- I feel like it's not maybe cookout appropriate
just 'cause if you at a cookout, it's 90 degrees.
- Yeah.
- That (beep) in the sun for more than an hour.
(upbeat music)
Hi, my name is Makeba
and welcome to my very first cocoa butter cookout.
Today, I have invited five special guests
to join me and show off their best cookout dish.
Now, three of the guests I invited are a part of the family
AKA they're black.
And two of the guests I are invited are
plus ones, AKA they're non-black.
Now, everybody at the cookout will get a chance
to taste all of the dishes except their own,
rate them on a scale of 1 to 10,
and see if they can guess which dish was made by the
plus ones.
At the very end of all the tastings,
the dish with the highest score
is gonna be crowned best dish.
Five dishes will enter,
but only one of them is gonna take home the title.
Let's see.
(upbeat suspenseful music)
In your opinion, what makes a great cookout dish?
- Homemade.
I feel like you can't bring something
store bought to the cookout.
- [Makeba] Really?
- Something that's easy to transport.
- It's gotta be shareable.
- Have you been to cookouts hosted by
both black and non-black people in your lifetime?
- [Kevin] Technically, yes.
- [Makeba] Okay.
- Because I am of Puerto Rican descent
- Okay.
- But I've never been to a white cookout, so...
- Never been to a white cookout.
- Call me for a white cookout.
(Makeba laughing)
- I have never been to a cookout with
white people before never.
- [Makeba] Never?
- Or if they have been there, I have not noticed.
- Really? Interesting.
- Usually people of African descent,
they usually use a lot of different spices,
and something with like big bold flavors.
- [Makeba] Yes.
- If it's non-black, it's usually kind of bland.
- How long have you been bringing dishes
to cookouts in general?
- This year, this my first time trying this dish.
- [Makeba] So wait, this is your very first time
making that dish?
- Yes, very first time.
What makes this special, it has a lot of things
from the Marine Corps.
So you got the air, land, and the sea.
Which means it's chicken, and beef, and fish.
- What makes my dish special is that,
it's been in my family for years.
It's something different than like a regular tossed salad
or a regular pasta salad.
It has a little bit of extra kick to it.
A lot of extra spices.
- My cookout dish, I think is incredible because
the sauce that's in my cookout dish is sticky.
The base of it is honey.
There's garlic, ginger, chilis.
- And it definitely has the strong flavors.
And it's a good mix between
the black and the Puerto Rican side of myself
into one dish.
- My dish is special because
it's a cultural recipe.
It's jerk chicken.
Me, and my aunt, and my mom made it together.
So there's a lot of love in it.
(upbeat music)
- So let's start with this one.
- Okay.
- We have a lemon chili wing.
(upbeat music)
- It's really good.
It's a little bit citrusy.
Good marinade.
- That's the best part.
- Mm hmm.
- I love citrus.
- When it comes to wings,
they need to be crisp.
- You gotta have that char.
- Yeah. And the skin on this was just a little gummy,
which is like really, really kind of
gross.
(both laughing)
- I like the idea of lemon,
but I feel like
maybe they were trying to make lemon pepper,
but it didn't hit the level of lemon pepper,
- Okay.
- that they were trying to get.
- Ew, it lacked seasoning.
I would think that this dish was brought by a plus one.
- How do you feel like that stands up to yours?
- Oh, that doesn't even come near mine.
We're at two different cookouts.
- [Makeba] Oh my God.
- This one's the boring one.
Mine's the fun one.
We got the band over at mine.
- Lord, have mercy.
(Anastasia laughing)
On a scale of 1 to 10,
what are you ranking that?
- I would rank it a five
- For effort...
- No effort. No, this ain't kindergarten.
(Kyla laughing)
- Well, I'll give it an 8 out of 10.
- That's definitely a zero.
That's a negative Yelp review.
I would give it a three.
- Is it making it to your plate at the cookout?
- Oh God, no, no, no, no, no.
I don't want your food.
- [Makeba] Oh no.
I don't wanna go to your house.
I don't wanna know what you order at a restaurant.
(upbeat music)
- Next.
This is a macaroni salad.
- [Antoinette] It's,
I don't know, like...
- Also gonna smell this one.
Interesting.
- Oh, they brought it.
- [Antoinette] It's tuna something, right?
Like, yeah. It's tuna.
Oh they used like a...
A flavored mayonnaise.
Or they just put a lot of seasoning?
- I just feel like I,
I tasted the paprika and nothing else.
- Really? Okay then.
- Hmm, it's really good.
I taste a little bit of mayo, a little bit of onions.
- Something about the color is throwing me off too.
When you see macaroni salad, like
either, usually you see like the rainbow pasta.
- Really?
I've never seen mac salad with rainbow pasta.
Oh wow.
- They have like a rainbow curly pasta,
or you'll see like,
it would just be lighter in color than it is.
- Lighter in color. Okay.
- There's lots of flavor.
The pasta you can tell was seasoned when they cooked it.
I really like the hard boiled eggs in there.
- Yeah.
- What did you feel about like, eggs that were added?
- There were eggs? That looks like an onion.
- Zero.
It wouldn't even make it to my plate.
- Wow.
- [Antoinette] That's why I gave it zero.
- Okay. Heard.
- All right.
I only tried it because I'm here.
(Makeba laughing)
- Definitely a nine.
I would go to the cookout,
eat the first bit, get a second helping,
and then when everyone else is like
kind of focused on other things, I would sneak over
and just like grab a little bit more.
- Is this making it to your cookout plate?
- [Kevin] No, no, I'm sorry.
- [Makeba] No?
- I probably would taste it once
and then be like,
Mm. Scrumptious.
- You? You that type?
You lie about people's food?
If you just lie to people about their food...
- [Kevin] They can make it again.
- Yeah.
Then they find out that their food is bad
on shows like this.
- I think, good textures.
I'll give it a nine.
- Six.
(upbeat funky music)
- [Makeba] This is chicken with awesome sauce.
- Awesome sauce?
- [Makeba] That's what it's called.
- First, I wanna taste the chicken.
- [Makeba] That is a honey and garlic sauce.
- Chicken is good.
- The sauce,
what is that like, some soy ginger?
- It's like soy, ginger, sesame seeds.
- I just feel like it's kind of dry.
The sauce is like the redeeming factor.
- I don't know if I taste the honey in it,
but I definitely taste like the ginger and the garlic.
- Blow my mind.
It's really good.
The sauce is brilliant, actually.
- Chicken is perfectly cooked.
- This is by far my favorite dish right here.
But not better than mine.
- It's a little too chewy to me.
- I would give it a 10 out of 10.
- Yes!
- 8.5
- A five, because the sauce was decent.
- I would give it a ten.
- You're the first person to finish the entire thing today.
- Am I the first black person here then?
- [Makeba] No, you're not.
- Who are these people leaving food around?
(upbeat funky music)
- We have land, air, and sea tacos.
- [Antoinette] The person named it that?
- Yeah.
- That sounds like a plus one kind of vibe.
- Land, air, and sea tacos?
- Yeah.
(Makeba laughing)
- The land taco is the steak taco.
The sea taco is the fish taco.
And then the air taco is the chicken.
(taco crunching)
- Mm mm.
- [Makeba] No. Oh my god.
- Mm.
- [Makeba] She lookin' for the trash.
Here, over here.
(Makeba laughing)
- [Antoinette] Sorry.
- It was really unbalanced.
The slaw that was on top
was just like a little too much,
'cause it overpowers like the whole taco.
- There's an odd mix of flavors going on there.
Incorrect.
- I think the flavor
on all the tacos are really good,
but the meats are a little dry.
- [Antoinette] I don't know what this is.
Is this fish?
Or what?
- Maybe that was..
I don't know.
- Okay.
- The beef one is better.
The beef I just think is under seasoned.
- And it was also super dry.
- The meat one best,
followed by chicken,
followed by...
sea.
- This is beef though.
This is, this is good.
I would give this taco,
a 10 out of 10 actually.
For this plate, but...
- [Makeba] Nice.
- The plate itself will get something different.
(Antoinette scoffing)
- I'll give it a six.
- Good solid four.
- Three.
- Is this making your cookout plate?
- No, no.
- [Antoinette] It's not gonna make the plate.
None of them?
- Not even close.
Even individually, none of them would make the plate?
- No, absolutely not.
- I'll give it like a 3.5.
- And the three comes from...
- From that.
- The middle one.
(Makeba laughing)
- And the presentation is nice.
- Would this make it to the take home plate?
Like you come home drunk and it's late at night.
And like you just want something quick and easy to like,
would it make it to your to go plate?
- I've gotta be drunk out of my mind
to the point where I don't taste my own spit.
- Oh wow. All right.
- Sorry to the person.
(upbeat music)
- This is jerk chicken over rice.
- I'm so excited.
- I was fully expecting it to be super spicy
or like, feel a little tingle.
I didn't right away, but it's slowly settling.
- Wow.
- This is really good.
I could tell by looking at it.
It had all the spices,
and it has the right amount of kick to it.
- It's got lots of flavor to it.
- How was the chicken cooked, in your opinion?
- Chicken was also good.
- It's very smokey,
have good flavor, but it's a little bit dry.
- To be fair,
this person left their jerk sauce at home.
So, they were little disappointed about it.
Do you feel like with sauce,
it would've like, brought it over.
- Yeah, definitely.
- I wanna make friends with that person
and get their recipe.
(Makeba laughing)
- If you guys wanna share that info.
- I'm gonna give it a nine.
- Eight.
Only 'cause...
- Eight.
- The chicken was tender,
- [Makeba] Mm hmm.
but a little dry, which is weird.
- [Makeba] Okay.
- Like an eight.
- I'll give it a seven.
With the sauce, I will give it a eight and a half.
(upbeat music)
- Which of these dishes were
brought by the plus ones?
- Without question.
And if it's not, you should be ashamed.
- I would say this one because they forgot the sauce
and I never knew a black person who forgets the sauce
at a cookout.
(Makeba and onlookers laughing)
So I base my opinion on my experience.
(Makeba laughing)
- The tacos.
- The tacos were made by the non-black person.
- I think so.
- [Makeba] Everything else was made by black people?
- Yeah.
- Nobody, nobody has this little presentation
for a little, for a little plate thing.
- You taking points off for like...
- That's a...
- It being well structured.
- That's a gimmick.
That's a As Seen on TV gimmick. Yes.
And I am gonna absolutely take points off for that.
- This one.
Just because they focus more on presentation
than how it actually tasted.
- Definitely this chicken.
And then...
I'll say the tacos is also a plus one.
- [Makeba] The tacos?
(upbeat music)
- The votes are in,
and with a score of 32.5
out of a possible 40 points,
Our winner is...
(drum roll)
Anastasia.
(Makeba clapping)
- Yay.
(Anastasia clapping)
- You, as the plus one to the black cookout,
were voted the best dish at the black cookout.
How do you feel in this moment?
- I feel good.
I feel great.
- If you're looking to give advice
to any non-black person
looking to like make a dish that is good enough
to come to a black cookout and perform well,
what would you give them?
- It's about the community.
It's about heart.
It's about soul.
Which is why soul cooking, soul food is so closely,
you know, put together with the black community.
So put your heart and soul into it.
Just no, no holds barred.
- You are invited to all of my cookouts,
if you bring this.
- Happily. Oh my God, yes.
- Thank you.
(Makeba laughing)
- Thank you.
(upbeat music)