Padma Lakshmi Wants Her Ideal Last Meal Cooked By David Chang

Have you ever thought about what you would want your last meal to be? Emmy-nominated producer and "Top Chef" host Padma Lakshmi has, down to the appetizer, main course, snack, and beverage. And not just any random chef will do — in a YouTube video on Mythical Kitchen's channel, the author proclaims she wants her final feast cooked by her friend David Chang.

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Chang is best-known as the chef who founded Momofuku Noodle Bar in New York City in 2004. According to The New York Times, he is credited with the modern popularity of Asian-American food in the U.S. And it seems as though the admiration is mutual between the two friends — just as Lakshmi would trust the chef to make her last meal, Chang praised her for being able to recognize great food. "...I would definitely be there to cook your last meal on this planet. You've traveled the world, you know great, great things to eat ... you have a great palate, you've seen it all," Chang said in a cameo.

The last dish on Lakshmi's vibrant final meal menu features high and low-brow cuisine: kettle chips topped with caviar, sour cream, and a little bit of chives. But before she gets there, the feast begins with her favorite childhood snack and Indian dishes.

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A multicultural feast

Per Lakshmi, her feast would start off with nachos with a cheese fountain and all the toppings — tomatoes, guac, olives, corn, ground beef, jalapeños, black beans, salsa verde, salsa roja, lime, and scallions. Lakshmi says that her love for nachos stems from eating them at the movie theater as a kid, especially with a generous topping of pickled jalapeños. To wash down those nachos, the TV show host would now drink an ice-cold margarita with Don Julio 1942.

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For her next course, Lakshmi switches from Mexican-American to Indian food. A lover of both cuisines, she realized there was plenty of crossover between them while eating a burrito as a teenager. "A lot of the same ingredients that are in Mexican food — you know, citrus, chiles, cumin, mango, tamarind ... are also very prevalent in Indian food," Lakshmi said.

She transitions from nachos and margs to dosa with coconut chutney and sambar, a South Indian vegetable stew. Lakshmi dips her dosa, a thin South Indian pancake made with fermented ground lentils and rice, into either the chutney or sambar — never both. She typically has to go to her mom's house to get high-quality homemade dosa, but if she was eating it as her last meal, David Chang would be given the task. 

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