Bullseye with Jesse Thorn Folgen

J. Kenji López-Alt is a chaf and food writer who has written for the New York Times, Cook's Illustrated, Serious Eats, and more. A lot of his recipes perfect the staples including steak, potatoes, beans, eggs, mayo, and mushroom soup. If you are a home cook, odds are you have a recipe from Kenji you swear by. In 2015, he compiled a lot of his signature recipes in his award winning book The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science . This year, López-Alt has followed up The Food Lab with a very different kind of cookbook. It is called The Wok: Recipes and Techniques. It is nearly 700 pages and includes not only recipes but a guide to acquainting, understanding, and eventually mastering one of the most versatile pans in the kitchen. J. Kenji López-Alt talks with Jesse about the new book and some of his favorite meals to make with a wok. He also shares how he used science to make the perfect chocolate chip cookie. Plus, he talks about how he balances inclusivity and appropriation when making recipes from other countries.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

For the first chapter of his career, Nick Kroll's comedy centered around big, outsized characters – the more preposterous the better. He created the sketch comedy series Kroll Show, and he starred on the FX show The League. These days he's behind the camera a lot more. In 2017, he co-created the animated show Big Mouth on Netflix. Now he's got a new show in the same universe: Human Resources. It centers around a group of personified emotion monsters and their workplace, and the feelings they represent. Nick Kroll joins us to talk about developing Big Mouth and Human Resources. Plus, why he's taken fewer on-screen roles lately for voice acting gigs and a seat behind the scenes instead. He'll also talk about the lessons he's learned since he became a father.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

On December 18, 2021, the rapper Drakeo the Ruler was murdered backstage at a festival in Los Angeles, his hometown. A group of 40 or so people ambushed him; one of them stabbed him to death. Drakeo was a young, rising rapper. Critics respected him and rap fans streamed his music millions of times. He was an LA gangsta rapper whose music didn't sound like what you'd think when you hear "LA gangsta rap" – it's subdued and anxious, less about the barbecue with your pals and more about looking over your shoulder. Jeff Weiss, the music writer, first covered Drakeo the Ruler in 2017, and they forged a friendship. Weiss also witnessed Drakeo's murder. We invited Weiss to our studio in Los Angeles to talk about Drakeo's music, what it meant to the broader hip-hop community, and his life and death. As a warning: there's going to be some discussion about violence, along with crime. If you or someone you're listening with is sensitive to that, we wanted to give you a heads up.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy