Friday Five: Foods That Make Us Think of Chuck

A confession: I’m a bit of a foodie. I spend way too much time (when I’m not obsessing over Chuck) thinking about food, researching food, cooking food, and eating food. So, of course it seems natural that I attempt to combine my two obsessions…er…hobbies whenever possible and thus this week’s Friday Five.

5 Foods that make me think of Chuck:

1. Cheese balls – I can’t walk past a mega-sized plastic jug of these without thinking of “Chuck vs the Pink Slip”. Chuck camped out on the couch, with a mountain man beard, a bathrobe, and a huge supply of cheese balls, mourning the apparent loss of both Sarah and his career, is one of my favorite scenes. The next scene in the Buy More when Chuck goes back (in his bathrobe) to replenish his cheese ball supply and gets in an altercation with Emmett Milbarge is also memorable. “Smell that…that is putrid stench of failure”.
2. Pancakes – the first thing Ellie can think of when she sees their dad again after so many years is how he was going to make pancakes the night he left them. Such an ordinary food, but with such intense emotional association. Ellie and Chuck (and us fans) may never be able to eat pancakes again without thinking of their father and all the tragedy that befell him.
3. Sizzling Shrimp – Morgan’s determination that he was not to be denied his favorite dish from the Bamboo Dragon lead to Chuck and Sarah getting pulled into the kidnapping of a Chinese business man and Chuck ending up arranging the defection of a Chinese agent. Of course things went awry and Chuck rescued Sarah and Casey using a van full of fireworks. This episode also foreshadowed Morgan’s trip to Hawaii to attempt a career as a hibachi chef.
4. Two Buck Chuck – Besides the obvious similarity in name, we got a great shout-out to this bastion of enological pop-culture in “Chuck vs the Balcony”. And for the wine snobs who think Two Buck Chuck is beneath them, there’s always the option for an upgrade to a classy French wine with ” a stable on the label and a stork on the cork” as well as 500 years of French history in the bottle. [For the uninitiated, “Two Buck Chuck” is the popular name of Trader Joe’s house wines, sold under the name Charles Shaw. In California, it sells (in different varieties) for, yep, you guessed it, $1.99 a bottle. In Massachusetts, it’s most accurately referred to as “Three Buck Chuck” which doesn’t quite have the same ring to it!]
5. Any item off the Subway menu – I’ve always been a fan of Subway, but ever since the Finale and a Footlong campaign, it’s becoming a bit of an addiction. Even when I’m not munching a $5 Footlong (Veggie Delight, not Tunaroni), I can’t help thinking of Chuck every time I pass a Subway (which is often, with how ubiquitous they are). The product placement has also become so blatant and expected that it’s evolved into a not-so-inside joke: How long until Big Mike eats his Subway?

Which foods to you associate with Chuck?

Cay writes the “She Said” reviews of Chuck episodes each week. Check them out here.