✳flâneur — a map of the web's best reading

Second order taste — LessWrong

lesswrong.com · 1,601 words · saved by 1 readers

Last year I got my friend a gift card to Beast and Cleaver for his wedding, a local butcher shop and restaurant. I was pretty proud of the gift. He and his wife said the meal was amazing and I wouldn't expect them to say that if it weren't true. Getting something on the wedding registry or perhaps a gift card would have been safer, but I don't think it would have yielded as much joy. I can't take too much credit though. As a Yelp Elite food critic with over a decade of experience churning out high quality restaurant reviews, I like to think I have pretty good taste in food. But this time it wasn't me. It was Kenji. I was watching a YouTube video by Kenji Lopez-Alt, a food writer who actually does have good taste in food. In his video he mentions Beast and Cleaver and says[1] that it's a very good butcher shop. I've read, watched and listened to a ton of Kenji's content over the years and think very highly of him. So really what's happening here is something I'll call second order taste

x Second order taste — LessWrong Practical Frontpage 8 Second order taste by Biff Wiff 7th Jun 2025 4 min read 3 8 Last year I got my friend a gift card to Beast and Cleaver for his wedding, a local butcher shop and restaurant. I was pretty proud of the gift. He and his wife said the meal was amazing and I wouldn't expect them to say that if it weren't true. Getting something on the wedding registry or perhaps a gift card would have been safer, but I don't think it would have yielded as much joy. I can't take too much credit though. As a Yelp Elite food critic with over a decade of experience

Explore this link on the map →

related reading