The World’s Smelliest Fruit? Sohla and Ham Try Cooking With Durian | Mystery Menu | NYT Cooking

Sohla and Ham are back for another installment of Mystery Menu. They have one hour, one surprise ingredient, and one challenge: make dinner and a dessert. Today’s secret ingredient, which was a fan request, is … durian! How will they use it? Watch to find out.

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[daffo]

Its just so freaking refreshing to finally see content about durian that respects it as a fruit and not just some stupid reaction content made for jokes and laughs. You have no idea how many videos i've seen about durian where people try a little nibble, loose their minds and toss out THE ENTIRE DURIAN.

[_helmi]

As a native SE Asian from Kuala Lumpur - congrats for getting THE actual durian that's fully riped, still intact and custardy, not the gym sock kind that most YouTubers tasted. As for the dishes, you guys have elevated the ways to use durians in cooking. I'm mindblown with your creativity and very impressed that y'all figured out the pairings with durian. One critique - I'd swapped sticky rice with plain jasmine rice and used the sticky rice together with shaved iced deserts.

[youdidthistomeyoutoldcoach]

Ham and Sohla have the most lovely chemistry - you can tell that they love and respect each other for both who they are as people, and who they are as chefs. It is refreshing to see.

[elizabethkendrick]

When Ham suggests halo halo it’s like Sohla looks at the crew like a little kid asking, can we have ice cream!! It’s just total bliss, makes me smile

[dbgermane]

As a Malaysian, I always get worried when Westerners feature durian. It devolves so quickly into ewwww gross territory. But of course, Sohla and Ham were pros and I loved seeing how excited they were to cook with durian and I wish I could taste this menu!

[akirebara]

I love these two so much. I'm Filipino and when they talked about halo-halo and flan, it made me fall in love with them more. Durian is one of our most beloved fruits. What amazing creative brains you have.

[MatthewWaltonWalton]

The eternal joy of this series! Durian has become a bit of a shock ingredient in western culture so it was great to see Sohla and Ham approach it with joy and enthusiasm and come up with food I mostly want to eat. Superstars.

[MrAilsaAng]

It’s crazy how Ham immediately went towards seafood, almost instinctively! In Malaysia we have a savory curry/stew-like dish called tempoyak ikan which is made of fish & fermented durian!

[SeamlesslyAwkwerd]

FINALLYY!! People who don't over dramatize the smell of Durian, if you keep thinking of the smell of feet/feces/and other bad smells then offcourse your gonna start associating the smell of durian to that. If you have durian keep an open mind, it's not gonna hurt you it's literally just fruit, it's edible (more than edible it's delicious), then form your own opinion. Some notes to think of rather than nasty things, think of a blend of Banana, Custard, Yogurt, Peach, and a bit of some fermented/wine-ish/Kombucha twist. The texture is creamy with some fibery strings because it's a literal fruit.

[Levynite]

As a South East Asian, I was so excited to see Sohla and Ham really exercise their wide range of cooking and cuisine knowledge and experience, and just extrapolate dishes that are variations of pre-existing dishes or an interesting spin of their own. Also, I was surprised that the aroma wasn't as strong as I expected but then again I guess the freezing process dulls it quite a lot. Edit: also when Ham suggested orange blossom water, I was delighted because there's variations of ais kacang aka a type of shaved ice dessert with fruits, sweetened condensed milk AND rose syrup cordial that works well with durian.

[wwaxwork]

You can tell how much they love food, they love the experimenting with flavors and building on what they already know. It's amazing to see a menu just pulled out of the air like that.

[berntan]

The creativity of Sohla and Ham floors me, and it’s so nice to see them properly challenged with great ingredients. For some reason, perhaps because it felt less gimmicky, I found myself drawn to the episodes where they were being given things like durian, bacon, or bananas. Not so much the candy or hot pockets. Sure, we all love to see them challenged, but it’s gratifying when their creativity is set free rather than hindered. Consider other awesome, perhaps less common to America items like: buckwheat, sea urchin, geoduck, cassava, ube, egusi, tamarind, a range of uncommon mushrooms, etc

[louh]

seconding a lot of opinions here -- i don't have any specific attachment to durian but it's still so refreshing to see it treated as a proper ingredient that can do lots of things, rather than a horrifying joke, and to see why people would eat and enjoy it

[gaby]

This is what I've wanted them to do: unprocessed but out of the ordinary food. All of the dishes looked amazing. I have been curious to try Durian for a while now. I just haven't seen it in my city. Papaya is one of my favorite fruits, and I was surprised they get feet smell from it.

[aom]

I love how sohla and ham communicate, like when they repeat or echo what the other has said so they both know they've listened and heard each other. no wonder they make such amazing dishes together, they're so good at encouraging each other!

[morrowdoug]

Was just wondering why I hadn't seen Sohla in so long. More Sohla content please!!!

[triggerfish]

As a South East Asian, who loves durian, its so intriguing watching what Sohla & Ham can do with it.

[annettejanai]

I love you guys so much!!! (Side note) Can we get a class on "communicating with your partner effectively"😂😂😂 Exceptional job you two, yet again!!!

[willcookmakeup]

Ham is such a fantastic chef. Just coming up with recipes out of nowhere in seconds

[amanidiotdo]

Unbelievable how chill they are in this episode. They are geniuses