From the "Lazy Sunday"–inspired Grant Achatz rap: "... Yo, where’s the first course? / Garnished roes, dude. / Then hit the fois gras, it's my favorite food. / I prefer Pork Belly. / That’s a good one, too. / Sweet Potato is the best. /True that. / DOUBLE TRUE...." [MenuPages Chicago]... More

Pulitzer Prize–winning LA food critic Jonathan Gold (LA Weekly, Gourmet) reveals a love of gangsta rap during a guest DJ session on KCRW. Host Garth Trinidad asks Gold about the time he spent in the studio with Snoop Dogg and Dr. Dre while they recorded Doggystyle. ... LA hip-hop had all been like very fast. Like pop, pop, pop, pop. Stuff for the girl in the disco, and he was the guy who like slowed it down and made it gangsta. Chronic, I think, was the total breakthrough album. It crossed over to the bouncing cars to hanging out barbecuing in the park. It was less about bang, bang, bang, and it was more about "this is a neighborhood you... More

Turns out that Taco Bell, back in January, had used focus groups operated by Q & A Research to shape the idea for a rip-off of the fast food drive-thru meme. I got in touch with Matt Whitlock, who participated in one of the focus groups--most interesting is that the producers actually took the feedback to heart and reshot the commercial: The next clip was actually with actors and it was more along the lines of what is played on TV right now, and people said the same thing, but we gave our input. We said it would be better if it looked like it was a YouTube video, like bad quality, amateur film, because the one they showed... More

It was only a matter of time before some big corporation caught wind of the drive-thru rap video phenomenon, previously covered here on Serious Eats back in April. Drive-thru rap videos on YouTube date back to 2006 but only recently have hit the mainstream. The basic premise: People drive up to the drive thru, usually with a friend providing beat-box, and rap with intentionally difficult-to-parse orders to confuse the employees on the other end of the intercom—the whole affair videotaped and uploaded to YouTube for all to see. Now, Taco Bell (or an ad agency working for them) has co-opted the meme, keeping the appearance of a homemade video but adding pretty glossed up close-ups of the food--and sanitizing... More

At first I felt bad that I couldn't understand what the lyrics of this rap were, but then neither could the McDonald's employees on the other end of the intercom. So the customers rapped again. And again. At different speeds. Hopefully after those few tries, the order made sense. ("Extra salt on the frizzle," anyone?) Watch the video, after the jump. It's not much visually, but it's funny to listen to the song interrupted by questions from the confused employees. [via Indablog]... More

Apropos of almost* nothing, I give you this: David Chang is the RZA of chefs, and Momofuku is his Wu-Tang Clan. Chang leads a crew of like-minded foodslingers, each of which he wants to help make a star in his own right. Hip-hop mastermind RZA did the same with the Wu, helping O.D.B., Ghostface, Method Man, Raekwon, etc., spin off successful solo careers. Not buyin' it? Consider the evidence.... More