Alton Brown got it all wrong on my home state’s chili and cinnamon roll culture.
Bear with me, I’m a bit riled up. Food Network star Alton Brown made a visit to my hometown of Lincoln, Nebraska, and ruffled the feathers of a whole state of mostly soft-spoken Midwesterners with just one video — pouring chili on top of a cinnamon roll in a strange twist on one of our wintertime favorites.
“This is not something I’ve ever seen before. I don’t know why you would do this,” the longtime host and star of “Good Eats,” says as he spoons heaps of Runza Restaurant’s chili on top of a cinnamon roll. He tries it, then makes a face that reveals he’s clearly not a fan. (Probably because he made mush out of it.)
Reaction was swift. Everyone knows you eat them at the same meal, but not together. Maybe tear off a piece of the sticky bun to dip, but that’s about as far as it goes.
“Nebraskans cringe as celebrity chef Alton Brown visits Lincoln, pours chili on cinnamon roll,” the Lincoln Journal Star headline read. The Omaha World Herald’s Facebook page read: “Celebrity chef Alton Brown committed first-degree food assault on Nebraska Friday when he posted a video on Twitter showing him pouring chili on a cinnamon roll, a method he erroneously dubbed ‘#LincolnNE style!’”
The good folks back home are even doubling down now, as local ice cream shop 402 Creamery has partnered with Runza to create Chili & Cinnamon Roll Ice Cream, described as “chili spiced ice cream with pieces of gooey cinnamon rolls.”
All this got us thinking: What’s a popular food from your hometown that the rest of the country would think is odd? In a city like Charlotte that’s full of transplants from other parts of the country, there’s got to be a few out-of-the-mainstream concoctions that are totally normal — and even celebrated — back at home.
Curious minds want to know what else is out there, so please share your unusual hometown dishes below in our poll. We’ll share what you tell us in an upcoming story. (And we won’t mock you for it.)
This story was originally published December 9, 2022 at 3:46 PM.
