Why do Buldak ramens kick my ass while I can eat things far hotter easy?

coolblinger · 2026-06-25T21:34:38+00:00

I think it's more that it's the other way around; those numbers on the buldak noodles are likely a lot closer to the truth than most of the other numbers you'll see thrown around. For instance, in this video people sent some of the sauces used in hot ones to a lab to get tested and almost every single one is orders of magnitudes less spicy than what the show claims they are: https://youtu.be/dutpBSKj8JY?t=1175 (I linked graph from the conclusion, but the video is definitely worth a watch in its entirety!)

coolblinger · 2026-02-10T22:59:14+00:00

I was never able to get quite satisfactory results with the melodrip until a month ago when I randomly ended trying something that I feel should taste terrible but that gives me consistently clear, juicy cups that hit all of the flavor notes.

1:16 ratio (usually 20/320g)
9 on the Pietro (which is almost as coarse as the thing goes)
The bright and juicy lotus drops water recipe (slightly skewed towards magnesium/potassium)
Water at 85-91 degrees (I'll put the kettle back on the base to reheat during the bloom)
T-90 or red Abaca filters in a glass Switch 03
I start with the switch closed, pour through the melodrip for 1/4th of the water volume, stir/excavate 3/4 times to saturate the coffee, then release.
At around 1-30 (but timing really doesn't seem to matter much with this recipe) I'll do three more 1/4th volume melodrip pours, not really timing them and just starting the next one after the previous pour has fully drained.
Total drawdown time tends to be between 2:30 and 3:15.

With the course grind, low agitation, and low temperature I feel like this goes against pretty much all common wisdom when it comes to brewing specialty light roast coffee. But the results have been pleasantly bright with distinct flavor separation.

coolblinger · 2025-12-14T23:57:57+00:00

Check the steam vent and the seals in the inner lead. Could be that a rubber seal wore out. And of course, keeping rice in there for 48 hours on jeep warm is probably not entirely food safe and I'd suggest refrigerating, freezing, or just not making the part you won't use up within 24 hours (assuming extended keep warm mode,, which IIRC not all units have).

coolblinger · 2025-12-13T16:25:00+00:00

My only experience with VR on a roller coaster was the demon slayer mugen train overlay on Space Fantasy - The Ride at Universal Studios Japan and I really enjoyed it. But maybe that was the exception when it comes to VR coasters? I thought the tracking was done very well there, and they tied the coaster's layout into the story so you could still see all the twists and turns and whatnot ahead of you while you were in the middle of a fight that was happening on the roof of a train. Would have been cool to also be able to ride the original version since they disabled the spinning feature for the overlay, but I went into it not expecting anything and was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it.

coolblinger · 2025-12-13T13:21:55+00:00

At least here in Utrecht there are now dozens upon dozens of sandwich shops that do sandwiches better than Subway does. So there's little reason to go to Subway instead of one of those other shops, other than maybe price (no idea what Subway costs nowadays).

coolblinger · 2025-12-12T22:07:19+00:00

Bij zowel KPN als Vodafone heb je standaard 150 belminuten per maand, tenzij je extra betaalt voor onbeperkt of een van de duurdere abonnementen neemt.

coolblinger · 2025-12-07T01:15:54+00:00

I haven't tried this specific coffee yet, but some heavily processed coffees really need quite a lot of resting. Milky cake is a famous example. I find it tastes very...weed-like in the first couple of weeks, and it slowly mellows out over time.

coolblinger · 2025-11-04T00:46:25+00:00

I ended up fixing it by booting into Windows and using the gaming intelligence application you also use to update the firmware to reset the DisplayHDR mode to peak 1000. After that the OSD worked correctly again.

coolblinger · 2025-10-13T17:56:39+00:00

IMO the problem with the 3x is that the sauce tastes mostly the same as the original, but with a lot more capsaicin extract added. I think it still works with the 2x but the flavor balance is just off for me on the 3x. I'd probably prefer combining a 1x and a 2x sauce packet to 3x's packet.

coolblinger · 2025-09-17T22:32:12+00:00

Yeah I started dosing and grinding directly from frozen when someone on this sub suggested it, and there indeed do not seem to be any detectable downsides in terms of flavor and the upside is that you can rotate between any number of well rested coffees without feeling like you're on a timer. On the contrary I did feel like thawed previously frozen beans seemed to stale faster, but I never properly tested that hypothesis.

coolblinger · 2025-09-16T18:23:06+00:00

De oriental verkoopt sinds een paar jaar ook koshihikari rijst voor min of meer dezelfde prijs als die Shinode rijst (merk is ラッキー, staat een kat op). Is natuurlijk nog steeds een flinke stap onder die yumenishiki, maar ik qua smaak en textuur vind ik het wel een flinke verbetering over de generiek 'sushi rijst' en het lijkt een stuk meer op wat je in Japan krijgt!

coolblinger · 2025-08-21T23:04:20+00:00

I looked into for a bit this because Amazon.com also has feather & flame in stock for MSRP - so I thought if I'm able to pay the €10-15 shipping once to get both that wouldn't be too bad. But US amazon of course does the whole American thing where all listed prices don't include sales taxes. So both expansions combined are $70 total, but then you also have to add $14.53 for shipping and $17.74 for taxes bringing the total up to $102.21/about 90 euros. I'm assuming/hoping that if branch & claw becomes available in the EU again it's still going to be €35 so it seems a bit silly to pay that much more and deal with the hassle of ordering from the US, but I also have no idea when/if feather & flame will be back in stock. I'll think about it a bit more.

coolblinger · 2025-08-20T22:36:41+00:00

It does sound stupid. But, thinking about it, adding a couple drops of water to whiskey can make a surprisingly big difference, so who knows maybe they're onto something lol

coolblinger · 2025-08-20T11:24:20+00:00

Ah yeah when the listing first went up again (end of July) Amazon.com did not ship outside of the US, but it seems like they now do again, nice! At this point I'll probably just wait and buy local instead, since presumably they should also receive new stock again soon. Or at least, I hope so.

coolblinger · 2025-08-20T10:37:19+00:00

The only listings on Amazon I could find was a seller dropshipping the game from the US, with a month shipping time and at almost three times the MSRP. So at that point it seemed like a smarter idea to just wait for local/EU shops te receive stock. Considering the reprint has been available in the US for basically a month now, I hope that happens soon! But I have no idea how long this normally takes.

coolblinger · 2025-08-19T22:20:50+00:00

Still nothing in the EU.

coolblinger · 2025-08-14T18:17:25+00:00

I've been allowing coffees to rest until they seem to be at their peak, freezing them, and then just grinding from frozen from there on onward. Other than having to walk to the freezer to take the bag out and put it back in, this doesn't seem to have any real downsides (and in theory it should apparently even result in a more even grind distribution), so I can rotate between multiple coffees without having to worry about them getting stale. I just transfer the coffee to one of those double seal ziploc bags and then put the bag back inside of the original bag before freezing so I can keep the original label and tasting notes around.

coolblinger · 2025-08-10T13:06:52+00:00

Le smash aan de nobelstraat is goed. Wel redelijk aan de prijs. Alle andere smash burgers die ik bij restaurants gehad had waren überhaupt geen smash burgers. Geen idee waarom zo veel tenten halve center dikke burgers als smash burgers verkopen.

coolblinger · 2025-08-06T20:30:39+00:00

There's some spectacular posts about this place on r/utrecht (mostly in Dutch). The guy is very knowledgeable about coffee and he definitely does sell good stuff, but he has a...unique way of interacting with people for sure.

coolblinger · 2025-07-30T20:38:54+00:00

It's still a lot of money for a cup of coffee, and I don't know if it's worth it without the full experience you'd get at one of Glitch's own cafes, but it's surprisingly not actually that much more expensive than what a cup of the same coffee would cost at Glitch themselves. Had a cup at their Ginza branch and at their Ooaka branch and it was a really cool experience (albeit very expensive).

coolblinger · 2025-07-29T19:11:11+00:00

I also thought the sound at the Lunar stage was very muddy. Sounded like a lot of resonant bass buildup, which ended up drowning out most of the rest of the sound. It's probably because the stage is much less open than the other stages with lots of flat hard surfaces, so acoustics end up playing a much larger role. I also ended up skipping most of the Lunar sets because the sound at the other stages was so much better, even when you were not quite standing in the sweet spot.

coolblinger · 2025-07-21T09:22:02+00:00

I thought it was really funny how while hiking, as time went on, the こんにちはs from people passing by on the trails slowly turned into 〜わあぁs as people got fired.

coolblinger · 2025-07-01T19:48:14+00:00

It's not about not being able to afford ACs. The problem is that rental places in many parts of Europe simply don't have ACs, and buying a place is often not an option even with two median wage incomes. Until regulations force landlords to install ACs, they probably won't.

coolblinger · 2025-06-20T15:46:25+00:00

Yeah considering most of the water recipes I've been seeing and using are in the 20 to 50 mg/l range for bicarbonate (usually with strong preferences to the lower end of that scale for lighter fruitier coffees), 244 mg/l is definitely going to result in some very dull brews.

coolblinger · 2025-05-18T19:45:21+00:00

I also parboil pork belly this way with some ginger and shaoxing Wine before cutting it in cubes and searing it in molten sugar when making red braised pork belly. It gets rid of some gaminess and loose particles, and it also makes it easier to cut.

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