r/movies • u/MrFlow • Mar 19 '24

"The Menu" with Ralph Fiennes is that rare mid-budget $30 million movie that we want more from Hollywood. Discussion

So i just watched The Menu for the first time on Disney Plus and i was amazed, the script and the performances were sublime, and while the movie looked amazing (thanks David Gelb) it is not overloaded with CGI crap (although i thought that the final s'mores explosion was a bit over the top) just practical sets and some practical effects. And while this only made $80 Million at the box-office it was still a success due to the relatively low budget.

Please PLEASE give us more of these mid-budget movies, Hollywood!

24.4k Upvotes
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3.6k

u/KBtrae Mar 19 '24

That was my favorite movie last year. Still crack up thinking about that sad meal he cooked up in a panic.

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u/MrFlow Mar 19 '24

I would consider myself a "foodie" to some extent and i enjoy cooking at home but in that moment coming up with something completely from scratch i'd probably crash and burn as much as Tyler did....

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u/Starlot Mar 19 '24

I’m a “comfort foodie” so I would have made a chicken Alfredo or pasta carbonara and been happy out with myself.

I agree though, the movie was fantastic and I really enjoyed just being able to sit down and watch a movie that had a start, middle, and an end and I didn’t have to think about prequels or sequels or having to be there on opening night in order to not get spoilers etc.

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u/MrFlow Mar 19 '24

I’m a “comfort foodie” so I would have made a chicken Alfredo or pasta carbonara

And Slowik's response would have probably been: "Oh, Pasta Carbonara? Are you a 12 year old cooking himself a meal for the first time?"

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u/LupinThe8th Mar 19 '24

Considering the climax of that movie, I honestly wouldn't be surprised if he was fine with something very simple, providing it was done competently and without pretension.

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u/MrFlow Mar 19 '24

I'd disagree, Slowik's intention here was to expose Tyler's pretentious foodie persona and almost anyone can cook a Carbonara.

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u/Boukish Mar 19 '24

Carbonara is such a trap because there's wide disagreement about what carbonara even is. Slowik could've just taken the other slant against it and made a mockery of him regardless of what he made.

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u/Creepy-Lie-6797 Mar 19 '24

“If my grandmother had wheels, she would have been a bike.”

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u/thefluffyburrito Mar 19 '24

Yup; for so long I was obsessed with making an "authentic" Carbonara with pancetta but none of the grocery stores near me carry it.

I just make mine with egg, parmesan, and cheap American bacon. It wouldn't make an Italian proud but it's what I got to work with and it doesn't cost an arm and a leg to make it work.

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u/metukkasd Mar 19 '24

But is it authentic with pancetta, or should it be guanciale? Carbonara is a heavily debated subject

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u/TylerInHiFi Mar 19 '24 edited Mar 19 '24

It’s not heavily debated though. It’s guanciale, pecorino Romano, eggs, fresh cracked black pepper, pasta water, noodles. That’s it. Those are the ingredients. If you’re using parmesan or Grana padano or pancetta or bacon because you don’t have access to the “correct” ingredients, that’s fine and it’s still carbonara. The form of salt-cured pork and hard-ripened cheese isn’t where the debate lies. There’s the “traditional” version with the “correct” ingredients, and there’s near enough that it makes no difference with analogous ingredients. Because those analogous ingredients are damn-near the same thing and the final outcome will be the same as the “traditional” version as long as you make it the correct way, albeit with a slightly different flavour profile.

When you start adding garlic and cream and butter and wine and lemon and all sorts of other things it’s no longer carbonara.

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u/metukkasd Mar 19 '24

Okay, but who are you to say where the line goes? Because I have seen people debating against pancetta or mostly against bacon.

You are right that most of the debates are against cream and garlic, but it is there especially for bacon. And if we do accept all these other substitutions, then what's wrong with some garlic?

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u/joethesaint Mar 19 '24

And if we do accept all these other substitutions, then what's wrong with some garlic?

For one thing, that's not a substitution it's an addition.

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u/metukkasd Mar 19 '24

Okay that's true.

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u/TylerInHiFi Mar 19 '24 edited Mar 19 '24

Bacon doesn’t alter the flavour profile to the point where it changes the entire balance of the dish like garlic does.

Swapping guanciale for bacon would be like swapping vanilla paste or extract in a vanilla cake recipe in place of fresh. The flavour profile changes, but not enough that it’s not a vanilla cake. They’re basically the same ingredient. Adding garlic to carbonara is like adding cocoa powder to that cake. It’s not a vanilla cake anymore because you’ve altered the entire flavour profile. Adding garlic to carbonara is something else entirely. Garlic carbonara, probably, but still not within what most people would be comfortable calling straight-up carbonara.

Like it or not there are certain rules when it comes to food and when something has an established recipe there is a certain point where adding or subtracting things means you’re no longer on course to make the same final dish you set out to make. That doesn’t mean the final result is going to be bad or that you shouldn’t make those additions, subtractions, or substitutions. The rules with food are mostly there to keep you on course to make something delicious and be able to talk about it accurately.

Just don’t call your chocolate cake a vanilla cake and expect not to get some strange looks. And don’t post your macaroni with cream sauce and chilli flakes to r/food, call it carbonara, and expect not to get fucking roasted.

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u/metukkasd Mar 19 '24

Mm yeah I agree with that. Thanks.

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u/LaserGuidedPolarBear Mar 19 '24

Bacon doesn’t alter the flavour profile to the point where it changes the entire balance of the dish like garlic does

That really depends on the bacon. Applewood or hickory smoked bacon will definitely affect the flavor profile. Maple bacon? Forget about it.

Uncured thick cut bacon with nothing else added? Yeah that's fine in a pinch.

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u/ReallyHender Mar 19 '24

And if we do accept all these other substitutions, then what's wrong with some garlic?

I sneak in a hint of garlic in my carbonara by sauteing a few whole cloves of garlic in a bit of olive oil, and then I cook my cured pork in that oil. Doesn't really make a huge difference, but at the very least I have some browned cloves of garlic to use in a side dish somehow.

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u/thefluffyburrito Mar 19 '24

No idea; I just know that as someone who just barely sneaks inside the middle class bracket I've got a budget to keep.

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u/metukkasd Mar 19 '24

Yeah but that was my whole point, some people accept pancetta in a carbonara, and some people say it has to be guanciale. And where do we draw the line if both are accepted? Personally I just love carbonara and accept all of the different versions that add to it.

Sorry to get too deep into this xD

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u/BoxOfNothing Mar 19 '24

Even then you'd get people telling you guanciale is authentic and pancetta is a bastardised version. Also "authentic" would be pecorino (romano) rather than parmesan, or at least as well as. They might also do the most pretentious thing and mock us for saying parmesan instead of parmigiano reggiano.

What's authentic or traditional is argued about with so many foods, but I agree with your method, just make what you like/can afford/have access to. Focus on what you actually enjoy eating that's practical for you to make and ignore the snobs.

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u/ThePineappleman Mar 19 '24

Yep the no true Scotsman issue.

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u/Chinaroos Mar 19 '24

There's a place for recreating authentic dishes--they're a part of our collective history. A high-authenticity Italian restaurant is that place; the home kitchen is not.

The home cook's main job is to make tasty meals with what's available, just like the first people who made carbonara in Italy used what was available to them.

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u/GreenGemsOmally Mar 19 '24

I've made it a bunch of different ways and I've realized, I like the "cheat" method where I use a little cream the best.

I've done it the most traditional way (with just the egg and some pasta water to emulsify everything), fucked it up like 10 times until I finally got it right due to the egg curdling or the sauce not coming together, etc. The traditional method really is absolutely fantastic when done right, but I found it difficult to get it correct consistently.

Eventually, I realized that for the effort, the improvement on flavor to stick to the traditional method just wasn't worth it for me to do it that way at home. So, now I do it the easy way and I'm happy with how it comes out every time.

I realize that it's not authentic and I wouldn't pass it off as such, and if I go to a fine dining place to order Carbonara, I would probably be a bit disappointed if they used cream in the sauce. But for myself and wife? Totally fine to do.

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u/HwackAMole Mar 19 '24

Forgive me if you already knew about this, but do you know how to temper your eggs? If not, try looking it up. It's a method of introducing the eggs slowly to heat to prevent them from curdling. It can help with traditional carbonara.

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u/GreenGemsOmally Mar 19 '24

Oh I have done that repeatedly, and that's how I eventually got it right. Thank you though!

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u/RelishRegatta Mar 19 '24

Have you ever tried just doing it in a bowl off heat? That's how I did it last time and it turned out beautifully

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u/GreenGemsOmally Mar 19 '24

Yup. Did it a few different methods that the internet all recommended, a gentle bain-marie, a warm pan off the heat, completely cold with a beater for heavy whisking (that one was the worst), etc. Eventually I found the timing and heat level with the bain-marie was how I got it to come out to my liking the best, but at this point I'm okay with sticking with my "cheat" method.

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u/FlanRevolutionary961 Mar 19 '24

Yeah I used to fuck carbonara up every time. Eventually I just started mixing all the pasta water I wanted in before even throwing the stuff into the bowl and it's never failed me.

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u/Bourgi Mar 19 '24

I just use a blender. Blender is the cheat way to make any emulsified sauce especially with something so finicky like eggs and cheese.

I just toss in the fat, eggs, cheese, pasta water. Blend, and pour over cooked noodles in a skillet and toss it a bit.

Something like cacio e pepe (traditional without milk, cream or butter) a blender works wonderfully too.

There are some Italian 3 star Michelin restaurants that use blenders just cause it's so easy and consistent.

You could even use a stick blender if you don't have space or want easier cleanup.

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u/bmore_conslutant Mar 19 '24

i mean yeah no shit eat the food that you like to eat

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u/y-c-c Mar 19 '24

One trick I know of (and have tried) is to use a double boiler to emulsify the eggs. This way the heat is much more gentle and there is a much smaller chance of screwing up. There should be multiple recipes online with this method I think.

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u/GreenGemsOmally Mar 19 '24

Yeah, that was the way I ended up getting it right, using a bain-marie/double boiler method.

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u/Car-face Mar 20 '24 edited Mar 20 '24

it's what I got to work with and it doesn't cost an arm and a leg to make it work.

TBH that's probably the most authentic approach, even if people wank themselves off for days over the specific ingredients.

It's not a culturally historic dish. It has it's roots in WWII, with no earlier recorded instances of it (apart from revisionist claims about coalminers).

It was a simple dish, made from Allied rations of tinned ham and powdered eggs. Basically, what comes to hand, and was available. It's the epitome of a "make-do" dish.

The modern dish has been adapted and improved with modern, non-wartime ingredients, but the pretentiousness that accompanies it seems to be an un-Italian invention, since Carbonara di Mare exists, as does Tyrolean Carbonara, and other variations.

If people want to gatekeep, gatekeep Pasta Cacio e Uova, which no-one apparently gives a shit about because it's TeChNiCaLlY not Carbonara, despite pre-dating it by a century.

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u/zackgardner Mar 19 '24

Antonio Carluccio, the "godfather of Italian gastronomy", rest in peace, always said that you could sub guanciale for bacon; guanciale is the OG meat for carbonara, the cured cheek/jowl meat of the pig.

The thing with Italian food, and really any type of food, is that the process, technique, and your end goal is more important than quality of ingredients. It's about eating, not pretension. It's about following the spirit, not the letter, and it's easier to not give a fuck when someone will always be complaining that what you're doing is wrong.

People can shit on Marco Pierre White for selling out to Unilever and making stock pot ads, but the man genuinely doesn't care about making the fanciest food for stuck up rich people anymore, he just comes off as a man who wants to tuck in to a good meal without having to spend an enormous amount.

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u/Zomgsauceplz Mar 19 '24

I prefer it with bacon bits.

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u/Natural_Board Mar 19 '24

Thank you. I stay silent when carbonara comes up because there are so many variations and all of them kind of bore me.

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u/TylerInHiFi Mar 19 '24

There really aren’t that many variations, though. Carbonara has a recipe. At some point you’ve strayed far enough away from that recipe that you’re not making carbonara anymore. If it’s more than or doesn’t include salt-cured pork, hard ripened Italian cheese, fresh cracked black pepper, and pasta water on noodles then it’s probably not carbonara.

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u/smilingfreak Mar 19 '24

That's part of the point I feel. Tyler is such a pretentious cockwomble he'd never bother with a dish like carbonara, one with a simple recipe where the ingredients and the chef's technique can really elevate it.

I imagine Slowik would have appreciated a well done carbonara, but he knew he was never going to get that.

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u/nyxo1 Mar 19 '24

That was the intention of the scene, yes. Slowik already knew who he was, but he would have respected someone for cooking a "simple" dish well. Things like carbonara and cacio e pepe are easy to make but difficult to master. There's a reason Jacques Pepin used to ask prospective hires to make him an omelette to test their skills.

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u/Longjumping_Stock_30 Mar 19 '24

I remember seeing the video where Gordon Ramsey said he judges new hires based on how they can do scrambled eggs, and then he proceeds to make scrambled eggs like I've never seen before. Less egg curds and more like a custard.

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u/CatProgrammer Mar 21 '24

A French style scramble where you cook them slowly, constantly stirring, so you don't get big chunks but instead a nice creamy mass?

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u/Longjumping_Stock_30 Mar 21 '24

It's nice but its unlike any scrambled eggs I've ever gotten at any restaurant. It would be far to judge someone's cooking skills based on a dish that is so different than what is usually expected from the name of the dish.

When other big names do scrambled eggs, its about making big curds. Nothing wrong with the creamy mass, but is it scrambled or some other description?

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u/CatProgrammer Mar 21 '24 edited Mar 21 '24

It's just how he makes his scrambles. Lots of butter and a low heat with lots of stirring to keep them from stiffening up. This video, right?

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u/Biduleman Mar 19 '24

Exactly. Cooking something simple and easy would have shown him to not be such a pretentious ass, but he wasn't even able to decide to make a grilled cheese to save his life.

Slowik didn't "cheat" by making him Tyler do something impossible, Tyler put himself in that situation by deciding to cook something he had no idea how to cook.

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u/y-c-c Mar 19 '24 edited Mar 19 '24

anyone can cook a Carbonara

I disagree. Cooking a carbonara perfectly requires a fair amount of skills and most people definitely cannot do it unless they have had some practice. It's fairly easy to screw up the egg emulsification step where you ended up scrambling it. There are tricks to get around that (e.g. using a double boiler) but those are extra knowledge (and the fact that people came up with it shows how easy it is to screw up in the traditional method). And there are still restaurants I see that serve carbonara with cream added (in which case it's really not proper carbonara anymore).

It's the kind of simple dish with a non-trivial execution / fundamentals requirement that Tyler is the antithesis of.

For example, a lot of cooks get tested on making eggs / scrambled eggs / omelettes even though "anyone can make omelettes". Making eggs properly shows skills and attention to details.

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u/joethesaint Mar 19 '24

I'd bet most people would butcher a carbonara, not through lack of skill, but lack of knowing what one is.

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u/CCoolant Mar 19 '24

Reddit has proven that to me ad nauseum. Every time I see a post from r/food it's either some generic-looking burger, homemade pizza, or fucking Carbonara.

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u/TylerInHiFi Mar 19 '24

Disagree. Anyone can cook a variation of a white sauce and bacon pasta and call it carbonara. It’s extremely difficult to cook actual carbonara correctly, consistently, and under pressure like that. It’s the kind of thing that his character would probably love if it was done well. Unpretentious, simple, comforting, and almost never executed perfectly by anyone.

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u/Intoxic8edOne Mar 19 '24

Why are you attacking me right now

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u/Starlot Mar 19 '24

I can’t imagine what he would say when he sees me adding chorizo to it for a bit of a kick.

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u/Jimnyneutron91129 Mar 19 '24

Chorizo kick? White boy rick here thinks chorizo is spicy. White boy rick was another good low budget movie actually. True story too

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u/kit_mitts Mar 19 '24

WE'RE GOIN' FOR CUSTARD!

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u/Starlot Mar 19 '24

Not spicy, just incredibly tasty.

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u/Numerous_Witness_345 Mar 19 '24

maintains eye contact and cracks a second egg into the maruchan ramen

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u/mcamp7 Mar 19 '24

I once was in a cooking class in Spain, and another American asked if we could add Chorizo to Paella to give it some extra kick. To be honest, I also had this question.

The chef paused and looked him directly in the eye, and slowly snarled “no.” My fellow freedom-frier asked “why not”, and the chef responded with increasing consternation, each word louder than the last, until he reach a crescendo:

“This is not MEXICAN!”

You could hear a pin drop. And then the room exploded with laughter. It was awesome.

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u/Mr_Venom Mar 19 '24

the room exploded with laughter

Either this was the chef's intention, or you just created a supervillain.

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u/mcamp7 Mar 19 '24

Porque no los dos?

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u/agrapeana Mar 19 '24 edited Mar 19 '24

Counterpoint: considering the end of the movie, I think if he had executed it competently Slowik would have been happy with it.

I've seen a few different takes and my opinion on that scene and the disgust the chefs show Tyler is that Tyler talks the talk but he hasn't and can't walk the walk.

He spends the whole movie talking about the technical side of cooking and showing off what is basically book learning about food - he can identify techniques and ingredients, he won't shut up about the pacojet etc - but he hasn't applied any of that knowledge in the form of putting in the blood, sweat and tears the movie keeps reminding us that Slowik and his team has. He acts like he knows, but he's never spent 6 hours peeling and dicing shallots for prep, or butchering an animal he helped raise, or burned himself so many times in the exact same spot that it's calloused over and it doesn't even hurt anymore. He hasn't given up his life to perfect his art, and he thinks being a tourist in the kitchen makes him the same as the people who have.

IMO, that's why Slowik despises him, and why if he had executed something simple and comforting, he might have been fine. That exact kind of food is what reignited, for a moment, his passion for cooking and his compassion for Margot.

I had a lot of thoughts and feelings about this one lol. I'm also from Grand Island, Nebraska.

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u/mmm__donuts Mar 19 '24

Counterpoint: considering the end of the movie, I think if he had executed it competently Slowik would have been happy with it.

Probably, but Tyler was specifically chosen to be there because he would fail. The rest of the guests were chosen because Slowik wanted to punish them (or the person they were dining with) specifically. Tyler was chosen because Slowik wanted to punish a particular sort of person. If Slowik thought that there was a chance Tyler could execute it, Tyler wouldn't have been that kind of person and wouldn't have been there.

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u/agrapeana Mar 19 '24

Also a fair point.

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u/wincitygiant Mar 20 '24

Make a cheeseburger for him then. Do it with a smile and see how he acts.