[Music]
alright you may have heard by now a hot
dog is a taco enchilada is actually a
sushi roll an article about a bizarre
new food classification system went
viral in the last week or so
our producer Ellie Holmes tracked down
the Washington Post reporter whose story
created this cuisine chaos believe it or
not case that was the first media outlet
in the country to go one-on-one with the
reporter who sparked a national food
fight good morning Maura thanks so much
for joining us thanks for having me
all right this is one of those
mind-blowing ideas to us we cannot wrap
our head around this cube rule thing
what in the world is this all right so
the cube rule is a way of classifying
foods according to their structure or
geometry and so you look at the
placement of the starch in the foods
determine what kind of food it is and so
for example when you look at a hot dog
which is surrounded on three sides by
bread the cube roll call that a taco you
can't have a call a hot dog taco and the
other one we have a bone to pick about
down here in San Antonio especially more
is enchiladas are apparently a sushi
roll sushi roll makes the rules tell us
about this this Brandon guy we don't
know the last name a 25 year old who
came up with the cube rule and he
doesn't want to be take credit for the
cube rule but but we want a board we
want to talk to him who created this
diagram that kind of classifies foods
according to a cube structure and so
when you go through them a toast is
anything that has one side of bread so
when you look at it like a pizza is
actually just a giant piece of toast in
the cube roll a sandwich we all know two
sides of bread taco we went over and
then four sides of bread or starch would
be a sushi something that's in there
roll shape and enchilada or a Swiss roll
cake and then five sides anything that
has an open top at bread all the way
around the bottom
and the sides I would get red bull or
quiche or hi and the last category is a
calzone which is something fully
enclosed by bread
so a pop-tart is technically a calzone
ravioli is technically a countdown and
then there's this other category it's
just things that don't fit into any of
those categories so that means they
either have starch throughout them or
they have no starch at all and so when
you think about it a spaghetti a plate
of spaghetti would technically be a
salad a nacho play it would be a salad
or why this one always gets people a
steak a seat has no starch a steak is a
salad so let's take is a salad now I do
like to take in my salad I do to know
about this you know what more I want to
go grocery shopping with you because I
want you to correct the manager and say
you've got stuff in the wrong section
too pal so what's the reaction been well
people love to fight about this it's one
of those internet arguments it's just
has always existed people just wanted to
bake but their hot dog is a sandwich and
the student frozen the attention to it
and so people have really enjoyed kind
of like making rulings on various foods
so you know for example if you go
through various hot dog related things
you get a blanket is a sushi but a
corndog is a calzone okay all right
that's just all right Maura so your work
for the Washington Post you actually
wrote this for voracious what is
voracious voraciously is our website for
novice cooks it's part of the food
section of the Washington Post okay all
very interesting well this really got
our attention and we talked about it for
a long time just the other day we did
and the question we want to ask you now
more now that you've been you know
published the article and it's it's
caught fire on the web and you're now
known around the world for the writing
this article McKee on the cube roll has
it hit you the lunacy of the idea that
geometry can meet our food and food
meets geometry I mean this is not
something that anyone should take
seriously whatsoever it's a joke theory
on the internet and you think if it
really more as a thought experiment it
really shows you how there are only so
many shapes but a lot of good foods we
love can really take and they also be in
common and so it really got to be nice
list
think about how all these foods across
cultures across different food
traditions
kind of take the similar form so it's
really just something to think about it
and fight about it's more fun than
debating politics oh you are a vegetable
yeah I think of amen to that sister had
a lot of fun with it more Judd gets with
the Washington Post thank you so much
for being with them you're a good sport
Martha thank you Merry Christmas
so we said she may say at 9:00 producer
Ellie Holmes and special projects
producer carlos Hernandez to the Perl to
see how the people feel about it but
could you imagine looking under the
sushi category at a restaurant and
enchiladas being there I can see where
they get the idea of it being a sushi
but like it's not a sushi yet the
enchiladas would be under the sushi
category because they are completely
enrolled in bread but don't have any
bread on either end what is no that's
just dumb that's kind of weird
yeah because she isn't necessarily a
roll like there's sashimi and nigiri and
I would consider that sushi too he has a
lot of time on his hands but sushi is
rice so and why couldn't the calzone be
the corndog you know like why is the
calzone the category I wonder what his
thought process is there okay so what's
our verdict our hot dogs
you said tacos sandwich or taco it's a
sandwich I say taco yeah
so your verdict again on the hot dog
sandwich or tax a sandwich a hot dog hot
dog man being in San Antonio in Texas I
mean there's only one taco to me I don't
think that I could categories categorize
a hot dog as a taco so I'm not a big fan
of the whole geometry of the food so no
I'm not either
sushi is sushi enchiladas her Angela
that's about all I have to say about
that