With its quick humor, eccentric characters, and of course, the oh-so-delectable food, “Ugly Delicious” is the Netflix binge you have been searching for (because that is totally what I did with my Sunday).
Imagine two cities: New Orleans and Houston. Both in the south, both with rich Cajun and Creole influences in their history, and both with a sizable Vietnamese population. From the outside, it would seem they have a lot in common, and possibly, their cuisine would be similar. But when it comes to the traditional crawfish, they diverge. Houston has embraced the Vietnamese culture to add a garlic butter sauce to the crawfish after they are cooked. In New Orleans, this technique is nowhere to be seen, sticking to the traditional way of boiling the crawfish in a broth of spices.
“Crawfish here is just a staple food on its own,” said a Vietnamese-American owner of a seafood restaurant in New Orleans. “It shouldn’t be changed. It should be eaten the same way it’s always been made.” She has no interest in fusing her American and Vietnamese roots in the dish. Star chef David Chang finds others agree with her, tallying it up to a “this is how it has always been done” attitude.
Chang hosts the one season docuseries that follows the adventures of him and his gang of friends and experts as they deep dive into the cuisines that vary around the world. He takes a food (fried rice, barbeque, pizza) and travels to different places internationally to see how it’s made in each region. He looks at the origins, influences and traditions of each food and searches for the boundary pushers, those who are taking the customary and fusing it into something exciting and unconventional. He challenges the idea of authenticity and what “authentic” food is and is not.
Each episode in the series has its own style, reflective of the topic. It’s intimate, as one episode follows Chang in his mother’s home in Virginia as he blends a traditional Thanksgiving meal with his Korean roots. But it still has worldly elements, as he journeys from California to Korea to Denmark to Tennessee to Italy to investigate the components of one food.
Chang gets serious with food by exploring the racial and social implications that can come with it. In the fried chicken episode, there is plenty of fried chicken, but it focuses on black culinary culture’s destruction by white chefs. The taco episode touches on borders and immigration culture in America. The fried rice episode explores the stereotype of cheapness and dirtiness that has become attached to Chinese American food.
The name for the show came from a hashtag the chef uses on Instagram, describing food that is incredibly delicious but doesn’t have the perfectly placed and coordinated plate of “tweezered” food. Its more homey, warm, and comfortable, but still flavorful. There is no upturning of noses in the show; Chang argues with a Brooklyn pizzeria owner that Domino’s has a fantastic slice.
“Ugly Delicious” is the perfect combination of wit, culture and tradition while still challenging the ideas of what society thinks of as good, quality food. It’s a casual “Chef’s Table,” honest and delicious.
If you’re browsing through Netflix this weekend looking for a new show to binge watch after “The Great British Bake Off,” turn on “Ugly Delicious” and follow David Chang as he explores food and how it does more than feed our bodies but feed our souls.