is negligible because the bagel is 99% of that.
This is one of the rare processed food “innovations” that’s actually good. Regular cream cheese is only for cooking now.
same way those American individually wrapped slices of milk-plastic is ‘cheese’.
I hate that I feel the need to chime in every time I see this, but no. Kraft Singles are not only garbage food, they’re literally not allowed to call it cheese.
There are some great American cheeses, especially for sandwiches. I really like Cooper Sharp.
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It comes back everytime there is a lul in the political discourse.
Gotta keep the olds against the youths
Why? Are you one of those lazy millennials?!
(I’m a millennial btw, and I agree that this stuff is really dumb)
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Yup.
Mayonnaise into aioli is the most successful rebrand of all time. Mayonnaise is dead, long live mayonnaise
I mean, Mayo is cheap, aioli is expensive.
Aioli is not mayonnaise though. There’s no egg, just garlic and oil. Although I bet a bunch of restaurant aiolis are technically mayo.
What? Mayonnaise is absolutely still a thing.
For real
What is with this constant narrative of us millennials killing shit?
Millennials are brutal murderers
White people are finally starting to catch on that food is supposed to taste good, leave mayo and ketchup in the past.
Nice bigotry.
You can pry “french”/“russian” salad from my cold dead arms. That shit’s delicious.
I really like mayonnaise, it makes for good sauces and macaroni salad is just best thing ever
I’m a simple man with simple tastes. Saltine crackers with mayo are a comfort food for me.
Sorry to tell you this, but your mouth is fucking broken.
(I really don’t care what you eat, but that sounds awful lol)
What mayonnaise do you people eat that what he described sounds awful…? My mayonnaise is so good I could eat it by the spoonful!
I’ma throw up
Stop buying shit mayonnaise.
I still fw egg salad though.
Millenials didnt kill mayonnaise… We might have killed Miracle Whip, but even Miracle Whip would famously claim it isn’t mayonnaise.
My partner and I are elder millennials, and I regret to inform you that we are keeping the people at Miracle Whip in business. I grew up poor and trashy, and one of my favorite snacks as a small child was Miracle Whip “sandwiches”. It was just Miracle Whip on nutrient deficient white bread.
I think in some sort of rebellion against what I was fed growing up, one of my favorite hobbies since I was allowed to use the stove has been cooking. I can make some very bougie dishes, but Miracle Whip will always have a place in my tuna salad and deviled eggs. My partner puts it in his grilled cheeses before frying them. We’re trash baskets at heart.
I grew up poor and trashy, and one of my favorite snacks as a small child was
Miracle Whipmayo “sandwiches”. It was justMiracle Whipmayo on nutrient deficient white bread.Me. I had my first one in years the other day after not buying groceries for a while and being hungry
Very small amounts of mayo to moisturize bread in a sandwich is about all the mayo I like. It’s heavy on almost anything with a significant amount, including stuff like takoyaki or okonomiyaki, which come with Japanese mayo on top by default. Chicken/tuna salads or coleslaw are maybes, but I think I like substitutes using say silky soy better anyway.
Reason I didn’t mention egg salad is because despite eggs previously being one of my favorite foods, I seemed to have developed an allergy to them. Them being in baked goods are fine, but I can’t eat them in full form. Maybe also a reason mayo messes with me.
The mayo also acts as a moisture barrier if you’re making lunch ahead of time.
Are they trying to say it’s dead because aioli exists?
Majonez kielecki.
Never considered commercial US branded bastardized mayo “Mayo” or even edible. Euro/Asian versions only, or homemade.
