David Chang's Ugly Delicious isn't your standard premium-cable food porn

The New Yorker

The Netflix series starring the Korean-American celebrity chef "has all the elements of a high-end food show: a globe-spanning location budget, a cavalcade of celebrity guest stars (chefs, comedians, food writers, actors, artists, novelists), and an expansive and appreciative appetite for meals at ends high and low," says Helen Rosner. "It’s lavishly produced, rigorously researched, and almost confrontationally weird, each episode (built around a single topic—pizza, fried rice, barbecue, home cooking, etc.) weaving together various segments filmed in restaurants and homes around the world. But this isn’t your standard premium-cable food porn. The camera rarely lingers on the food, or even the acts of cooking or eating; dishes and ingredients fly by without explanation. A viewer won’t walk away with a life-changing cooking method or a new must-visit restaurant. The show isn’t about what food is, it’s about what it means, and about the choices people make that change its meaning."

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• Chang's claim as the lone "badass" appreciating undersung foods ignores famous TV foodies like Anthony Bourdain, Guy Fieri and Andrew Zimmern
• The show never feels like it's all about Chang -- instead, it is driven by his interests
• Ugly Delicious tackles food snobbery -- and embraces Taco Bell and Domino's Pizza
• Chang says guest Jimmy Kimmel will surprise people: “I don’t think people realize that Jimmy is like a really amazing amateur home cook"