Favorite Seinfeld food moments
It's amazing what dreadful food Seinfeld eats. Elaine likes the Big Salad just because it's big. Food is often used as a proxy for something else. Everyone wants to be given a free meal at Mendy's, not because it's good but because it's expensive. Bread from a good bakery is given as a status gift. But it's amazing how often food comes up. Chinese takeout, Chinese food at a restaurant with a sadistic, churlish owner, lobster (which makes repeat appearances -- in Long Island, as bisque, etc) , lots of scenes at restaurants. And there's some true food wisdom there. Seinfeld befriends a Pakistani who runs a wildly successful restaurant offering ecletic crowd-pleasers. He persuades him to change to rigorously authentic Pakistani food. No one wants it and the restaurant tanks. George wonders how a restaurant with 200 items on the menu manages to keep everything fresh. "Look at that. They got lobster on the menu. Who would order a lobster here. I mean, do they bring a lobster in everyday hoping *todays* the day?"
What are your favorites?
Brian S
Jan 02, 2007 04:36PM
Brian, Certainly the Soup Nazi is on the short list. (From what I understand, he was based upon a real-life character in New York.) One of the joys of watching Seinfeld was knowing that Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer had no social redeeming values--including those associated with food.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qdhfr...
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The Soup Nazi was based on a real guy in NY who had one little soup place - west 55th if I recall correctly. Soups were amazing, prices high and he, Al Yeganeh the owner, was behaved exactly as he was portrayed on the show. I was there years and years ago before Seinfeld. Yeganeh, who made quite a stink with Seinfeld over the Nazi reference, now has a chain of soup places all over the city. I haven't tried them.
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I went there about a year after the show. There must have been a line of 50 people waiting outside for a $10 cup of soup, including one guy who pulled up in a limo and had his driver stand in line. From what I could tell, at least half the people in line were tourists like me. It was exactly like the show. Place your order, step to the right, and you get free bread. Depsite the hype, the soup was really quite good, although that was a long time ago.
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The soup was amazing and sadly closed a few years ago so he can get his franchise business up and running. His chain, The Original Soup Man, is a disgusting replacement.
And for the record, Babu's Dream Cafe in Seinfeld was anything but wildly successful. There was no one in the restaurant which is why Jerry recommended he change it to a Pakistani place.
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The Soup Nazi also spawned imitators like -- I kid you not -- "Soup Nutsy."
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Brian, Babu's restaurant was not successful initially. That's why Jerry tried to convince him to change it to a Pakistani place.
On a side note, I happen to know that the real Seinfeld is a lousy tipper.
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Elaine takes up residence in a janitor's closet of another apt bldg because a Chinese place won't deliver to her home.
"No soup for you!"
Elaine goes through great lengths to recover a lost nearly-full punch card of a sub shop she hates, all to get that free awful sub.
At the movies, Elaine is called to the hospital because her boyfriend was in an accident. She first takes the time to buy some joogie (sp?) fruits. He notices this and breaks up with her.
Kramer & Jerry, watching an operation from high up in the viewing gallery, flip a Junior Mint into their friend's body while Kramer is trying to force one on Jerry. He almost dies from complications later but makes a miraculous recovery. The doctor credits it to "assistance from above."
Kramer counts the days until the "Mackinac peaches from Oregon" (no such thing-there are great peaches here though) but loses his sense of taste from staying in Jerry's apt while it's being flea-bombed. Recovers it, but has already given away all the peaches to Newman.
Chocolate bobka!
Jerry & Kramer get banned from the neighborhood grocer for daring to return bad fruit.
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I like when Jerry and Kramer get banned from the fruit vendor, and Geroge goes out to but them fruit. Geroge then try's some of the mango, and feels like it gives him a vitamin B shot like Viagra.
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Elaine and the chocolate bobka! The soup nazi goes w/o saying. How about the one where George is sweating in his office from eating the Kung Pao but his boss thinks it's b/c he's involved in recent thefts in the office and fires him. I think he also talked in the 3rd person like Jimmy... HA!
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Let's not forget the Marble Rye and the lobster hauled in from the ocean by Kramer!
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The Marble Rye show is the classic in my mind. And don't forget about the Beefarinos - same episode, Kramer bought huge cans of them at the Price Club and couldn't eat them, so he fed them to the horses. That was all one big show plot centered around food items.
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He fed them to the horse which pulled his carriage through central park, and the horse kept farting!
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The purpose of that particular ride was to take Susan's parents for their anniv, so as to distract them from George trying to replace the marble rye that his parents had brought the night before, but was not served, so they took it back, and Jerry had to snatch the last one from an old lady who was a friend of his parents in FLA, then he hooked it to the end of a line and George reeled it in from the third floor. Of course, because of the horse's farting the ride was cut short, ensuring they would catch George in the act!
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The shot of him having reeled in the rye and holding it up like a trophy fish just as Susans parents walked in is classic.
DT
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That must rank up there as one of the best plots in SitCom history. The whole show is a classic.
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The Black and White cookie.
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Yes indeed--tied with George eating the already disposed of pastry from the garbage and the muffin crown thing--selling only the top halves and ditching the bottom.
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The muffin top episode is my favorite food related Seinfeld.
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Yes! That black and white cookie description inspired me to try my first ever black and white cookie when I first moved to NYC...and Jerry was so right, it really tastes best when you get a little bit of both sides in every bite!
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Hmmmm... does envelope glue count?
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Kenny Roger's Fried Chicken and Kramer getting "fried"!
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"Newman, you wouldn't eat broccoli if it was deep fried in chocolate sauce!"
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The time Jerry couldn't eat because the restaurant chef/owner "Poppy" (sp?) didn't wash his hands after using the bathroom.
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Yes, Poppy was a little sloppy.
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I always started drooling when the the one where Elaine wanted that Flounder from the Chinese place was showing (the one Leonardo mentioned) the Kung... POW!!! Chicken one was great do. It also made me hungry
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great thread,
the Kenny Rogers Roasters was great, especially when Newman spits out the Broccoli., and needs a shot of sauce to get the vile taste from his mouth..
Also I like the one where they are waiting for a table @ the chinese restaurant, and the owner calls out the name Cartwright.. instead of Costanza...
what a great show
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I forgot about the broccoli part- I loved that!
Also, when Elaine is addicted to poppy seed chicken and keeps failing the drug tests!
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It was great that that was how he tipped off Jerry the food wasnt for him,
"Broccoli, I love Broccoli.."
There are so many Seinfeld shows that revolve around food, I didnt realize it until this thread, I am sitting @ my desk almost laughing aloud remembering these episodes..
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"You wouldn't eat broccoli if it was deep fried in chocolate sauce."
Classic line.
I also liked the red laser beam coming from Kramers peep hole.
DT
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I think that was a poppy seed bagel.
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Poppy seed muffin.
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definitely a muffin
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You know a muffin can be really filling!
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It was the poppy seed muffin that made her test positive for opiates. She then convinces Peterman to let her retest and stops eating the muffins. Right before her retest, however, she discovers a poppy seed in her teeth from some chicken Kramer had fed her.
She ends up testing negative for opium because she gets Jerry's mother's urine, but she doesn't get to go to Africa because she's menopausal with a 68-year-old's metabolism.
http://www.seinfeldscripts.com/TheSho...
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Wasn't it poppy seed muffins that she had every morning?
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When George Steinbrenner loved a certain Italian hero and sent George to get one everyday for lunch, but George didn't put change in the tip jar and the place wouldn't sell him food. He was trying to talk everyone else into going there for him.
Also Elaine gets banned from the Soup Nazi's place, but ends up with his wooden chest and finds all his recipes in there, and goes to his restaurant to taunt him.
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It was calzone!!
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Thanks! Wasn't it stuffed with something like eggplant?
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One of my friends saw this and emailed me that I was wrong about the Pakistani restaurant, it got no business when it had an eclectic menu. He's right. http://www.seinfeldscripts.com/TheCafe.html But my version of the truth makes my point better: that really good authentic restaurants often fail as crummy crowd-pleasing chains prosper. All my favorite Pakistani restaurants have gone belly-up. http://www.chowhound.com/topics/247368 Although the correct version makes a point too: in NY at least some locations seem "cursed" -- every restaurant opened there fails. Either way, it's a funny show!!
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Re: Brian S. - "all my favorite Pakistani restaurants have gone belly-up"
You should move to Berkeley, CA. There are a few around and a really good one on University Avenue, called Kabana.
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The "non-fat" yogurt ...
The poppyseed muffins ...
George and the Snickers Bar ... with knife and fork.
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Was that the one where Elaine wants to start a business selling only muffin tops?
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No, I think the poppyseed episode involved Elaine trying to go on an expedition with J. Peterman, but flunked the drug test.
She blamed the poppyseed muffins she was eating, of course.
Muffin top episode is a classic as well.
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Top of the Muffin to you!
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Yes. She goes into business with her former publishing boss.
But they can't get rid of the stumps. The homeless don't want them!
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eipl1...
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The one where George's date has amazing risotto and reacts more orgasmically towards the food than she does durng sex with George. She admits that he is not as good as the risotto.
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well then there was the one where elaine found the lobster bisque more exciting than the action with her date....
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Wasn't that the "Yada, yada" episode? Another classic.
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Yes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Yada...
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Ha, ha...Seinfeld: "But you yada, yada'd over the best part!"...Elaine: "No, I mentioned the bisque."
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How about Joe DiMaggio (The Yankee Clipper) eating at Dinky Donuts and dunking!!!!
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There's also the one where Kramer tried to cook for a Jewish Singles Function and wanted to recruit George's father to cook, but can't because of a traumatic incident while as a mess cook in the army that sent the boys to the latrine.
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Oh my gosh...yes, that one where Jerry's father had the flash back in slow motion of the guys in the mess hall was so funny.
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It was George's, I think.
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George eating the eclaire out of the trashcan.
George eating the pastrami sandwich during sex.
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He could only do his best performance while eating pastrami. One of my faves.
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