After all the pretentious ingredients videos you've done, this one suddenly crystallized something for me! Your discussion about the morels made me realize that one of my signals for whether I would consider something pretentious or not boils down to actual vs artificial scarcity. Something (morels, e.g.) is not pretentious simply because it is naturally rare, but MAKING something rare through marketing, branding, or supply controls DEFINITELY signals pretentiousness to me.
Exactly! For me, truffle and morels aren't pretentious. Solely because they're not artificially rare (to my knowledge, neither can be farmed). But, and this isn't a food example, a diamond IS pretentious. Because the only reason why they're rare is because one family owns all the diamond mines and only lets so many be sold at once. But then, the marketing of individual products from these ingredients can totally change my opinion. Like the purple salt. It jumped to pretentious for me with all the unproven (and often times in these cases, unproveable) health claims. But a (to use another non-food example) grinding wheel coated in diamond dust isn't pretentious, because it's just letting the product speak for itself.
@@MissingmyBabbu also the marketing for diamond has been, buy this expensive thing to show how much you truly love her. So if diamonds are cheap they are less interesting due to how effective the marketing has been.
@@MissingmyBabbu Morels are not pretentious. My grandparents live on a small farming plot and you would not believe the amount they can get every spring. They just have a rather narrow time slot for growing (after thaw but before getting real warm), which is what leads to their low production for commercial selling (if you can get the people who have them to part, those things are delicious). The diamond craze was started in the late 1800s upon the discovery of mines in Africa which made the formerly rare commodity suddenly abundant. The engagement ring was their advertising campaign that drove the prices back up and the industry has even called a cartel.
When scarcity starts being an impactful quality it changes the meaning of the product and put an unquantifiable value in its worth that is status, therefore pretentiousness.
This reminded me of my favorite food quote of all time, "Shaving a bunch of black truffles over a dish, doesn't make it good, it just makes it expensive..." ~Rick Bayless (on Top Chef Masters)
The Morel mushrooms bit was quite interesting to me, because in my country a traditional activity is to go "mushrooming", you just go to the forest and spend your time picking gorgeous wild mushrooms, then bring them home and cook the hell out of them(I think Ben would enjoy that activity very much) and from that I know about morel mushrooms for a long time, they are completely amazing and it didn't even cross my mind that you just didn't know them at all 😀 nice to broaden my horizons... Shows how big the cultural barriers are even throughout Europe
So is there a place to learn about all the mushroom types? Or have someone verify that they're safe to eat? Just curious since poisonous/hallucinogenic mushrooms might be accidentally used...unless people are into that stuff (no judgement)
@@cocolao6954 Because it is popular, there are many books about mushrooms that are found in czechia, on how to recognize them, where they are usually found and if they are safe to eat and things like that.
As a boy, growing up in rural Canada, morel mushrooms grew on my parents’ front lawn. When we saw them starting to show, we knew steak was on the menu the next weekend.
Same, they say it is "rare", but in France by going in the woods near my village you can easily find a Kg in a few hours in Spring. We dry them just because we can't eat that much during the season, not because it is "rare". (it is rare for city dwellers only ^^) There are rarer mushrooms with more complex cooking process etc... (coprins, truffles etc...) Having a UE/Non-UE pot is a huge red flag though. There are 3 varieties of morels and clearly the chinese and yellow ones taste poorer. You want the grey ones. (just like how black truffle from France is way more tastier than summer truffle from China or Italy, they are just not the same products)
Here in Montana the season for morels is late May and June. Most people go to the mountain forests and foothills. They tend to grow especially well in area where there have been fires to clear the forest canopy and underbrush.
@@etienne8110 You're just falling for the typical French attitude of "it's French, so it must be better", Italian truffles aren't better or worse than French ones, if French ones were better, all the top restaurants would use exclusively French truffles, but that doesn't happen.
SORTED is one of the last cooking channels on TH-cam that keeps putting out quality content that never makes you bored or skip to the end. Fingers crossed!
What I find extremely fascinating is how the "normals", specifically Jamie have grown and changed and their definition of pretentious has almost evolved since their first pretentious ingredients video. I remember watching the early pretentious ingredient videos and mostly agreeing with Jamie's and Mike's and Barry's judgement on whether or not something was pretentious but in this video there were a few times where I thought an ingredient was absolutely pretentious but Barry and Jamie unanimously said it wasn't. (What's interesting to me is that even how I define something as pretentious as changed since I started watching Sorted. I actually learn so much from this channel and I'm extremely grateful for it.) You can tell that the guys have grown and become (for lack of a better word) more 'chefy' (I mean that they are more advanced home cooks and treat cooking and ingredients completely differently than say how i would approach cooking. I think that's really cool because you can actually gauge just how much Mike Barry and Jamie have grown and learned with Sorted. It also means I am jumping on the old bandwagon and saying there is no way these guys are normal anymore.
can you do a video where you serve the normals the exact same thing but presented in different ways (like one very fancy and one just chucked on a plate). I think it would be interesting to see if presentation subconsciously makes you think food tastes better!
Morels are pretty common is the US, I think. People love to go "mushroom huntin" here in the south. I'd be interested in a video about other foraged ingredients. Things not often thought of as edible, like dandelion edit to specify by "common" i mean "widespread", as in, everywhere from the south to the west, people can harvest morels during their season. This is in response to the guys having seemingly never heard of them.
Well known but not common. That is why you have to hunt for them! It is so expensive because they are much harder to cultivate commercially than other popular mushrooms. They are so finicky about conditions. I have great memories of morel hunting in the midwest with my dad as a kid.
@@amberp8835 Yep. I live in central Illinois, USA, and the first really warm day in spring after a rain everyone is out in the woods hunting for morels. At best, you've got 2 to 3 weeks to harvest and then they're gone till next year. I'd rather eat morels than nasty, dirt flavored truffles any day!
@@Depsilon69 it's not just talk, at least not in Texas and certain other parts of the US. They may not be as common as other mushrooms but in the spring after the first rains they can be found if you know how to find them. The issue is having the land to go mushroom hunting.
@@Jaqen-HGhar I didn't say Morels are just talk. I said there might be more talk about them in the US than the UK, referring to what they said in the video. I know how they grow and when etc... It's just hard to find. Hence why I said not common.
Yep, I thought the same as I knew what they were. But then I watched the Epicurious video on all different types of mushrooms last week, so maybe I just sub-consciously retained morels from there. Loved seeing Ben’s dish using them though - that looked epic... Edit: I lived in the US mid-west for 10 years, so reading other comments below, I just realised I prob know them more from restaurants and meals there, as they are v plentiful.
Imagine having friends over like, "Would you like some mustard on your sandwich? Just let me get the mustard BALL out." It's not pretentious, just weird.
I grew up eating morels, my entire life, fresh from the woods! They're so good fresh. I love them fried, and made into a bisque, too! They're very diverse in all the things you can use them for. :)
Honestly, as a european (Switzerland), I'm also shocked they don't know morels.... It's decently common to search for them and they are pretty popular as dishes!
Oh yes! Every spring in Michigan. We always wait to mow our lawns too, living near the woods. There's always a few that pop up in random spots every year.
Listen, the price is irrelevant, you go to a friends house & they bring out a ball of mustard like that & not a jar how on this planet are you not going to think it's pretentious?
Yeah, if you are eating hot dogs and someone asks for mustard. If someone pulls out that ball and a cup of water I am getting the hell out because I am absolutely in the wrong place.
It's always interesting to me how other cultures use certain ingredients. Over here, I've always tasted black garlic in Japanese food like in ramen. It gives a really deep warm flavor to the broth and just *chef's kiss*
Yeah, i grew up hunting them around the neighborhood. Around here they are common but still pricey because that short window of growing and everything having to be just right. Some times we get tons and sometimes we get a handful.
I live in Georgia, USA and my father-in-law goes on a scavenger hunt to harvest morels every year! He keeps a lot and then he sells the rest. He can sell them for a pretty penny! I don't think that morals are pretentious, they are just not very common and not sold in many places because they are not a mainstream ingredient. The expensive price is bc of the labor to pick them & the process of trying to find them in the same place every year. Pretentious ingredients take the extra step to impress (e.g. the purple salt). Morels don't need that extra step because they are delicious at they are.
Yep. Once you’ve trudged through the woods with a couple old wonder bread bags picking morels and then go home and pick the ticks off yourself you got while morel hunting, pretentiousness is out the window.
Midwest here and it is definitely the thing we rurals go out for every year. I have great memories of mushroom hunting with my dad as a kid. And you don't share your spots when you find a good one.
You should get Barry to bring in a load of stuff from his kitchen and mix them with other pretentious ingredients and you guys have to guess which are his and which aren’t
This episode was truly fascinating! The processes of transforming the simplest of ingredients into something else altogether offered such an insight in to history and tradition and just general industriousness of people…
For our first anniversary, my hubby took me morel hunting, and his brother gave us fresh caught trout. We had the trout stuffed with the morels and wild garlic, then grilled. That was a wonderful anniversary dinner.
I think we all operate on a different definition of pretentious. For me "pretentious" would mean something that doesn't provide a meaningfully different experience than a cheaper alternative, but you pay more because it is more expensive and has an exotic back story. "This Coffee is expensive because the beans came out of a marsupial's bum" is pretentious if what you are left with is basically a cup of coffee..
But...(No pun intended!)that would mean it went through an actual process in the marsupials intestines to get that specific taste, like kopi lupak, which is rare and therefore expensive?
And someone had to clean the beans and then dry them so it's actually a process that takes a while plus if your cleaning poo beans all day you deserve a good pay 😅
@@Marysart Or it didn't. As I explained, if it just tastes like coffee then it's pretentious, if it is actually a unique flavor that creates a unique experience then it isn't pretentious.
I've had a carpaccio with black garlic aioli, grilled leak vinaigrette, dutch old cheese flakes and thinly sliced radishes. It blew my mind how creamy the aioli was, and it tasted amazing!
Have you lads ever considered a short series on doing historical british food? Perhaps with a back to back historical and modern dish comparison! Also! Regional and UK specific food review? :-)
@@MtnNerd I've done so and love it! Though it's be an utter delight to see these lads dip into their culinary heritage and relate that to the world! They've gone to great lengths to show us cusiine and culinary experiences from accross the globe (for better or worse), and a touch of their locality to add to that would be lovely to see And! Who are we kidding, more Ben Nerdisms???? Please!
Cannot believe you let Barry talk as though he isn't the only normal who consistently already has very many of the pretentious ingredients at home! Love watching you guys!
Pass It On order idea: Alphabetical by the Name of the last song they've listened to. (a great insight to everyones music taste and sufficiently random :P)
I would love an episode that shows several ways to use the black garlic! For instance, does it work on garlic bread, in ethnic dishes, or in marinades and so forth?
It does work on garlic bread but it lacks that distinct garlic flavor so it won't be the same. It's also easy to make at home.. Just takes a long time as you have to slowly cook it at a low temperature.
@@SilvaDreams yeah, I use black garlic, and for me, it's not at all unusual to use black garlic and non-black garlic in the same dish. However, unlike regular garlic, there's not any one dish where I always use black garlic, I often use it for a change of pace.
if you have a rice cooker or slow cooker with a warm setting you can make black garlic at home. of course, you can't use the appliance for about 14 to 20 days.
Morels are so delicious. My family forages for them every season in the woods on our property. Then we just lightly flour them and fry them but if you're doing fresh you have to let them soak in salt water to remove insects.
Morels grow all over my grandparent’s property. We used to forage for them all the time when Iw as a kid. Even around that area in Northern Michigan people go nuts for them. We used to fill grocery bags! I recognized them immediately
There was a fire at the nearby high school about 40 years before I attended the rebuilt school. There’s a back wood area and morels grow like weeds, it’s a treat of the season and only 5 or 6 people know about it!
I don't think that this would count as Chef vs Normal. Just the title that needs to be fixed Unless Barry is now a chef. Maybe cumin and lavender was a genius move after all
Me, who lives where Morel Mushrooms grow: "oh, are those dehydrated morels?" Barry: "IS IT CORAL?" Edit: also, they were calling it meaty, which is interesting, because some people say it's like chicken, even giving it the nickname "Hickory Chicken" in some places
Meanwhile, me, who lives where coral grows: "Barry.... no.... no Barry... its not coral. Coral, although living, has the same consistency as a rock. Its not squishy."
I live in southern Oregon, USA. Morel mushrooms are plentiful here in the spring and fall right after a rain. They are often found under Oak, Laurel and conifer trees in the leaves. Once you find one there will be more...most always in a group. Often when new bark dust is put down in a new landscape and people water well they will have a huge patch of them in their new bark dust. My father made the most wonderful mushroom soup base with them and my mother loved them egg, cracker crumbs and pan fried.
MORELL trivia for you! In 2003 here in British Columbia we were hit by massive wild fires. The following spring people went into the burned acres of forest land to find thousands upon thousands of Morells under the ash. Hippies then would gather and sell from their trucks these very large and gorgeous mushrooms at a very high premium where Kelowna residents would barter for them. I myself was amazed by the flavour. Lesson......beauty from tragedy. 🇨🇦
I’m glad to see i’m not the only one who find him a little different than usual. It looks like he lose some weight. He looks brighter and fresher for some reason.
Soooo, bored and in quarantine I am rereading lots of different literature, and thought at : „fillet of a funny snake, in the cauldron boil and bake, eye of newt and toe and frog, wool of bat and tongue of dog, adders fork and blind worms sting, lizard s leg and owlets wing. For a charm of powerful trouble , like a hell broth boil and bubble“ now I remember that eye of newt is mustard seed, toe of frog is buttercup, not sure about all the rest, but it made me wonder what odd brews and recipes might be in other classics….might be an interesting challenge to see what the „normals“ could do with those classical, fantastic and or historic recipes, twisting them as they see fit,… and you could use the mustard ball 😁
@@xdgirl8886 well, that particular thought came up during Macbeth/ Shakespeare, I always wondered about lambas bread ( lord of the rings… or maybe just a hobbit food schedule feast), in a little princess by burnett it’s more of a generell description of rich hot tasty soup and sandwiches and blueberry muffins, a moveable feast by Hemingway describes very good chicken … I think de bresse(?!), the Queen of hearts tarts stolen by the knave of hearts in Alice adventures in wonderland by carroll, maybe the chocolate cake from mathilda by r Dahl, or maybe from pippi longstocking „and they shouted with delight when they saw all the good things pippi had set out on the bare rock. There were lovely little sandwiches of meatloaf and ham, a whole pile of pancakes sprinkled with sugar, little brown sausages and three pineapple puddings“, …. Maybe a duck rochambeau from the moviegoer by walker percy, I think there were some amazing potatoes mentioned in the secret garden by burnett, in the secret life of bees there are a few references to classic southern dishes (since the author put the whole story in South Carolina), or maybe the „normals“ could make lane cake from to kill a mockingbird by Harper lee „I’ll make a lanecake. That Stephanie s been after my recipe for thirty years, and if she thinks I’ll give it to her just because I am staying with her, she got another thing coming“(no clue what a lanecake is, but why not?!) , or maybe a twist on the Turkish delights from narnia, …. Or just recipes out of nanny ogg s cookbook ( part of terry pratchetts epic discworld series), … Any book recommendations would be welcome for my reading list too 😉 Most stories have some food in them, it’s a big part of social interaction and even buisness…. And for historical ideas, well has beer probably the oldest recipe from 3500 BC, or maybe the meatpie recipe from Mesopotamia dating back to like 1700 BC,…
If you're looking for adaptations of famous recipes in Media, maybe give Binging with Babish a try. He does movies and Shows so idk how that translate to your list but I'm fairly certain he tackled the cake in Matilda at least
Morels! Got it first glance!! They grow around where I live (West Virginia, US) and are, indeed, highly prized. Two friends of mine were crossing a street and the center divider was covered in mulch out of which a swarm of morels were growing. They ran back to their house, got a paper bag, returned to the divider and picked every morel. They feasted on some and dried the rest.
@@Khazandar It's not *that* bad, horseradish can be a lot stronger to be fair. Then again, I adore sitting there scoffing handfuls of wasabi peas so I might be mildly resistant now.
@@SortedFood clean them, then dredged in seasoned flour, quick pan fry in brown butter! Great with steak or served over a grain like cooked buckwheat. Eaten with quinoa and zucchini is delicious as well!
Tons in the river bottoms in Nebraska and Iowa, for about two weeks or so in spring. It's tough to get any, as many people around here treat morel harvesting as a contact sport.
You can find morels in northen Europe too (scandinavia, Finland). I have not eat morels myself but some say that you can find them in burnt places/forests (like swidden) and new garden areas at spring (when the soil is new).
This is wild seeing morels on here. I saw them and IMMEDIATELY knew what they were. Never figured them for pretentious though since they just grow in my parents backyard naturally here in the states. But I will say - morel hunting is pretty common and people guard their sites religiously! It’s a common activity around here to go mushroom hunting and spend the day wandering the woods, looking for mushrooms and avoiding snapping turtles!
Morels are absolutely amazing and worth the cost. Also, I genuinely prefer black garlic powder to the paste. I feel like you can get more uses out of it!
Never seen dried morels before. Used to pick them when I was younger. Pretty common in the midwest states (at least in Missouri where I'm from) if you know what you're looking for, but since most people don't know how/when/where to find them they cost a fortune to buy at a store, or even from a local picker. We used to just batter them in egg and flour with some salt and pepper. To me they taste quite similar to fried calamari when cooked that way. I love them. One of my favorite foods. I'd say the opposite of pretentious if you pick them yourself, but rather pretentious the way they're presented in this video.
I remember my grandpa had a secret mushroom patch in the woods, he would pick pounds and pounds of them, freeze most of them. We always had a feed of mushrooms with Swiss chard sautéed in butter and served with heavy cream and dill. They were so delicious and it was a once a year treat. They looked identical to these morels. A nice memory.
Boys: these morel mushrooms sure are pretentious! Me: goes out to the woods in Illinois with a stick and finds enough to fill a trash bag. We fry them in cornmeal here. 😂
I have friends and family who forage for them! In Kansas, they have pretty good luck, but thanks to the fires in Washington, my more local friends are getting luckier. The fact they'd never heard of morels blows my little mind!
@@violablaire6499 Oh, I just had spots in the woods beside my house growing up. It was always a challenge getting to them before the deer and the turkeys found them!
About 68 years ago in the Spring, my father would take me into the woods early in the morning to find Morel mushrooms. At home, he would soak them in salt water so any bugs in the folds could be rinsed out. Then they were chopped and mixed in scrambled eggs. One of my favorite memories as I lost him when I was 5 years old.
I think it would be interesting to challenge Ben to see how far his cooking has come in all the years. As James went off to learn, it would be interesting to compare Ben's best now, and see if it impresses James when he shows up again.
Gotta say, black garlic is amazing. I found some bulbs in a jar at a discount mart years ago, then powdered dehydrated, and switched from white to black. So much more savory, sweet...depth of flavor.
Hey guys! love your videos! I am from Kaliningrad, Russia, just across the baltic sea from you! I wanted to recomend some crazy russian ingredients for your next video! (recipie ideas included) Krapiva(крапива) which in english translates as urtica stinging nettles, basically its a plant that grows in lots of places and is very prickly, russian tradition that our ancestors and nowadays we still cook with this. These leaves are boiled to remove their prickly nature and made into schi which is basically soup with potatoes, meat and boiled eggs. Another intresting thing we make is all kinds of варенья, which is basically jam Pine cone jam, rose hip jam(my grandmother always collects it in the summer and boils with sugar to make jars and jars of it for the winter), rose hips are very good for heart and gut health. Anyway here are some possibly pretentious ingredients: Rose hip jam Pine cone jam Stinging nettles Amber salt Hematogen bars (also called blood bars, in reality they taste like chocolate) Talkan grain Kvas Hope you try one of these!
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I'd be really interested to see how the Bamboo salt compares to Indian Black Salt. When Barry and Jamie were describing the taste I expected it to be black salt, which is much, much cheaper! It's a vital ingredient in chaat masala.
I think you should have a ‘Regional Treats’ episode where you look at weird local ingredients (like the Tewkesbury Mustard). I’m sure there must be loads in Britain to binge on. Maybe Stargazy Pie, Bedfordshire Clangar, Staffordshire Oatcakes etc
Morel mushrooms are truly the best mushroom when fresh & not pretentious at all at least not in Iowa where we pick them every spring. The best way to have them is to saute them in a little butter add a little salt to them just before serving.
Oh man it was so interested to see you guys defining what you find pretentious! It definitely explained why I disagree so much with you what you find pretentious, I always think a pretentious ingredient is just an ingredient that's useless, can easily be replaced, isn't required, etc (so the mustard, salt especially) but hearing you guys' pov explains so much, that's fair!
Why didn’t they hear me yelling dried morels, when I was a kid- we picked them every spring at the edge of the woods near a field. I haven’t had them in years. In Canada you can still find them, but I can’t tell the difference between edible morels and the poisonous morels. We soak the in a salty brine , drain , cut them up and fry them in butter. Then later in the season we’d look for puff balls
👋 👋 Hello from Ontario! We too used to go "mushrooming" every spring. My dad knew every wild mushroom growing so no fear of getting a wrong one. Morels often have a LOT of dirt and sometimes worms, so soaking them took care of that. I never could bring myself to eat puffball though. The rest of my sibs and dad couldn't get enough of them. Not me. And not my mum. But she'd have a big cast iron frying pan with a tonne of butter in it to fry the shrooms and puffball up. That was over 50 years ago and I still think of that as a great time.
@@rhijulbec1 Hi from Texas I would read my dad's book on mushrooms when I was Little and always enjoyed the wild mushrooms that would pop up every year just in the back yard where we hung out the laundry.
@@rhijulbec1 Yes especially the fact that knowing too much about poisonous mushrooms made you stare at them wondering if you made a mistake one day you would die horribly. But we also gathered up the wild greens with mom that will kill you vary painfully if you don't know how to cook them mostly listed as poisonous in field books with skull and crossbones ☠️. They are the best of greens vary tasty.
@@windyhawthorn7387 Now that's something I haven't tried doing! Foraging. There are so many edible greens that grow right under our noses, yet we treat them like weeds instead of food. I know you can eat things like stinging nettles as long as they're young and well cooked. Dandelion greens are excellent when they're young as well. So are the flowers. I've seen them made into a jam! Now I've never eaten a dandelion flower, but it really doesn't have a strong smell, so I can't imagine what it tastes like. I absolutely love greens of all kinds~spinach, kale, collard greens, watercress, chard and more. Love them. I usually just boil them, either for a short time~like spinach or a long slow boil for collard greens. All I add is salt and a big slice of lemon and cook them. Do you know what greens you used to pick? I'd love to know. Just in case I can find them. Thanks for your reply! Nice to meet you! Jenn
So since I can't get the mustard balls where I live, I went on Google. And since they have put in the request for them to be a protected food, I found a paper submitted to ur gov about them. It tells exactly what ingredients r used and even their exact process. Hehe. So now I know exactly how they make them and even the recipe sais it makes 33 balls. So hehehehehe. I love the interwebs. 😁 Totally gonna make some.
I think what this series has made me realise is how much disposable income I lack that makes me so uncultured 😂😂 seeing them review these ingredients and having an actual stomach churn when I hear the price makes me appreciate how well the channel has done to be able to afford these products to review them and provide their opinion when it’s most likely that I’ll never be buying these products 😂
We used to pick morels when I was a kid. We'd either fry them in butter as a side for venison or deep fry them in an egg batter for breakfast. They were very good, I've never tried them dried.
When I saw the salt and heard you describe it as ‘eggy’ I was SURE it was kala namak (black salt) as it looks just like it and seems to have the same characteristics… apart from the price point, what’s the difference? I’m intrigued!
I do love black garlic. I saw it online a couple years ago - and since I had a suitable rice cooker, I started making it myself. I have it for breakfast each day - a clove spread on toast instead of butter, under a poached egg, along side some pork chipolatas and tomato-chili jam, and some (non-black) garlic mushrooms. They cost me, like, $2 for 250g of raw garlic, and then 30-ish days of time and electricity.
Morels are quite "usual" here in Austria and in the east of Europe. Of course fresh. Every posh restaurant has them when they are in season. Either way, I don't like them very much 😅
Mustard ball : dehydrated, can use when cooking (really the only time I use mustard) and high quality? I might try these. If they export to the colonies. We have the queen on our money!
I live in rural Indiana, USA. Every spring, mushrooming is a popular pastime here. We hit the woods searching for Morels, and people find several pounds of them at one time. They sell around $60 a pound fresh during the season. Delicious fried!
With dried products it's always important to realize that their price is actually based on the full, undehidrated weight with the drying process on top of that. So in this case you get 30 grams for 18,50, which translates up to 300 grams of wild morels. Fresh morels go for 50 to 70 bucks per kilo. And they're being cultivated now, so if you want to grow them you can.
Being from the north Midwestern US, morels seem very normal. Every spring people go out looking to find and harvest morels. It’s hard to say that they’re pretentious but it was neat to see them highlighted 😄
After all the pretentious ingredients videos you've done, this one suddenly crystallized something for me! Your discussion about the morels made me realize that one of my signals for whether I would consider something pretentious or not boils down to actual vs artificial scarcity. Something (morels, e.g.) is not pretentious simply because it is naturally rare, but MAKING something rare through marketing, branding, or supply controls DEFINITELY signals pretentiousness to me.
Exactly! For me, truffle and morels aren't pretentious. Solely because they're not artificially rare (to my knowledge, neither can be farmed). But, and this isn't a food example, a diamond IS pretentious. Because the only reason why they're rare is because one family owns all the diamond mines and only lets so many be sold at once.
But then, the marketing of individual products from these ingredients can totally change my opinion. Like the purple salt. It jumped to pretentious for me with all the unproven (and often times in these cases, unproveable) health claims. But a (to use another non-food example) grinding wheel coated in diamond dust isn't pretentious, because it's just letting the product speak for itself.
@@MissingmyBabbu also the marketing for diamond has been, buy this expensive thing to show how much you truly love her. So if diamonds are cheap they are less interesting due to how effective the marketing has been.
@@MissingmyBabbu Morels are not pretentious. My grandparents live on a small farming plot and you would not believe the amount they can get every spring. They just have a rather narrow time slot for growing (after thaw but before getting real warm), which is what leads to their low production for commercial selling (if you can get the people who have them to part, those things are delicious).
The diamond craze was started in the late 1800s upon the discovery of mines in Africa which made the formerly rare commodity suddenly abundant. The engagement ring was their advertising campaign that drove the prices back up and the industry has even called a cartel.
When scarcity starts being an impactful quality it changes the meaning of the product and put an unquantifiable value in its worth that is status, therefore pretentiousness.
Yes for me it's pretentious if it's deliberate, e.g. gold leaf on food
Pass it on idea: Cook a specific country’s cuisine but only tell the first person
Or everyone gets told different country when they come to the kitchen. Making it ultimate fusion pass it on. 😂
@@Aquelll con-fusion
No.
Remember the paella burrito incident?
@@Fyreflier I think that is why I want that, just for the chaos 😂
@@Fyreflier but thats what makes it funny
I miss the fridge cam, that always made me smile, doesnt matter how bad the dad jokes are!
"Butt first..."
I actually miss the comment of the week days...
This reminded me of my favorite food quote of all time, "Shaving a bunch of black truffles over a dish, doesn't make it good, it just makes it expensive..."
~Rick Bayless (on Top Chef Masters)
Unrelated but Barry's hair is looking very nice in this vid. Those waves!
I'm very surprised Truffle boy hasn't heard of morels. You know who you are
Truffle boy!!!! Love that!!
take it from the truffle boy himself, "sometimes I wake up, with a craving for truffle, and it hits the spot."
Who's truffle boy?
Yeah, I recognised them straight away but could only remember the name started with M.
@@OK-mv4ih Starts with B, rhymes with Scary
Jamie: it’s sweeter than normal horseradish
Barry: *dying in the corner*
Pain hurts but victory is sweeter
"this is the original form of true pure mustard" *Barry takes a full f**** forkfull*
...while wearing a shirt literally saying "Wild Ones"
if only.
Proceeds to beat Jamie in excitement over the sandwiches lmao
The Morel mushrooms bit was quite interesting to me, because in my country a traditional activity is to go "mushrooming", you just go to the forest and spend your time picking gorgeous wild mushrooms, then bring them home and cook the hell out of them(I think Ben would enjoy that activity very much) and from that I know about morel mushrooms for a long time, they are completely amazing and it didn't even cross my mind that you just didn't know them at all 😀 nice to broaden my horizons... Shows how big the cultural barriers are even throughout Europe
Thank you for sharing! An intrigued American!
So is there a place to learn about all the mushroom types? Or have someone verify that they're safe to eat? Just curious since poisonous/hallucinogenic mushrooms might be accidentally used...unless people are into that stuff (no judgement)
We do the same thing in Australia but we make a tea
@@cocolao6954 Because it is popular, there are many books about mushrooms that are found in czechia, on how to recognize them, where they are usually found and if they are safe to eat and things like that.
I googled the name in Russian and was so confused that that mushroom is apparently rare 😅
I remember “hunting” for morels with my dad when I was a child. We would just fry them in some seasoned flour and they were so delicious. 🤤 😋
As a boy, growing up in rural Canada, morel mushrooms grew on my parents’ front lawn.
When we saw them starting to show, we knew steak was on the menu the next weekend.
Also in our frontyard in Estonia.
Same, they say it is "rare", but in France by going in the woods near my village you can easily find a Kg in a few hours in Spring.
We dry them just because we can't eat that much during the season, not because it is "rare". (it is rare for city dwellers only ^^)
There are rarer mushrooms with more complex cooking process etc... (coprins, truffles etc...)
Having a UE/Non-UE pot is a huge red flag though. There are 3 varieties of morels and clearly the chinese and yellow ones taste poorer. You want the grey ones. (just like how black truffle from France is way more tastier than summer truffle from China or Italy, they are just not the same products)
Morel pickin' is a tradition for a long spring family walk in my neck of the woods too. (Central US)
Here in Montana the season for morels is late May and June. Most people go to the mountain forests and foothills. They tend to grow especially well in area where there have been fires to clear the forest canopy and underbrush.
@@etienne8110 You're just falling for the typical French attitude of "it's French, so it must be better", Italian truffles aren't better or worse than French ones, if French ones were better, all the top restaurants would use exclusively French truffles, but that doesn't happen.
“A slice of history.”
That’s what my dad calls stale bread. 😂
Hahaha sounds YUMMY!
@@SortedFood haha. It does right? 😂
Your dad is hilarious 😂
We got a Dad joke after all that! Missed those!
@@janmay3901 I thought the Dad jokes were "toast". 😇
I love these episodes of “raiding Barry’s kitchen” 😂
or, in the case of the stuff Barry doesn't know, "raiding Barry's future kitchen" (time machine sold separately)
@@MercenaryPen oh yeah, “giving Barry ideas” or “the reason Barry went broke: $135 salt” lol
Or we can even name it "does Barey have it?"
Brilliant!
They need to actually raid his kitchen in an episode , go through his cupboards and see how many pretentious ingredients he has in his kitchen
SORTED is one of the last cooking channels on TH-cam that keeps putting out quality content that never makes you bored or skip to the end. Fingers crossed!
I recommend Glenn and Friends. He's from Canada 🇨🇦 and he is straight forward, mindful of the costs of things.
I think the boys here would like him.
What I find extremely fascinating is how the "normals", specifically Jamie have grown and changed and their definition of pretentious has almost evolved since their first pretentious ingredients video. I remember watching the early pretentious ingredient videos and mostly agreeing with Jamie's and Mike's and Barry's judgement on whether or not something was pretentious but in this video there were a few times where I thought an ingredient was absolutely pretentious but Barry and Jamie unanimously said it wasn't. (What's interesting to me is that even how I define something as pretentious as changed since I started watching Sorted. I actually learn so much from this channel and I'm extremely grateful for it.)
You can tell that the guys have grown and become (for lack of a better word) more 'chefy' (I mean that they are more advanced home cooks and treat cooking and ingredients completely differently than say how i would approach cooking. I think that's really cool because you can actually gauge just how much Mike Barry and Jamie have grown and learned with Sorted. It also means I am jumping on the old bandwagon and saying there is no way these guys are normal anymore.
can you do a video where you serve the normals the exact same thing but presented in different ways (like one very fancy and one just chucked on a plate). I think it would be interesting to see if presentation subconsciously makes you think food tastes better!
Morels are pretty common is the US, I think. People love to go "mushroom huntin" here in the south. I'd be interested in a video about other foraged ingredients. Things not often thought of as edible, like dandelion
edit to specify by "common" i mean "widespread", as in, everywhere from the south to the west, people can harvest morels during their season. This is in response to the guys having seemingly never heard of them.
May be more talk here in the US but they aren't common... Just the nature of the morel.
Well known but not common. That is why you have to hunt for them! It is so expensive because they are much harder to cultivate commercially than other popular mushrooms. They are so finicky about conditions. I have great memories of morel hunting in the midwest with my dad as a kid.
@@amberp8835 Yep. I live in central Illinois, USA, and the first really warm day in spring after a rain everyone is out in the woods hunting for morels. At best, you've got 2 to 3 weeks to harvest and then they're gone till next year. I'd rather eat morels than nasty, dirt flavored truffles any day!
@@Depsilon69 it's not just talk, at least not in Texas and certain other parts of the US. They may not be as common as other mushrooms but in the spring after the first rains they can be found if you know how to find them. The issue is having the land to go mushroom hunting.
@@Jaqen-HGhar I didn't say Morels are just talk. I said there might be more talk about them in the US than the UK, referring to what they said in the video. I know how they grow and when etc... It's just hard to find. Hence why I said not common.
I'm truly surprised the guys hadn't had Morels...or even heard of them.
Intriguing.
My thoughts exactly.
I get them all the time where I live at local farmers markets I didn't realize they were so hard to find but they are awesome.
I'm surprised that they didn't taste them during their trip to Washington and Oregon.
Yep, I thought the same as I knew what they were. But then I watched the Epicurious video on all different types of mushrooms last week, so maybe I just sub-consciously retained morels from there. Loved seeing Ben’s dish using them though - that looked epic...
Edit: I lived in the US mid-west for 10 years, so reading other comments below, I just realised I prob know them more from restaurants and meals there, as they are v plentiful.
And here I sit, reckognizing them by shape from Stardew Valley...
Imagine having friends over like, "Would you like some mustard on your sandwich? Just let me get the mustard BALL out." It's not pretentious, just weird.
Haha so you wouldn't try it for yourself?
@@SortedFood I'd try it once, but probably be laughing at it the whole time
@@theotherVLF i think a mustard ball is still better than the small wooden handmade barrel i once got my mustard in
@@suppersdinner119 ok now that's a pretentious mustard
Most pretentious things ARE weird!
I grew up eating morels, my entire life, fresh from the woods! They're so good fresh. I love them fried, and made into a bisque, too! They're very diverse in all the things you can use them for. :)
This is the moment I realized as someone who lives in central Michigan not everyone can walk into their backyard and just pick morel mushrooms.
I was literally just like we have morels all over in michigan!
We have them all over Ohio also
*Midwestern Americans stare in shock at never having heard of morels.* We hunt morel mushrooms every spring; it's a family fun outing.
Honestly, as a european (Switzerland), I'm also shocked they don't know morels.... It's decently common to search for them and they are pretty popular as dishes!
I really don't like Morels, tbh. (Indiana born and raised.) I'm more of a shiitake/porcini kind of guy.
They usually don't grow in England id assume
I’m from the Midwest and I knew what they were right away 🤦🏾♀️ Never hunted them tho.
Oh yes! Every spring in Michigan. We always wait to mow our lawns too, living near the woods. There's always a few that pop up in random spots every year.
Listen, the price is irrelevant, you go to a friends house & they bring out a ball of mustard like that & not a jar how on this planet are you not going to think it's pretentious?
You know when you put it in that situation absolutely pretentious.
And cups of warm beer to dilute 😂
Same with Morels or truffle from our pretentious head boy Barry Taylor… like how do you even justify truffles as not pretentious?
Yeah, if you are eating hot dogs and someone asks for mustard. If someone pulls out that ball and a cup of water I am getting the hell out because I am absolutely in the wrong place.
Well yeah then they are just pretentious. I would use it as an ingredient. The first thing that comes to mind is rubbing it on a pork roast.
As soon as I saw the Morel i called it… Cause someone played a lot of Stardew Valley during lockdown… A LOT !
Haha can relate
They grow wild where I live, so I see them quite a bit! I never really thought of them as pretentious, just a lucky find lol
It's always interesting to me how other cultures use certain ingredients. Over here, I've always tasted black garlic in Japanese food like in ramen. It gives a really deep warm flavor to the broth and just *chef's kiss*
I only knew about the Korean salt and when they said “20-ish” quid each I was like “Oh you sweet summer child…”
Oh you lemon and herb boys…
I said 100, but I meant euros, so I wasn't even close.
"This is a slice of history." More like a ball of history, surely.
You're not wrong! A spicy ball of history
@@SortedFood is that Ben?
Looking at your profile avatar and readi g this comment...I can see that face saying that
I feel like living in an area where morel-hunting is a thing cuts way down on the pretentious factor.
Yeah, i grew up hunting them around the neighborhood. Around here they are common but still pricey because that short window of growing and everything having to be just right. Some times we get tons and sometimes we get a handful.
Exactly! MY favourite way to make it is to stuff them with prunes, wrap them in bacon and cook the in the oven. :)
I live in Georgia, USA and my father-in-law goes on a scavenger hunt to harvest morels every year! He keeps a lot and then he sells the rest. He can sell them for a pretty penny! I don't think that morals are pretentious, they are just not very common and not sold in many places because they are not a mainstream ingredient. The expensive price is bc of the labor to pick them & the process of trying to find them in the same place every year. Pretentious ingredients take the extra step to impress (e.g. the purple salt). Morels don't need that extra step because they are delicious at they are.
Yep. Once you’ve trudged through the woods with a couple old wonder bread bags picking morels and then go home and pick the ticks off yourself you got while morel hunting, pretentiousness is out the window.
Midwest here and it is definitely the thing we rurals go out for every year. I have great memories of mushroom hunting with my dad as a kid. And you don't share your spots when you find a good one.
You should get Barry to bring in a load of stuff from his kitchen and mix them with other pretentious ingredients and you guys have to guess which are his and which aren’t
But what would they do, when they have two of almost everything?
This episode was truly fascinating! The processes of transforming the simplest of ingredients into something else altogether offered such an insight in to history and tradition and just general industriousness of people…
For our first anniversary, my hubby took me morel hunting, and his brother gave us fresh caught trout. We had the trout stuffed with the morels and wild garlic, then grilled. That was a wonderful anniversary dinner.
I think we all operate on a different definition of pretentious. For me "pretentious" would mean something that doesn't provide a meaningfully different experience than a cheaper alternative, but you pay more because it is more expensive and has an exotic back story. "This Coffee is expensive because the beans came out of a marsupial's bum" is pretentious if what you are left with is basically a cup of coffee..
But...(No pun intended!)that would mean it went through an actual process in the marsupials intestines to get that specific taste, like kopi lupak, which is rare and therefore expensive?
And someone had to clean the beans and then dry them so it's actually a process that takes a while plus if your cleaning poo beans all day you deserve a good pay 😅
Hence why the mustard balls are pretentious
Fully agree!!
@@Marysart Or it didn't. As I explained, if it just tastes like coffee then it's pretentious, if it is actually a unique flavor that creates a unique experience then it isn't pretentious.
I've had a carpaccio with black garlic aioli, grilled leak vinaigrette, dutch old cheese flakes and thinly sliced radishes. It blew my mind how creamy the aioli was, and it tasted amazing!
Sounds delish!
Now that's pretentious
Have you lads ever considered a short series on doing historical british food? Perhaps with a back to back historical and modern dish comparison!
Also! Regional and UK specific food review? :-)
Try watching Tasting History
@@MtnNerd I've done so and love it! Though it's be an utter delight to see these lads dip into their culinary heritage and relate that to the world!
They've gone to great lengths to show us cusiine and culinary experiences from accross the globe (for better or worse), and a touch of their locality to add to that would be lovely to see
And! Who are we kidding, more Ben Nerdisms???? Please!
love this!
Also Townsends! He tries to keep everything as authentic as possible, including the methods and utensils.
I'd love to see a Sorted take on a Heston Blumenthal like series
Morel mushrooms grow in the Midwest. When I was a kid we would go hunting them in the spring
Cannot believe you let Barry talk as though he isn't the only normal who consistently already has very many of the pretentious ingredients at home! Love watching you guys!
9:18 Ben reminds me of a teacher, his mouth says "Interesting" but his face says "You're dumber than I thought" xD
SO ACCURATE
Pass It On order idea: Alphabetical by the Name of the last song they've listened to. (a great insight to everyones music taste and sufficiently random :P)
This is such a good one!
@@gibuttersnaps2538 thanks! I hope it reveals some musical guilty pleasures
I would love an episode that shows several ways to use the black garlic! For instance, does it work on garlic bread, in ethnic dishes, or in marinades and so forth?
It does work on garlic bread but it lacks that distinct garlic flavor so it won't be the same. It's also easy to make at home.. Just takes a long time as you have to slowly cook it at a low temperature.
😉 Bob thinks it's great on a burger
This was all I was thinking during the discussion on black garlic!
@@SilvaDreams yeah, I use black garlic, and for me, it's not at all unusual to use black garlic and non-black garlic in the same dish. However, unlike regular garlic, there's not any one dish where I always use black garlic, I often use it for a change of pace.
I've used it in a recipe for ramen. Also it's not that hard to make on your own. It's just gently heating the garlic until it caramelizes.
I like how the subtitles spelled "cloche" four different ways, none of them correctly.
Just picked 20lbs of morels last week here in western Canada! So many amazing uses for it but nothing beats sauteed in garlic butter!
On these video, Barry should be labeled as a “pretentious normal”
1 Chef, 2 Normals, 1 pretentious individual
@@rebel4466 yes! Add that to his pass it on title page for sure.
I think biased will do
or just normally pretentious
if you have a rice cooker or slow cooker with a warm setting you can make black garlic at home. of course, you can't use the appliance for about 14 to 20 days.
Instant pot can be used too.. I heard the smell can be very strong so to do it in the garage or on a covered patio
I laughed so hard!!
Morels are so delicious. My family forages for them every season in the woods on our property. Then we just lightly flour them and fry them but if you're doing fresh you have to let them soak in salt water to remove insects.
Yes! I always just saute them in butter, sometimes flour them sometimes don't! It's a great time of year when the morels start.
@@laakins We always soaked them and THEN fried them, but some people didn’t bother. It’s just extra protein, right? Haha.
@@laakins haha, no. Fresh as in not dried.
12:00 I love Barry so much 😭😭 when he was like "I did" after Jamie tried to confirm if anyone saw his amazing catch. Barry's the best.
Glad to see morel mushrooms on here! In Ohio in the US, I grew up hunting for morels every spring! A real delicacy
Morels grow all over my grandparent’s property. We used to forage for them all the time when Iw as a kid. Even around that area in Northern Michigan people go nuts for them. We used to fill grocery bags! I recognized them immediately
There was a fire at the nearby high school about 40 years before I attended the rebuilt school. There’s a back wood area and morels grow like weeds, it’s a treat of the season and only 5 or 6 people know about it!
I don't think that this would count as Chef vs Normal. Just the title that needs to be fixed
Unless Barry is now a chef. Maybe cumin and lavender was a genius move after all
It could be jamie , cuz after the paella burito, the articles did call jamie chef🤭🤭🤭🤭
No, Jamie revealed last video, that he has been Running a Food channel for 10 years.
Baz is just there to photograph things, and leave hobs on.
Also if it was versus then the chef (as there is only one) should be tasting stuff to !
Yeah, this doesn't feel like a "vs" episode really.
@@hrithikasarvodayan Jamie did work in the test kitchen under James for a long time. That's practically an apprenticeship.
Me, who lives where Morel Mushrooms grow: "oh, are those dehydrated morels?"
Barry: "IS IT CORAL?"
Edit: also, they were calling it meaty, which is interesting, because some people say it's like chicken, even giving it the nickname "Hickory Chicken" in some places
Meanwhile, me, who lives where coral grows: "Barry.... no.... no Barry... its not coral. Coral, although living, has the same consistency as a rock. Its not squishy."
@@TheLoreSeeker And meeee, in similar to both of your situations...agreeing with you both! lol Barry, don't eat coral!!
I live in southern Oregon, USA. Morel mushrooms are plentiful here in the spring and fall right after a rain. They are often found under Oak, Laurel and conifer trees in the leaves. Once you find one there will be more...most always in a group. Often when new bark dust is put down in a new landscape and people water well they will have a huge patch of them in their new bark dust. My father made the most wonderful mushroom soup base with them and my mother loved them egg, cracker crumbs and pan fried.
MORELL trivia for you! In 2003 here in British Columbia we were hit by massive wild fires. The following spring people went into the burned acres of forest land to find thousands upon thousands of Morells under the ash. Hippies then would gather and sell from their trucks these very large and gorgeous mushrooms at a very high premium where Kelowna residents would barter for them. I myself was amazed by the flavour. Lesson......beauty from tragedy. 🇨🇦
People here on Vancouver Island also forage for Morell as well as other wild mushrooms. Chantrel (spelling?) is also yummy
Yes very cool. Chanterelles are a real delicacy also. Cheers to you 🇨🇦
Does Barry seem healthier or happier to anyone else? Whatever he's doing, I hope he keeps it up! 💖
I’m glad to see i’m not the only one who find him a little different than usual. It looks like he lose some weight. He looks brighter and fresher for some reason.
@@avariceseven9443 Could it be that a certain something that rhymes with hamchemic is tapering off in England?
Honestly I wonder if it's James.
Soooo, bored and in quarantine I am rereading lots of different literature, and thought at : „fillet of a funny snake, in the cauldron boil and bake, eye of newt and toe and frog, wool of bat and tongue of dog, adders fork and blind worms sting, lizard s leg and owlets wing. For a charm of powerful trouble , like a hell broth boil and bubble“ now I remember that eye of newt is mustard seed, toe of frog is buttercup, not sure about all the rest, but it made me wonder what odd brews and recipes might be in other classics….might be an interesting challenge to see what the „normals“ could do with those classical, fantastic and or historic recipes, twisting them as they see fit,… and you could use the mustard ball 😁
Oooh that's an interesting one! Do you have any particular books/novels in mind?
@@xdgirl8886 well, that particular thought came up during Macbeth/ Shakespeare, I always wondered about lambas bread ( lord of the rings… or maybe just a hobbit food schedule feast), in a little princess by burnett it’s more of a generell description of rich hot tasty soup and sandwiches and blueberry muffins, a moveable feast by Hemingway describes very good chicken … I think de bresse(?!), the Queen of hearts tarts stolen by the knave of hearts in Alice adventures in wonderland by carroll, maybe the chocolate cake from mathilda by r Dahl, or maybe from pippi longstocking „and they shouted with delight when they saw all the good things pippi had set out on the bare rock. There were lovely little sandwiches of meatloaf and ham, a whole pile of pancakes sprinkled with sugar, little brown sausages and three pineapple puddings“, …. Maybe a duck rochambeau from the moviegoer by walker percy, I think there were some amazing potatoes mentioned in the secret garden by burnett, in the secret life of bees there are a few references to classic southern dishes (since the author put the whole story in South Carolina), or maybe the „normals“ could make lane cake from to kill a mockingbird by Harper lee „I’ll make a lanecake. That Stephanie s been after my recipe for thirty years, and if she thinks I’ll give it to her just because I am staying with her, she got another thing coming“(no clue what a lanecake is, but why not?!) , or maybe a twist on the Turkish delights from narnia, …. Or just recipes out of nanny ogg s cookbook ( part of terry pratchetts epic discworld series), …
Any book recommendations would be welcome for my reading list too 😉
Most stories have some food in them, it’s a big part of social interaction and even buisness….
And for historical ideas, well has beer probably the oldest recipe from 3500 BC, or maybe the meatpie recipe from Mesopotamia dating back to like 1700 BC,…
how about.... no.
If you're looking for adaptations of famous recipes in Media, maybe give Binging with Babish a try. He does movies and Shows so idk how that translate to your list but I'm fairly certain he tackled the cake in Matilda at least
@@BlueGangsta1958 thanks for the rec, I check it out :)
Morels! Got it first glance!! They grow around where I live (West Virginia, US) and are, indeed, highly prized.
Two friends of mine were crossing a street and the center divider was covered in mulch out of which a swarm of morels were growing. They ran back to their house, got a paper bag, returned to the divider and picked every morel. They feasted on some and dried the rest.
I like having both Barry and James giving their opinions together. I like the interplay.
Alright then boys, MUSTARD, HORSERADISH, AND WASABI POKER FACE CHALLENGE
We would LOVE to see that
I doubt that they'll be able to get actual wasabi, though.
@@Khazandar there's a company in London that sells real wasabi root! I've purchased from them before and it tastes delicious! The Wasabi Company :)
That would be great, good fresh horseradish is something you can't help but react to as it burns through your brain.
@@Khazandar It's not *that* bad, horseradish can be a lot stronger to be fair. Then again, I adore sitting there scoffing handfuls of wasabi peas so I might be mildly resistant now.
Morels are not uncommon in the mountains of Oregon. However, they do have a very short harvest cycle making them a delicacy here!
Ah lucky you! How would you serve them?
@@SortedFood clean them, then dredged in seasoned flour, quick pan fry in brown butter! Great with steak or served over a grain like cooked buckwheat. Eaten with quinoa and zucchini is delicious as well!
They are fairly common here in Illinois as well. We either lightly bread them or saute them in butter.
Tons in the river bottoms in Nebraska and Iowa, for about two weeks or so in spring. It's tough to get any, as many people around here treat morel harvesting as a contact sport.
You can find morels in northen Europe too (scandinavia, Finland). I have not eat morels myself but some say that you can find them in burnt places/forests (like swidden) and new garden areas at spring (when the soil is new).
This is wild seeing morels on here. I saw them and IMMEDIATELY knew what they were. Never figured them for pretentious though since they just grow in my parents backyard naturally here in the states. But I will say - morel hunting is pretty common and people guard their sites religiously! It’s a common activity around here to go mushroom hunting and spend the day wandering the woods, looking for mushrooms and avoiding snapping turtles!
Watching Barry and Jamie have so much fun together made me so happy
Morels are absolutely amazing and worth the cost. Also, I genuinely prefer black garlic powder to the paste. I feel like you can get more uses out of it!
Hahahaha, Barry's face, the little slapping of Jamie's arm, brilliant!
I have very fond memories or morel hunting every spring, and how dellicious they were just sauteed in butter.
get the “Morille de feu” (fire morel) they grow after forest fire. they are even more expensive.
And they grow rather large too, found a few on some hunts here in Montana as big as my forearm.
Never seen dried morels before. Used to pick them when I was younger. Pretty common in the midwest states (at least in Missouri where I'm from) if you know what you're looking for, but since most people don't know how/when/where to find them they cost a fortune to buy at a store, or even from a local picker. We used to just batter them in egg and flour with some salt and pepper. To me they taste quite similar to fried calamari when cooked that way. I love them. One of my favorite foods. I'd say the opposite of pretentious if you pick them yourself, but rather pretentious the way they're presented in this video.
I remember my grandpa had a secret mushroom patch in the woods, he would pick pounds and pounds of them, freeze most of them. We always had a feed of mushrooms with Swiss chard sautéed in butter and served with heavy cream and dill. They were so delicious and it was a once a year treat. They looked identical to these morels. A nice memory.
Boys: these morel mushrooms sure are pretentious!
Me: goes out to the woods in Illinois with a stick and finds enough to fill a trash bag. We fry them in cornmeal here. 😂
My mom has them growing wild in her front yard. We get a ton every year
I have friends and family who forage for them! In Kansas, they have pretty good luck, but thanks to the fires in Washington, my more local friends are getting luckier. The fact they'd never heard of morels blows my little mind!
Western WI on the Mississippi - us too! Couldn't believe I knew what the pretentious ingredient was! :)
Which parks do you go to? I rarely find any mushrooms in Illinois
@@violablaire6499 Oh, I just had spots in the woods beside my house growing up. It was always a challenge getting to them before the deer and the turkeys found them!
Morel mushrooms used to grow in the woods behind my childhood home. Ate them as a child never knew they were so expensive until I was an adult!
this was one of the most informative pretentious ingredients episodes!! loved it
Sorted is the perfect mix of fun ans informative. The host’s are perfectly complementing each other like [insert a food parable].
About 68 years ago in the Spring, my father would take me into the woods early in the morning to find Morel mushrooms. At home, he would soak them in salt water so any bugs in the folds could be rinsed out. Then they were chopped and mixed in scrambled eggs. One of my favorite memories as I lost him when I was 5 years old.
seeing black garlic makes me wonder, have the sorted food group ever used cured egg yolks
I thought that when they said that the salt was eggy.
Yup, they have! I think in the ramen battle
Normals: "I wouldn't know what morels were unless you explained them to me."
Me, having played Stardew Valley: "Do you guys not play games?"
I've been wondering why I instantly recognised morels, having never seen or eaten one. You have solved that mystery!
I think it would be interesting to challenge Ben to see how far his cooking has come in all the years. As James went off to learn, it would be interesting to compare Ben's best now, and see if it impresses James when he shows up again.
Gotta say, black garlic is amazing.
I found some bulbs in a jar at a discount mart years ago, then powdered dehydrated, and switched from white to black. So much more savory, sweet...depth of flavor.
Hey guys! love your videos! I am from Kaliningrad, Russia, just across the baltic sea from you!
I wanted to recomend some crazy russian ingredients for your next video! (recipie ideas included)
Krapiva(крапива) which in english translates as urtica stinging nettles, basically its a plant that grows in lots of places and is very prickly, russian tradition that our ancestors and nowadays we still cook with this. These leaves are boiled to remove their prickly nature and made into schi which is basically soup with potatoes, meat and boiled eggs.
Another intresting thing we make is all kinds of варенья, which is basically jam
Pine cone jam, rose hip jam(my grandmother always collects it in the summer and boils with sugar to make jars and jars of it for the winter), rose hips are very good for heart and gut health.
Anyway here are some possibly pretentious ingredients:
Rose hip jam
Pine cone jam
Stinging nettles
Amber salt
Hematogen bars (also called blood bars, in reality they taste like chocolate)
Talkan grain
Kvas
Hope you try one of these!
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I'd be really interested to see how the Bamboo salt compares to Indian Black Salt. When Barry and Jamie were describing the taste I expected it to be black salt, which is much, much cheaper! It's a vital ingredient in chaat masala.
I think you should have a ‘Regional Treats’ episode where you look at weird local ingredients (like the Tewkesbury Mustard). I’m sure there must be loads in Britain to binge on. Maybe Stargazy Pie, Bedfordshire Clangar, Staffordshire Oatcakes etc
I would love an episode testing all historical ingredients.
Morel mushrooms are truly the best mushroom when fresh & not pretentious at all at least not in Iowa where we pick them every spring. The best way to have them is to saute them in a little butter add a little salt to them just before serving.
Oh man it was so interested to see you guys defining what you find pretentious! It definitely explained why I disagree so much with you what you find pretentious, I always think a pretentious ingredient is just an ingredient that's useless, can easily be replaced, isn't required, etc (so the mustard, salt especially) but hearing you guys' pov explains so much, that's fair!
Why didn’t they hear me yelling dried morels, when I was a kid- we picked them every spring at the edge of the woods near a field. I haven’t had them in years. In Canada you can still find them, but I can’t tell the difference between edible morels and the poisonous morels. We soak the in a salty brine , drain , cut them up and fry them in butter. Then later in the season we’d look for puff balls
👋 👋 Hello from Ontario!
We too used to go "mushrooming" every spring. My dad knew every wild mushroom growing so no fear of getting a wrong one. Morels often have a LOT of dirt and sometimes worms, so soaking them took care of that.
I never could bring myself to eat puffball though. The rest of my sibs and dad couldn't get enough of them. Not me. And not my mum. But she'd have a big cast iron frying pan with a tonne of butter in it to fry the shrooms and puffball up. That was over 50 years ago and I still think of that as a great time.
@@rhijulbec1
Hi from Texas I would read my dad's book on mushrooms when I was Little and always enjoyed the wild mushrooms that would pop up every year just in the back yard where we hung out the laundry.
@@windyhawthorn7387
Great memories~right? ☺
@@rhijulbec1
Yes especially the fact that knowing too much about poisonous mushrooms made you stare at them wondering if you made a mistake one day you would die horribly. But we also gathered up the wild greens with mom that will kill you vary painfully if you don't know how to cook them mostly listed as poisonous in field books with skull and crossbones ☠️. They are the best of greens vary tasty.
@@windyhawthorn7387
Now that's something I haven't tried doing! Foraging. There are so many edible greens that grow right under our noses, yet we treat them like weeds instead of food. I know you can eat things like stinging nettles as long as they're young and well cooked. Dandelion greens are excellent when they're young as well. So are the flowers. I've seen them made into a jam! Now I've never eaten a dandelion flower, but it really doesn't have a strong smell, so I can't imagine what it tastes like.
I absolutely love greens of all kinds~spinach, kale, collard greens, watercress, chard and more. Love them. I usually just boil them, either for a short time~like spinach or a long slow boil for collard greens. All I add is salt and a big slice of lemon and cook them.
Do you know what greens you used to pick? I'd love to know. Just in case I can find them. Thanks for your reply!
Nice to meet you!
Jenn
So since I can't get the mustard balls where I live, I went on Google. And since they have put in the request for them to be a protected food, I found a paper submitted to ur gov about them. It tells exactly what ingredients r used and even their exact process. Hehe. So now I know exactly how they make them and even the recipe sais it makes 33 balls. So hehehehehe. I love the interwebs. 😁 Totally gonna make some.
I think what this series has made me realise is how much disposable income I lack that makes me so uncultured 😂😂 seeing them review these ingredients and having an actual stomach churn when I hear the price makes me appreciate how well the channel has done to be able to afford these products to review them and provide their opinion when it’s most likely that I’ll never be buying these products 😂
We used to pick morels when I was a kid. We'd either fry them in butter as a side for venison or deep fry them in an egg batter for breakfast. They were very good, I've never tried them dried.
16:56 I like the how the lighting show his internal shock and discuss of how much was spent.
New drinking game: take a shot every time Barry knows what the pretentious ingredient is.
We would all be getting pretty wasted (depending on what you're drinking) and this is not approved for doing at work. LOL
Sorry but I'm gonna have to copyright strike you for copying my profile picture 😂
Presumably it'd have to be a shot of Meloni?
Double shot when hes super sure but suuper wrong too 😅
Mate, they'll end up on the floor within minutes!
I like the fact that it’s a certified joke that Pretentious Ingredients is equal to raiding Barry’s Fridge.
...except the raid is real.
When I saw the salt and heard you describe it as ‘eggy’ I was SURE it was kala namak (black salt) as it looks just like it and seems to have the same characteristics… apart from the price point, what’s the difference? I’m intrigued!
I’m glad they agree black garlic isn’t pretentious. It’s delicious and I love it
I do love black garlic. I saw it online a couple years ago - and since I had a suitable rice cooker, I started making it myself. I have it for breakfast each day - a clove spread on toast instead of butter, under a poached egg, along side some pork chipolatas and tomato-chili jam, and some (non-black) garlic mushrooms. They cost me, like, $2 for 250g of raw garlic, and then 30-ish days of time and electricity.
Morels are quite "usual" here in Austria and in the east of Europe. Of course fresh. Every posh restaurant has them when they are in season. Either way, I don't like them very much 😅
Bets are off when stuff is served with ‘courgette fries in Parmesan’
Like, zucchini? The things people literally give away in August?
Mustard ball : dehydrated, can use when cooking (really the only time I use mustard) and high quality? I might try these. If they export to the colonies. We have the queen on our money!
I live in rural Indiana, USA. Every spring, mushrooming is a popular pastime here. We hit the woods searching for Morels, and people find several pounds of them at one time. They sell around $60 a pound fresh during the season. Delicious fried!
I'm from Virginia, USA and here the Morel Mushrooms are called dry land fish. We forage them and deep fry them. They are delicious!
Why is nobody talking about Barry and Jamie’s reaction to the price of the bamboo salt? 😂
I'm starting to think that Mike's color is fuschia. Go Mike!
It would be fun to have a spin off of this focused on foods with a history like the mustard balls or Patum Peperium gentlemans relish
There is a channel that I think that you will enjoy along these lines. It's called Tasting History with Max Miller.
With dried products it's always important to realize that their price is actually based on the full, undehidrated weight with the drying process on top of that. So in this case you get 30 grams for 18,50, which translates up to 300 grams of wild morels. Fresh morels go for 50 to 70 bucks per kilo. And they're being cultivated now, so if you want to grow them you can.
Being from the north Midwestern US, morels seem very normal. Every spring people go out looking to find and harvest morels. It’s hard to say that they’re pretentious but it was neat to see them highlighted 😄