Gastronomics

How a weak yen made Japanese beef the new truffle. Plus the fall and rise of chicken thighs and a food fight between credit card companies that's making it impossible to get dinner reservations. With guest Adam Chandler of the WSJ. Show Notes Adam Chandler's WSJ articles are available at https://www.wsj.com/news/author/adam-chandler "What the Rise of Chicken Thighs Says About America," Adam Chandler, WSJ, March 19, 2026 https://www.wsj.com/arts-culture/food-cooking/chicken-thighs-popularity-rise-27b5b355 "Reservation Apps Have Made Getting Into a Restaurant a Nightmare," Adam Chandler and Heather Haddon, WSJ, August 8, 2026 https://www.wsj.com/business/restaurant-reservation-apps-30a29e6b "How Wagyu, Japan's Prized Beef, Took Over America," Adam Chandler, WSJ, August 22, 2206 https://www.wsj.com/arts-culture/food-cooking/how-wagyu-japans-prized-beef-took-over-america-20546680 "Japan's Beef With a Weak Yen: The Best Wagyu Is Just for the Tourists," Miho Inada, WSJ, May 18, 2024 https://www.wsj.com/world/asia/japans-beef-with-a-weak-yen-the-best-wagyu-is-just-for-the-tourists-42be2a7b "'Wagyu' Used to Guarantee Quality Beef. What Are You Paying for Today?" Tejal Rao, NYT, April 21, 2026 https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/21/dining/wagyu-beef.html "Caviar 'Bumps' Are All the Rage," Alyson Krueger, NYT, June 7, 2022 https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/07/style/caviar-bump.html Drive-Thru Dreams: A Journey Through the Heart of America's Fast-Food Kingdom by Adam Chandler https://www.adamchandler.com/drive-thru-dreams "Mass Psychosis in Food Science: Americans happily ate monosodium glutamate for decades, but one (fake?) letter sparked mass hysteria and the bogus MSG scare was born." Sam Kean, The Disappearing Spoon, November 7, 2023 https://www.sciencehistory.org/stories/disappearing-pod/mass-psychosis-in-food-science/ Heather Haddon's WSJ articles https://www.wsj.com/news/author/heather-haddon

Peru gets a lot more tourism from North America and Europe than you might expect for a country so far away. The hidden reason why? Asparagus. And the War on Drugs. Show Notes "Going on Vacation to Peru? Thank Asparagus," Jonathan English, June 22, 2206 https://infrastory.substack.com/p/going-on-vacation-to-peru-thank-asparagus "How the War on Drugs got us... blueberries," Erika Beras and Keith Romer, Planet Money https://www.npr.org/2025/04/04/1242780124/blueberries-asparagus-cocaine-foreign-aid-usaid-war-on-drugs-peru-free-trade "Airline premium cabins: Profitability at the front of the plane," Jake Hart and Ryan Mann, McKinsey, June 1, 2026 https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/travel/our-insights/Airline-premium-cabins-profitability-at-the-front-of-the-plane?hsid=353d6648-1afa-4fe0-a948-2b566d3637a3

Private equity firms and venture capitalists are investing millions in new bagel shops. Can they bring great bagels to towns and cities across the country? Or are bagels the next investment bubble? Show Notes "Grip, Rip, Dip, Repeat. Grip, Rip, Dip, Repeat," Liz Dunn, New York Magazine https://www.grubstreet.com/article/popup-bagels-national-franchising.html "Inside the Venture-Backed Bagel Boom," Liz Dunn, Consumed https://consumed.substack.com/p/inside-the-venture-backed-bagel-boom Correction: The Love Island star with a PopUp Bagels schmear was Jen Terry. I don't think she ever cried on Love Island, though. "The Forgotten History of New York's Bagel Famines," Natasha Frost, Gastro Obscura, February 9, 2018 https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/bagel-union-strikes-new-york-city "Grip, Rip, and Scale," Gad Gallon, Gad's Newsletter, April 20, 2026 https://gadallon.substack.com/p/grip-rip-and-scale For more on Marriott Hotels and core competencies, see The Fissured Workplace: Why Work Became So Bad for So Many and What Can Be Done to Improve It, David Weil https://www.hup.harvard.edu/books/9780674975446 "Bagels Are a Bubble Now," Milena Pagán, Latent Heat, May 13, 2026 https://milenapagan.substack.com/p/they-want-the-same-food-in-every Boom: Bubbles and the End of Stagnation, Byrne Hobart and Tobias Huber https://www.stripe.press/boom

After the pandemic, eggs were the poster child for inflation. Experts said egg prices were high because of avian flu. But then, this summer, the Department of Justice charged Big Egg with an honest to God conspiracy. Show Notes This episode is sponsored by LMNT. Get a free 8-count Sample Pack of LMNT's most popular drink mix flavors with any purchase at DrinkLMNT.com/gastro Note: The egg companies in their settlement with the Department of Justice agreed to pay $3.3 million in fines and donate 53 million eggs (rather than "a few million [eggs]"). Also, Boris Yeltsin was impressed by the selection of pudding pops, not push pops. "Justice Department Requires Egg Producers to End Coordinated Benchmark Manipulation that Artificially Inflated Prices Across the Country," June 30, 2026 https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-requires-egg-producers-end-coordinated-benchmark-manipulation Kraft Foods Global, Inc. et al v. United Egg Producers https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/illinois/ilndce/1:2011cv08808/263305/713/ "Justice Department Sues Agri Stats for Operating Extensive Information Exchanges Among Meat Processors," Office of Public Affairs, September 28, 2023 https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/justice-department-sues-agri-stats-operating-extensive-information-exchanges-among-meat "Four Executives and Company Charged with Price Fixing in Ongoing Investigation into Broiler Chicken Industry," Office of Public Affairs, July 29, 2021 https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/four-executives-and-company-charged-price-fixing-ongoing-investigation-broiler-chicken "Kings Over the Necessaries of Life": Monopolization and the Elimination of Competition in America's Agriculture System, Basel Musharbash & Farm Action https://farmaction.us/kings-over-the-necessaries-of-life-monopolization-and-the-elimination-of-competition-in-americas-agriculture-system/ "To Defy the United States, Fidel Castro Built the World's Greatest Ice Cream Parlor," Alex Mayyasi, November 8, 2019 https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/ice-cream-in-havana "Hatching a Conspiracy: A BIG Investigation into Egg Prices," Basel Musharbash, March 7, 2025 https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/hatching-a-conspiracy-a-big-investigation "Fowl Play: How Chicken Genetics Barons Created the Egg Crisis," Basel Musharbash, March 23, 2025 https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/fowl-play-how-chicken-genetics-barons "The Egg That Cannot Be Priced," Footnote Capital, August 25, 2026 https://footnotecapital.substack.com/p/the-egg-that-cannot-be-priced

Great cooking is an art, and people make pilgrimages to restaurants that make us feel a certain way. But a restaurant is also a business. A notoriously hard business. So how do chefs and restaurateurs create these special experiences without going broke? I talk with Louis Lin and Jolyn Chen about opening their dream restaurant: Xiao Ye in Portland, Oregon. Show Notes "After Becoming Housemates, Romance Entered the Picture," Alix Wall, NYT https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/18/fashion/weddings/after-becoming-housemates-romance-entered-the-picture.html "Only the Bad Die Young: Restaurant Mortality in the Western US," Tian Luo and Philip B. Stark https://arxiv.org/pdf/1410.8603 You can find Xiao Ye on Instagram at @xiaoyepdx or visit their website at www.xiaoyepdx.com