The Bon App Recap: If You're Throwing a Dinner Party and Someone Shows Up on Time, That's Unacceptable

Hello! For last week’s Bon App Recap we only had four videos and for this week’s we only have three. That’s one less! I’m not going to hypothesize as to why we had basically half of the content this week that we’ve come to expect. I will simply blame it on Adam Rapoport and keep it moving.

While it’s true that numerically we have less to work with this week, spiritually we have been given so, so much more. This week we get Carla, and she’s roasting a chicken. If I’m being perfectly honest there are few things that bring me more joy than roasting a chicken. I think it’s the perfect food, and it’s honestly not nearly as hard as everyone would have you believe. Also, Carla is my favorite person in the Test Kitchen so for me, this is my perfect storm.

After Carla roasting chicken we have Molly playing with caviar, which is fun and frivolous and maybe made me want to pretend I’m rich one day and try caviar? We’ll see. They ended this week on a sad note with another one of those videos where we watch the BA team watch other videos and provide commentary. High highs and low lows my friends.

“From the Test Kitchen” —Carla makes 30-minute brick chicken: 5/5 Would Bon

As I’ve already said, there is nothing I love more than roast chicken and there is honestly no one I would rather walk me through the process than Carla Lalli Music so off the bat, there’s a zero percent chance I won’t be absolutely here for this content.

Spatchcocking, which Carla says is a word we should use as many times as possible so I will say it again, spatchcocking is not something I’ve ever done but will absolutely be doing this evening as I’ve waited all week to try out this recipe after watching the video. Carla is giving us everything. She’s giving us news you can use, she’s giving us humor, she showing me the visual cues I so often miss in written recipes and empowering me with the confidence I need to go forward into the kitchen and be successful. It’s gorgeous, it’s life-giving, and it’s a roast chicken in 30 minutes which gives me big Rachael Ray vibes and I’m not mad about it.

The video wraps up with some b-roll where Carla drops some very heavy knowledge. “If you’re throwing a dinner party,” she says to someone off-camera, “and someone shows up on time, that’s unacceptable.”

She goes on to say that should someone show up to her house at the time she said to be there for a dinner party, she will only just be stepping out of the shower, which is information that kind of shook me to my core. Not to use my sign as a crutch here, but I’m a Virgo and therefore chronically on time. I don’t think I’ve ever been to a party I haven’t shown up early, which is embarrassing but is just the disease I live with.

My main takeaway here is that I need to know the birth charts of everyone in the Test Kitchen ASAP.

“Molly Tries” —Molly makes a meal with $10K+ Caviar: 3/5 Would Bon

Okay so mainly this video is fun, and not to be like a huge nightmare buzzkill here, but I wish these videos with Molly would kind of just get to the freaking point. There’s a lot of clue-giving and weird transitions that don’t really feel necessary considering Molly is one of the few people in the Test Kitchen who is entirely entertaining all on her own.

I’ve never tried caviar, mainly because I just don’t get it to be honest, but this video really did its job in making me kind of curious about it. We learn about the different kinds of caviar and the different grades, and then at the end Molly walks through a few different variations of preparation. Specifically a high-brow preparation, a low-brow preparation, and a Molly-brow preparation, which is somewhere in between.

All three versions look bomb as fuck, although when you’re working primarily with starches, fats, and very expensive caviar I don’t know how difficult that is to achieve. Mainly, this made me want to drink a couple bottles of wine in a fancy dress with some friends in a dimly lit restaurant that has velvet booths, which I now think is what I will do for my 30th birthday.

Oh, also of Andy she says, “I love him so much and I also fucking hate him a lot of the time,” which I couldn’t agree with more.

“Test Kitchen Talks” —Pro chefs review home cooking scenes from movies & TV: 2/5 Would Bon

“I love films,” Andy says in the opening of this video, “I took one film class.” This is really where I should have stopped watching this video, but here we are.

If you’ve been reading these recaps it’s no secret at this point that this is my least favorite kind of output from BA. It’s betting on fun but really just leaves me confused as to who the audience is for this and what the point is.

If they’re asking the chefs to critique the cooking scenes of these movies, which Andy does in earnest, then I really don’t get it, because the entire point of every single one these scenes is to be funny, so none of the cooking should make sense.

Like, no thinks that Robbin Williams lighting his fake boobs on fire in Mrs. Doubtfire was meant to be a teachable moment, and trying to make it that is honestly just annoying to watch.

The only part of this video that was worth it was watching Gabby demonstrate how to properly fold cheese into something after she watches the scene from Schitt’s Creek where David has a meltdown in the kitchen. Leave that on loop for fifteen minutes and skip the rest of this.