Holly Nguyen-Barba

Seniors Nara Soudthiem and Angel Tellin have a completely casual conversation.

This article was part of Stargazer’s March 28, 2025 satire print issue. Satire serves as an ironic or sarcastic commentary to draw attention to current issues and events. While quite humorous, stylistically competent, and perhaps based on real events, the stories in this issue are false.

It is banana bread crazy just how much this new trend of “culinary slang” has swept the nation. Over 180% of the Gen Z population has been speaking with expressions such as “I’m cooked” or “she ate and left no crumbs.” However, according to some North students, these fondue-tastic phrases are spreading like wildfire.

“I swear to you until this week I had only been saying how my friends would ‘devour’ their outfits as a little inspirational joke,” said Karen Carmel, sophomore. “But now I can’t stop baking up these watermelon words around them. It just spews out of me like a syrupy river flowing through a french toast forest.”

In a famous study done by Stanford University students, called the “Anyone Can Cook Effect,” they surveyed how the Ratatouille influence affects one in 10 teens across America. It has been reported that those who have developed this delicious disease show symptoms of increased watch time of “Hell’s Kitchen,” reading baking books before bed or having a sudden interest in buying cooking utensils.

“My older brother, Macintosh Josh, constantly roasts me whenever I play against him in Mario Kart,” said Gene Bean. “But I mostly use ‘culinary slang’ when I’m being baked alive by all these Nutella noobs on Fortnite.”

North’s culinary courses have been filled up for the next three semesters because of how many students crave more foody knowledge. Only 5% of students knew the classes were for learning to cook recipes, while 80% reported they thought the classes were about studying the history of “How to Cook or be Cooked: Spice Level Chili Pepper.” The other 15% reported just wanting to be taste testers or to take home all the leftover food.

“Though most of these students didn’t seem to understand what a culinary course was before signing up for it, I can see the determination in some of them to rise to the culinary challenges in this class,” said Dr. Peter Pepper. “Honestly it makes me feel very bubbly inside, giving me the extra pep in my step to continue on teaching.”

  This culinary trend, though bitterly bizarre, has one student claiming he kneaded these new words to help connect more to his peers. 

“I mean sure, trends come and go, but food is a core aspect of everyone’s lives,” said Pedro Pickleston. “I feel this trend allowed me to break out of my eggshell more and work better with other people like a PB&J sandwich.”

Unfortunately for Pickleston, reports predict this wave of culinary slang will sadly souffle away, rising for a while but ultimately falling flat once some air has entered the chat.