Entertainment

All The Food Shows David Chang Has Coming After 'Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner'

by Lindsay Denninger
David Chang in 'Breakfast, Lunch, And Dinner'
Netflix

Though Netflix has yet to announce if David Chang's new show, Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner, will return for Season 2, it comes across as a true passion project for the restaurateur — and with only four episodes, one he'll likely want to continue. In each episode, Chang travels to a different city with a different celebrity — this time Seth Rogen, Chrissy Teigen, Lena Waithe, and Kate McKinnon — to eat, explore, laugh, and most importantly, open their minds to something new. "Being away from all the craziness of daily life, you spend long days together in an unfamiliar place with nothing to do but wander the street, share meals, and talk," Chang said in the series announcement, per Eater. "That's what [Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner] is all about — learning more about ourselves, our friends, and the people we encounter out in the world."

For Chang, eating is key to understanding and breaking down cultural barriers — something he champions both on the show and off. In the past, he's spoken out against the stigma placed on MSG, which is in many processed snack foods (like Doritos!) but is largely associated with Chinese food. He's also criticized the so-called "ethnic" aisle in the supermarket on his podcast, calling it "the last bastion of racism" in retail America. In a September interview with The Washington Post, Chang doubled down on the assertion, saying that the foods in that "ethnic" aisle are accepted in America and widely used on American tables, so it's not only silly from an organizational point of view to segregate them, but it's also marginalizing to people of color. According to Chang, food can be both a uniter and divider; Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner is focused on the former.

That's reason enough to renew the show, but there are plenty of ways to get your Chang fix while you wait for news about whether or not it will come back. Though Chang made his name with his Momofuku restaurant franchise in the early 2000s, over the past few years, he's expanded into the world of entertainment. He began the food magazine Lucky Peach in 2011, and while it shuttered in 2017, there are probably a few issues kicking around that you could dig up. He also released the first season of his other Netflix show, Ugly Delicious, in 2018, and recently completed filming for the second (a good sign Netflix is invested in his ideas). And he currently oversees his entertainment group, Majordomo Media, which includes his TV series as well as his podcast, The Dave Chang Show, produced in partnership with the Ringer.

Finally (and perhaps most significantly), Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner is only the start of a long partnership for Chang and Teigen: the two are working on a whole slate of food-focused content for Hulu, beginning with Family Style, a talk show-type series that will "explore the ways people express their love for family and friends through cooking and dining together," according to the Hollywood Reporter. Of course, that could also mean Chang will be too busy to do Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner Season 2 — at least for the foreseeable future — but either way, there's a lot more Chang content to look forward to.