Oh my God. There it is. Oh no, no, that’s good! Okay! That’s good. You wanna use a heavy bottom saute pot that you buy from the Walmart.com. Hello there. Hello. Hi, how’s your day going? Pretty good. How about you? It’s going great now that I’m at Carl’s Jr. Can I go ahead and get two Western Bacon cheeseburgers? Two Western combo meals? And then can we upgrade the fries on one of those to criss cut? Sure, no problem. I’m needy. Anything else for the order, sir? I think that’s gonna go ahead and do it. Okay, that’ll be 27.76 forward please. Thank you. Thank you so much. I love you. They never say it back. And that’s fine. Lily, break out these Western Bacons. Wait, if you can just admire the fact that the grease has seeped through the bag. I know. That’s good. You gotta have some greasy fast food. You gotta lay down a bed of napkins across your lap. Okay. One for you. I maintain that this is the single best fast food hamburger in the entire game. My expectations are high. Wait, wait, wait, did we get the extra barbecue sauce? Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah, crack open the barbecue sauce, put some extra BBQ in there. Barbecue sauce. Yeah, give me a little dump. Give me half, you take half. There it is, there it is. Isn’t barbecue already on it? Yeah, yeah, yeah, there’s barbecue already on it, but you’re gonna want more. Extra barbecue. It’s a good barbecue sauce. All right, cheers. Cheers. I’m excited for your first Western Bacon. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. The bacon’s gonna pull out in one piece, and that’s what you want. That’s really good. The American cheese. I love the way the barbecue sauce seeps into the onion ring, and it kind of like, floods it. It becomes like a crispy sponge that explodes. Where’s the onion ring? Oh, the onion rings are on the bottom. Yeah, so we gotta make onion rings for sure to go on this. Do a little dissection. Okay. A little onion ring. You get two in there. That’s the best part. So you get your side dish inside of it. Also, we should address the fact that no one knows who you are. My name’s Trevor. No, this is Lily Cousins. She’s the newest Mythical Kitcheneer. Lily, tell them about yourself while I stuff my face with this burger. I studied finance, went to culinary school, and just eat a lot of food. How do you feel about like, do you think this has merit to be in the culinary canon? I do, yeah. I mean, the bun is like, really important, and the bun to burger ratio. Yes. You can have too much bun. It’s a big burger, but it’s a wide burger, which is what I love. So I have a question. What’s up, Lily? How are you gonna make this fancy? I think we’ve got some sort of like, tempura thing on the onion rings. Okay. For me, I’m eating this, I love barbecue in all forms, I’m thinking we might use Korean barbecue as like, an inspiration. Yeah, a little Asian route. I like it. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Get some Gochujang and some pork belly. Mm-hmm. It’s about to get weird. Yeah. I’m ready. Lily, the first fancy ingredient in this burger is you. You’re coming to us directly from a Michelin star kitchen, is that correct? Yes, that’s true. Have you been impressed with the level of Mythical Kitchen’s cookery thus far? You’ve been here for a week. I’m actually kind of impressed. I will say. I didn’t think you were gonna be. Which I really appreciate. No one believed in us, including her. I’m kidding. Okay, so right now, we’re gonna make… I’m calling it like, a bulgogi inspired barbecue sauce to go on this using some elements of American barbecue sauce, some elements of a Korean bulgogi marinade. Typically there would be something like apple or Asian pear inside there, right? Instead, we’re using apple flavored soju. I love a replacement with alcohol. Nice. It’s a great way to sub anything in there. You don’t need vegetables, just drink potato vodka, you know what I mean? And then also, St. Germain elderflower liquor. This is a really cool product, it’s gonna bring a lot of that sweetness in there. You wanna start just dumping the barbecue sauce ingredients in there? We got ginger, we got garlic, you’re gonna have to palm heel strike that in a second, but I’ll leave you to it. Meanwhile, I’m gonna be making our kimcheese. American cheese, you mentioned how much you loved that. I love American cheese too. We’re gonna use a chemical called sodium citrate, which is an emulsifier, that’s gonna bind this here double Gloucester extra sharp Cheddar with milk and blended kimchi to hopefully create a perfectly silken, American kimcheese. Okay. We’ll figure it out. We’ve got some dehydrated kimchi. You wanna try that? It’s like kimchi jerky. It does have a little bit of a chew to it. I’d snack on this in the movies. Why don’t people do this? It’s good. Oh, that’s a pungent bunch. Yeah, it’s spicy after. It will be good in the cheese though, I think. What do you think the weak link of the Carl’s Jr burger is? Like, where do you think we can improve on it? Maybe the bun. We got something special for that. It had a good bun ratio, but you know, it could always use a little more improvement. Is it broken? What the… Push harder. I’m trying, Lily, God dammit, I’m trying! There it goes, let’s see if this turns into an actual powder. In your Michelin experience, have you ever done anything like this? Have you ever used your powers to make a very incredibly fancy cheese burger? You know, I haven’t dived into that yet. Oh God, don’t breathe the kimchi powder. Oh, that’s rough. How much of this should I put in? To your heart’s content. However much you think should be in there is how much should be in there. Lily, you have all the tools you need to succeed. I have no idea, we’ve never done this before. In theory, it works, right? Like, the sugar from the alcohol’s gonna cook down, it’s gonna get nice and thick. I’m gonna burn that milk. All right, so we’re gonna add kimchi powder to that milk. That’s a fudge ton of kimchi powder, dude. Oh yeah. Okay, no, this is gonna work great. And then, oh dude, look at that. That’s something. Now I’m gonna add… Oh dude, the cabbage is hydrating in the milk. Oh yeah. Wait, go grab some more milk, grab some more milk. We might need it. One minute in, we’ve already messed up and we’re panicking. Lily, welcome to Mythical Kitchen. That’s right. That’s what we do. Splash some more milk in there. Yeah, also I accidentally ate some straight up sodium citrate earlier. Yeah, that’s good, that’s good. And I don’t know if you’re supposed to do that and we’ll figure that out. So Lily, keep blending, what are you doing? Why have you stopped? I don’t know, I don’t know. So sodium citrate, we’re adding it in there. And then I’m just gonna start breaking up this cheese. Wait, Lily, eat this cheese. Wait, can you show me how to do the garlic? Eat this cheese, eat this cheese. Yeah, give me a sec, I need to get this cheese in there. How is it? It’s good. It’s sharp. Is it strong? Sharp? Mm-hmm. But we’re cutting the sharpness of all that dehydrated kimchi. So that’s the good news. I don’t know. The kimchi flavor’s lingering in my mouth. Yes. All right. That’s in there. If my knowledge of science is right, that’s gonna perfectly emulsify. We’ll just let that go. Meanwhile, that’s a good sound. I need to add garlic. Yeah, you gotta palm heel strike your first garlic, Lily. Normally, you’d put like, a knife blade over it and hit it, right? Yep. I don’t believe in that. What happens if you accidentally flip the knife up and you turn it? So what you wanna do is you wanna stack the elbow right over your wrist, and then you wanna sort of raise a leg like you’re letting out a fart. Okay. And then you’re just gonna drop down, and then crush it and then boom, easily peelable garlic. All right, they didn’t teach me this in culinary school. No, no, no, ’cause now you’re coming to the culinary school of hard knocks. Okay, I have to do the leg raise? Yeah, yeah, like you’re doing a fart. There it is! Yay. Look at that! That was a natural. This is a smell that I’ve never smelled before in food. You wanna give it a huff? You know, I don’t love it but I think it’s gonna come together. I think it’s kind of like, you know, sometimes fish sauce can have a heavy smell and then you eat it and it’s delicious. And that’s what we’re going for with this. Oh, fingers crossed. This is an unrefined sugar called sucanats. I mean, just really fantastic, got these like, big granules. It’s gotta be sweet, right? Barbecue sauce is meant to be sweet. It’s kind of like melt in the pot, so, I don’t need a blender, right? No, no, no, just toss it in. All right, we’ll crank that up. Oh my gosh! No, no, no, that’s good! Okay. That’s good. You wanna use a heavy bottom saute pot that you buy from the Walmart.com. ‘Cause you’re, “Oh, those will look pretty on camera,” and then they don’t cook things too good. It smells burnt in here. The only word I can describe the fumes right now is noxious. Like, if we stayed here for another 10 minutes, we would pass out. So we gotta stir this for about another 10 minutes, and then this is gonna come together. All right, so now let’s give this cheese one more taste. Spoinky, spoinky. Do you know how to dance the yoinky spoinky? I don’t know if I wanna know. It’s not It’s a stupid dance we made up. I realize that sounds dirty. I think we’re there. Yeah, it’s good. That’s a hefty Cheddar punch. All right, we’re gonna let this cool down a little bit, we’re gonna spread it out on a Silpat, and we’re gonna let that chill and then we’re gonna cut it in some squares. Now what are we doing? I feel good about the first beat. You feel good about your first cooking beat on camera? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s going well. Pork belly? That’s the next thing? I think so? Let’s do it. We gotta make the bacon. Okay. So right now, we have Kurobuta pork belly, it’s a heritage breed pig, gonna be like, a lot of nice fat on it. This looks really good. It looks really good. Right now, we’ve simply cured it in salt, sugar, and gochugaru, which is the Korean chili flake, and so right now, it should sort of like get some of that moisture out. But we’re gonna put some moisture back in with the marinade. So you’ve got gochujang, this is a fermented rice and chili paste. Very big in Korean cuisine, it’s frigging delicious. Yeah, do the Vanna White thing, that’s smart, that’s smart. We got some barrel aged soy sauce right here, it’s soy sauce that’s actually aged in whiskey barrels, so that’s gonna be pretty rad. We got ginger, we got garlic, we got some more of that sucanat, and then more gochugaru, and of course apple soju. So do you wanna make that marinade real quick? Yes. I’m gonna… Man, this isn’t gonna help your idea that we do a bunch of janky crap here in the kitchen. We’ve soaked a bunch of mesquite chips right here. If you see, you can kind of put together what’s about to happen. So we’re gonna try and create like, a tabletop smoker here. We’re gonna scatter wood chips all over the sheet pan that is on top of a $19 burner. Okay. Anything where you screw a butane tank into that could kill you, you generally want it to cost more than $19. Yeah. ‘Cause it cost $19, you’re like, “Well, where are they pinching pennies?” This seems dangerous. Uh-huh, definitely, definitely. Just you know, try and lean your bad side towards it, in case it kinda explodes. And then you’ve still got a good side for thumbnail pictures. Welcome to YouTube. Thanks. So we’re scattering some wet wood chips around here. The idea is we are going to light the bottom of this on fire, it’s going to get direct heat contact to the wood chips, it’s gonna smoke, it’s gonna go all like, and then we’re gonna put the pork belly on it with the marinade, wrap it in tinfoil, insulate that smoke, pop it in the oven, roast it off, crisp it up on a Korean barbecue grill. Nice. It sounds like a plan. It sounds like it’s gonna work, right? Yeah, I hope so. I can’t imagine what could go wrong. I know. So let’s… No, we should probably brush it on first. You wanna start? You do it. I’m just gonna stand here. So what’s your favorite part about the office? I don’t know, maybe the kitchen. Who’s your favorite member of upper management? Rhett and Link, of course. Yeah, no, that’s a good, safe choice. You always want to start at the top. Yep. Well, what’s the most surprising thing that’s happened in the kitchen so far? Was it the time that the first day you walked in that I had hurt my back so badly that I couldn’t stand up? Yeah, you were hunch back. That’s true. It was her first day, and Nicole had to drive me to the urgent care, ’cause I hurt my back dead lifting at the gym, and she bought me ice cream. And the first time I met Lily, I was I think like, holding ice cream, bent over, like the guy in “300” who’s like, “I’ll give you my shield.” You know, they don’t let him join the army, and then he sabotages them. That’s where I was at. It was very tragic. Yeah, I’m normally more like, mobile. Yep. Yeah, as you can see. Sometimes we just go and run laps in the parking lot. You’ll see. We’re fast. We’re very fast. We’re the fastest department here. We got the gochujang marinade all over the pork, and then you see like… I mean, get that whiff. Oh yeah. You smell it? It’s gonna start smelling pretty acrid in a second, but I think in a good way. So when we think this is adequately smokey, we’re gonna pop this on the top and then wait, we need a stabby device. You want the cool knife? I’ll take the cool knife. It’s got a compass on it so you know which direction you’re cooking in. Oh my God. So when this gets adequately smokey, we’re gonna see, it’s gonna start to puff up, I’m gonna throw the tinfoil on, try and clamp it around there without scolding myself, then you’re gonna violently stab a couple of holes in it. All right, sound good? I’m ready. Perfect. All right, we’re getting a lot of smoke on this. We see the pan starting to warp. I think we’re gonna shut it down, I’m gonna drape with foil, you’re gonna stab it. Okay. All right, in three… Wait, wait, wait, don’t stab me. Don’t stab me. Lily, for the love of God, don’t stab me. Okay, go. Ah, there it is. That was good. You wanna go more violent with it, typically, but… There it is, there it is. Get that anger out, Lily. Take that Rhett and- No, you like Rhett and Link. I do too. All right. Pop it in the oven, we’re gonna let that render, and then we can take it up, crisp it up on that KBBQ grill. Lily, we gotta make our beer battered, Kogi powder doenjang onion rings. Ooh. But before that, hey, have you ever heard of podcasts? Me and Nicole have one called “A Hot Dog is a Sandwich,” and Lily’s gonna tell you about it. Uh… Sell it good. Okay. Lily, tell them about it. Tell them about your favorite episodes that you’ve listened to. “A Hot Dog is a Sandwich” is about There you go. all the food controversies. I shattered the beer bottle, dude. I shattered the beer bottle. That’s my bad. Oh no. I was trying to, I shattered it. I don’t think I’m bleeding. You’re bleeding? No, I think we’re good. That’s my bad. That was unsafe and it’s not cool. Tell them about the podcast. I didn’t see the bottle opener. I didn’t see it. So yeah, it’s about a podcast of how they talk about the biggest food debates. Yeah, that’s good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s good. I watched the culinary school one, ’cause I obviously went to culinary school. Ah! Was it pretty messed up when Nicole and I were like, talking crap? No, honestly, it’s a good podcast to watch if you’re thinking about it, so. Yeah, we don’t have a visual component. It’s just like, a listen thing. Wait, what? Well, you said “Watch,” but like, there’s no visual. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. You listen to it. With your ears. We used to have video and some people are very mad that we don’t still have video. Okay, okay, okay. But it’s just like, it was dragging the channel average, and it was just a lot of work for a lot more people, and then COVID happened, and we were just like, recording from home, so we were like, “Okay, what are we really gonna do?” Yeah, you can’t watch podcasts. It’s a pretty good podcast ad we did, I think. Yeah, it is. It was very good. I think we nailed it. I’m just adding beer to flour. You wanna cut up those onions in like, semi-thick. I’m judging you on your knife skills. Okay. We might need more beer. Well, we had more beer and then I ruined it. That was my bad. All right. See, and then Kogi. Kogi is… Kogi… Kogi is a mold, a good mold. There’s good mold and there’s bad mold. Black mold in your home is bad, and if you’ve been effected by mycelium, call the law offices of James Sofolov. But also, this is mold that is the same mold, it’s on rice grains that they powder, and then they use that to make all sorts of things, such as mirin, sake and soy sauce. Yes. I said this was fermented sake leaves last time, and somebody called me out, and so I Googled about 30 seconds ago what it is. Yeah. Does it have a smell? You wanna try some? No, you can’t smell anything. Try the mold. It doesn’t really taste like anything. It tastes like mold. Okay, that’s cool. Well, we’re gonna add it in there ’cause it’s a fancy ingredient that a lot of people think is very cool, such as René Redzepepi from Noma in that one movie about Noma. He’s the fanciest chef in the world. He like, ferments reindeer penises and stuff. That is very true. That is true, that’s like, a real dish that he had on there, just like, a reindeer penis. And when we cook reindeer penis, people are like, “That’s weird.” When this guy cooks it, he’s a genius. Yeah. Double standard much? We’re gonna add a little bit of this doenjang. This is a fermented soy paste. Really delicious. Gonna add some nice umami. And then salt and pepper to the batter. I think that’s it. Okay. I think this would be good without any sort of binder, right? Yeah, I think it looks good. Rocket. Oh shoot, we need another bowl. Flour. Do you wanna start dropping onions in there? Sounds good. Are you big on deep frying? Is that like, part of your culinary repertoire? Yeah, I do like a good deep fried anything. Heck yeah, you’re gonna fit right in. As if you haven’t been already. You have. I didn’t mean that as like- Yeah, that’s kind of messed up. You’re going to be, you’re not currently. Do you want me to buy you Yogurtland? Yes, please. Yeah. That’s how we generally apologize here. Can somebody else get Lily Yogurtland and say it was from me? Like I’ve done for every relative’s birthday with my brother’s card for the last eight years? He just signs my name now. All right, heads up. I’m gonna drop one in. Let’s do a little tester, see how it is. Okay. I’m backing up. Swiggedy swoody, look at that booty. All right. It looks pretty good. Do you think it’s thick enough on the batter? I think so, yeah. It looks pretty, oh, oh, okay. It’s fine. Okay. Shall we try it? Yeah. Shoot. Here. Ew, it’s so battery! I messed up. That one’s mine. Yum. What? I’ll try that one more time. Huh? Where’s my hamburger? Hamburger? Yeah. How to hamburger? Let’s do it. Okay. We’ve reached the home stretch. Okay, I’m ready to try it. No one thought we could do it, and here we are, just me and you, just like it’s always been for a week. All right, so, we got the burger there. Do you wanna heavily salt and pepper that up? Yes. We got fresh cracked pepper, very fancy. It’s from the smart and final region of Burbank. I’m gonna take some wagyu beef tallow, and then we’re gonna get that over. We have a Korean barbecue grill that we bought. And it’s got little things in it and it cost $129 on Amazon, and it’s pretty cool and we’re pretty stoked on it. So just take that. Do you want me to do it? This is a kind of dangerous maneuver. I can do it. But you just flip it and flap it. Okay. Confidence. You just jumped right in there. There it is. I tried. Too much confidence! Too much confidence. Wait, wait, wait, it’s on the hook. It’s on the hook, wait, we gotta… I think you just gotta leave it. Ah! Ah! That hurt. So milk bread. We’ve made a milk bread bun that has black sesame seeds on it, ’cause it looks pretty rad. It looks really good. Thank you. I’m gonna barbecue sauce up this here. Well, shall we, you know… ? Okay. Shh. Nicole, don’t go far over there, we’re putting a little bit of wagyu beef tallow right on the bun, which is gonna make it nice and wet. We want that. I love a wet bun. I mean, you gotta have that little bit of . You saw how the grease… When the hot burger goes on there, it’s gonna be good. What are you guys yucking and yawing about? That’s like, a lot on there. It’s not a lot. Well, we’ll steam it over the top. All right. I don’t wanna steam the bun. And it’ll melt in there. That’s nice. Lily, don’t start questioning the methods now. I’m questioning it. Lay down a base of barbecue sauce. I’m gonna start getting some onion rings on there, we’ll put that in a minute, ’cause then the barbecue sauce is gonna bleed into the tallow, what? Ye of little faith, ye of little faith. What happened when the followers of Moses had little faith? We’re gonna start stacking onion rings. We’re gonna get the beauties up top. Beautiful. These look really great. Yeah. Call me Jerry Stackhouse when I’m stacking onion rings, then you gotta kind of smoosh them a little bit. Yeah. All right, cool. Okay. Shall we flip it? Yeah, let’s do it. Do you wanna flip it? You had a lot of confidence and you nailed the first one, let’s do the second one. I know, I don’t have confidence anymore. Yeah, yeah. There it is, that’s looking solid. That’s looking solid. Now what we’re gonna do, we take the cheese. Yep. We’re gonna gently place that on top. Kimcheese turned out great. Yeah, looks amazing. And then shall we just start… Hold on, here, let’s, yeah, yeah. Warm those up? Like Korean barbecue, we’re gonna start warming these up on the outskirts. There we go, like the corn cheese. There we go. Now we just gotta wait a couple seconds for this to… This is melting pretty fast. Good. It’s going quick. How do you like your burger? I like it medium, medium well. I think like, are you like a mid-rare girl? I am. You’re a hard ass? But it depends on the place. I don’t want a mid-rare at McDonalds. Carl’s Jr.. I don’t know, man. Like, a nice McDonalds beef tartar. I don’t know about that. I’m into it. Wait, hold on, here, let’s start getting some bacon on there. Okay. It’s looking pretty good. Do you wanna grab that one? Looking pretty good. Shall we… I think it’s done, pull it. Pull it. Screw it. Am I putting it on or are you putting it on? You put it on. Lily, you have so much confidence. Just pop it right on here. All right. Oh yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Ow, we’re good, we’re good. Ow! It’s hot. Lily, why do you let me do this? I’m trying to get the nice side to the camera. Okay, cool, cool, cool. Why is there a wet paper towel? This is gross. Is this all that goes on it? I think so, yeah. This is all that we made, right? Yeah, this is everything. Hell yeah, dude. All right, get some barbecue sauce cascading. Lily, do you wanna do the final crown? You should see this burger in a crown. Billy Idol, we love you, come on the show. There it is, we have the official Western Bacon Cheeseburger made by me and Lily, that’s very fancy. Let us eat it. Don’t leave me hanging, this is incredibly embarrassing. I am so, oh my God, embarrassed. I can’t even. I thought you were… Wow. Lily, we did it. This looks absolutely incredible. Can’t wait to dig in, but grab the original Western Bacon Cheeseburger, let’s see how it compares. Ours got a little big. It was a little bit bigger than I was expecting, but I mean, it’s the same format, right? Yeah, it has all the components, yep. Cheers. Cheers. Mm. It’s so good. Yeah, it’s so good. This is a good, this is the best hamburger. I’m in. We’ll see. After we try this one. Cut it in half, Irish spot. You want a smooth, clean cut across the throat. Grab the half. This is a nice visual. You can’t really see what’s going on in the inside. It’s all kind of mushed together, but… It’s gonna be a flavor bomb. Mm-hmm. Cheers. Uh-oh. Oh yeah. I’m tasting all of the kimchi. I’m tasting that gojuchang. The candied pork belly is incredible. Yeah, it’s just sweet and salty. It’s got everything to it. It’s super juicy. Mm! You know what really did it, . It’s the wagyu… Hold on. It’s the wagyu beef tallow on the bun. Yeah, I think I’m tasting that. And a little bit of grease. Mm-hmm. This keeps a lot of the integrity of the Western Bacon Cheeseburger. Soft, squishy bun. Nice charred meat. Sauce soaking into the onion rings. There’s that extra dimension in every single layer, that to me really comes through. Yeah, I agree. Lily, I’m sorry for what happened here. I have a question though. What’s that? How much did this cost? It only cost me $208.35. Oh, wow. Yeah. That’s an expensive burger. It’s all the wagyu really, and then we put a lot of liquor in it. Cheese was pretty expensive. Yep. And then you know, it was the gas in my car to go to Carl’s Jr, that was about 18 cents. Yeah. That was a lot. Lily, thank you so much. This was your first fancy fast food experience. I’m so sorry for being gross. I’m normally better. I don’t know if you are. Yeah, that’s fair. Thank you guys so much for stopping by the Mythical Kitchen. We’ve got new episodes for you every week. Uh-oh. Our podcast every Wednesday, wherever you get your podcasts. on Instagram and TikTok You’re too hot to handle and so is your bakeware. Get a Mythical Kitchen oven mitt, available now at Mythical.com.